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 Today was my first 100 mile day of this trip, although of the 109 miles, about 8 were spent in my quest for tyres this morning. Because of the late start and the predicted headwind, I expected to be arriving in Plovdiv after dark and booked a room in this behemoth because I knew it would be easy to find. I don't know why I bother looking at weather forecasts though because today actually brought a wonderful tailwind, which combined with the fact that Plovdiv is 400 metres lower than Sofia to have me going at an unbelievable speed for most of the day. I even had time to spend 50 minutes repairing a broken spoke, the first for 11 days. This hotel is pretty impressive and contains several high-class shops, several bars and three restaurants. They stay open until nearly midnight but I don't think I've got time for a proper dinner tonight. I tried to book a room some 50 miles from here for tomorrow night. booking.com, which has been very useful and efficient up to now, offered a hotel which it showed as being in a village in the right area. After I had booked it, I did some checking and found that it was actually in a town with the same name on the other side of Bulgaria. I've cancelled that and reported the problem. Instead, I'm going to get a good rest here, stay in Plovdiv for a second night, and then attempt the 190 km to my next country on Saturday. Whether I stay in this hotel or move to a cheaper one will depend on how good the breakfast is and whether I'm allowed to keep my room. If I have to move, I'll be out on the street for a couple of hours with my luggage waiting to be let into somewhere else. I would like to spend tomorrow replacing worn-out bike parts but failing that, I could just experience what is apparently the cultural capital of Bulgaria and one of the most ancient towns in Europe. I could use the Lonely Planet guide to Bulgaria, which I only discovered in the bottom of my pannier this morning. I looked up cycling and it said that didn't really happen in Bulgaria. Another problem with the bike is that over the last few days, the chain has developed an tendency to slip off the front gears and get itself jammed behind the chain guard. I can't pedal at all when that happens. If it happens going uphill, I come to a stop pretty quickly, which isn't always safe in heavy traffic. Today, belting along with the wind behind me, I changed to a low gear to overtake a slow-moving crane. As I pulled in in front of it and changed back up, the chain jammed and, inexplicably, my left pannier fell off into the crane's path. Luckily, the road was wide enough for the crane to avoid squashing it. I have to say the pannier survived the experience very well, given how fast it was going when it hit the ground. A soft pair of tracksuit trousers inside protected the laptop. UTC Time: 17:58, Thursday 25 June 2009 Local Time: 20:58, Thursday 25 June 2009 Estimate of longitude: 24° 44' 42.89" E = 24.745246° Estimate of latitude: 42° 9' 18.24" N = 42.155066° Possible error on position estimate: 10 metres | |