Why Bulgaria ?

Some 15 years ago (or maybe longer) we had spent many holidays in Spain and had always had the thought that it would be great to actually buy a place of our own in the sun that we could escape to.

No more disappointments over hyped up hotels that didn't deliver as promised in the brochure. No more living out of a suitcase dumped on the floor of a hotel room that was usually no bigger than an average dining room. Maybe it was just our perception but more often than not we always seemed to end up with a room right on the ground floor (very noisy and can't get to sleep) or so high up we needed oxygen to attempt the climb up the stairs each time the lift broke down (which seemed to be often).

The standard hotel "double" room is expected to cope with two beds, a dressing table (of sorts) a wardrobe (if you were lucky) and a bathroom and toilet area combined which usually left no room at all to swing the proverbial cat.

Anyway the hotel room was only a stopping off point and always we got used to it and enjoyed our holiday but the nagging feeling that things could be much better with a place of our own was always there.

In the end lack of finances always got in the way of our dream and crazy as it seems now we passed on the opportunity to spend between £10-15,000 to buy our very own Spanish Finca with land, lemon trees, great views and everything we could want to relax in our very own place in the sun.

We got on with the day to day and put the dream on hold but it was re-awakened by endlessly watching "A Place In The Sun" on the TV covering many different Countries. Then sometime in June/July 2003 the TV was flicked on a little late but just in time to see a property being shown to a couple that looked like it needed a touch of work but nothing major. A nice layout to the main house, several useful outbuildings, a seemingly endless garden with all manner of trees and shrubs, masses of "potential" and the sun was shining brightly. As we were late switching on we had no idea at all where it was but we always played a guessing game on prices. Surely it must be somewhere near £75,000 ?

Then the details came up on screen and we saw that it could be all ours for just £12,000 plus maybe another £2-3,000 to fix the work. But where was it ? Yes, you guessed it ...

BULGARIA !

We were both stunned and excited all at the same time and couldn't get it out of our heads over the next few days. Is this for real ? Can we really get all that for so little ? Investigation was needed and not just about the house prices. Of course we had heard of Bulgaria but it was one of those places that given the task of sticking a pin in a map of the World we would both struggle to get anywhere near it !

We knew it was somewhere in Europe but we had to get a map to really get our bearings as to where exactly it was. As for what it was like all we could imagine were images of Cold War Russia as depicted in spy films with Michael Caine as Harry Palmer or Sean Connery as James Bond dressed in grey furtively creeping around in an even more grey and depressing landscape. Was it really like that we wondered once the sun went down in Bulgaria ?

We needed to find out !