Training while Traveling: Running in Sofia, Bulgaria

I don’t talk about it much here, but in the list of hobbies that form the foundation of my adult identity, fitness ranks pretty highly.  In fact, after puppies and travel, I’d say fitness, and running in particular, is a close third.

David and I run several distance events every year, ranging from half marathon to ultramarathon distance, so staying fit when we travel is important to us.  That isn’t to say that we actually do train when we travel, but rather we usually think aloud about how we aren’t doing it, then proceed to stuff additional cheesey carbs into our face holes.  After all, the base of the traveler’s food pyramid is cheesey breads, am I right?

But, as we were in the middle of some hardcore training for our most recent event, an ultramarathon here in the Pacific Northwest, during our last stint in the Balkans, we thought it would be circumspect to get at least one run of somewhat significant distance on the books while we were traveling.  Some creative googling later led me to Tour Sofia Run, a company out of Sofia that takes visitors on combination runs/tours in Bulgaria’s capital city.

After some easy correspondence with Ani, a tour guide with the company, we scheduled our tour for the late morning – we had planned to take our run directly after our shopping excursion to the Bitaka Flea Market.  We had a few troubles getting back to our hostel on time to meet Ani – thanks to the most confusing Bulgarian custom – but she didn’t mind, and by 11:30am or so we were off on our run around Sofia!

The tour itself was lovely, and took us through 10 kilometers (around 6 miles) of the old streets of Sofia.  Our pace was easy, so Ani could better explain the sights we were passing.  She had a great, dry sense of humor, and told us stories about her city as well as about her time working in Montana (at hotels in the Yellowstone National Park area – cool, right?) on a work exchange program.  Running in Sofia was a great way to kick off our time there, and proved to be a great help in getting our bearings in the very walkable city. It also helped us to determine which places we would revisit while out walking later in the day.

The running tour hit all the major sights of the city – starting south from our hostel, we ran past the National Palace of Culture (pictured above – looks straight out of 1980s Tron, if you ask me), and into the major park of the city – Borisova Gradina.

After a few miles in the parks, we headed back into the touristic core, over the Eagle’s Bridge, and past Sofia University.  We also passed the iconic Alexander Nevski Cathedral, Ethnology Museum, National Bank, and other major landmarks of the city.

Everywhere we went, Ani had great tidbits of information to share – like, the two hills behind the Ethnology Museum are referred to by local youths (get off my lawn!) as “the two boobs” – I won’t give away all her shtick, but if you ever go to Sofia, make sure to to look really closely at the statues above the Ivan Vazov National Theater.

The  proprietress of our hostel, who two hours previous had been shocked to learn of our sketchy flea market adventure, was then doubly shocked to learn that we had run 10 kilometers.  For fun.  On our vacation.  Not so Slavic-normal, apparently.

We absolutely loved our run with Ani, and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys the ubiquitous free walking tours in European cities, but may be looking to reach a higher heart rate.  I chuckle to myself here, thinking about the 0.02% of the population this post may appeal to – you know, for the off the beaten path travel-obsessed endurance runner!   All five of us!

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Tour Sofia Run does not organize tours at regular times, all are custom bookings.  They offer 3km, 5km, and 10km courses, all led by their tour guides (most likely, Ani, I believe).  Our 10km tour cost 25 leva per person, so 50 for the two of us (around $30 USD).   You can read more about them on their website, or email Ani directly at sofiarunning@gmail.com.

Do you exercise while on vacation?  How do you like to keep fit while on the road?  Or do you just eat cheesey carbs and call it a day?

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