PLATFORM Five East, Sofia railway station, June 3, 10pm: I decide to write this article.

The overnight train to Varna - departure due in 15 minutes, ETA tomorrow 7am - beneath the faded signs on the coaches in French and Bulgarian, has a small metal sign announcing its destination. This sign, and the big electronic ones at the entrance to the station, are not enough to prevent confusion as people with tickets for Bourgas get on the wrong one, detect their mistake, and scurry across to their train, waiting on the parallel platform. And vice versa.

Having read that smoking is not allowed in sleeper coaches of the kind I am about to board (in my wallet, a computer-printed first class ticket for a bed in a coupe, price 20 leva and 20 stotinki), I stand on the platform to carbo-load on nicotine and watch the hurrying last-minute arriving passengers, and the farewells, some passionate, some awkward, and some, those troubling farewells when the words will not come, and eyes are fixed instead on the dusty concrete and uncertain spaces in the rafters of the station.

The conductor, short, chubby, curly-haired and Puckish, has been effusive in his welcome. Puzzled by my accent and having established that I am South African, he engages me in an animated recounting of the fortunes of his friend who is managing a rock band in Johannesburg. I am tired: only 90 minutes' sleep divided Wednesday and Thursday, and so following his rapid-fire Bulgarian and responding in kind are challenges.

In the corridor of the coach, I listen to the voices from the other compartments, many of them speaking German, some English. With less than two minutes to departure, a Czech tourist and his friend board, and the conductor assists in issuing tickets to them and showing them to a coupe, and offering coffee or other soft drinks - all in fluent and flawless English. As the conductor hurries past me back to his booth, there is a smile and an inquiry in my voice as I say, in Bulgarian, "But you speak very good English". He gives me a winning grin and shrugs. I ask whether one can smoke. It's okay in the corridors, he says, so I flip open the steel ashtray beneath the no-smoking sticker.

In my coupe, fresh clean sheets are arranged beneath a blanket on my bunk. Extra blankets are stored in the luggage rack. The conductor appears to offer me a hanger for my jacket. I decline, and arrange my bed without waiting for him to do so. As the train speeds away, running precisely on time, he locks the doors to the coach and the interleading doors, a security precaution against theft and stowaways. I lock my door too. Fifteen minutes after departure, I am catching up on lost sleep.

Not long before arrival in Varna, a tap on the door by the conductor wakes me, and he cheerily asks whether I slept well. For the record: the train arrives on time.



THE road from Varna to Albena, early Friday morning. New hotels in evidence along the way, passing glimpses of the construction sites that have been the foundation of so much controversy of late. Apart from a short badly potholed stretch, the road is in good condition. At the entrance to Albena resort, a security staffer in a booth issues, without charge, a magnetised card for the car, a measure against car theft. Reassuring to think that theoretically at least, your car or your rental should not go on a one-way holiday excursion without you.



FRIDAY and Saturday along the Albena beachfront. This is where this series of anecdotes turns into a cautionary tale about prices. A small sample: within the resort, there is in effect a set of two minimum charges for taxi rides, irrespective of distance travelled: five leva for Bulgarians, 10 leva for foreigners. For the briefest of rides, deploying my best Bulgarian accent and denying that I was a foreigner enabled me to get away with a five leva fee. Word has it that the prices are so exorbitant because the taxi drivers have to give the resort a cut for operating there.

Restaurants and bars, especially at hotels, charge excessive prices, even by Black Sea resort standards. At one hotel, even a frappe costs four leva. Beer prices range from high for Bulgarian brands, to outrageous for imports. Cocktail prices: at a beachside bar, six leva for a martini. At a street stall, a 350 ml Coca-Cola bottle costs two leva, double the price of that in a Sofia shop. Along the paved walkway, among those touting for business are slim young women with pamphlets for the timber-frame booths in which massage (yes, meaning nothing other than massage) is on offer. Price range: 15 leva for a shoulder rub, up through 30 leva for a "four hands" massage to 60 leva for a full package. To rent a bicycle, three leva for 30 minutes, five leva an hour; as to watersports, seven leva for a ride on the banana, 30 leva for a 10-minute rental of a jet ski. A brand-name ice cream stick, average 3.50 leva. At a stall selling ice cream cones by the scoop, a lev for a ball of ice cream; unfortunately, its probably the smallest scoop I've ever seen.



Deduction: the prices are designed to fleece foreigners, because most items are out of the range of affordability for most Bulgarians.



Truth: most of the guests at the resort are part of German or British charter groups, and at that, many are pensioners. Probably, they paid on the basis of getting an "all-inclusive" holiday and may not have that much extra cash to spare - after all, they came to Bulgaria because it is an affordable destination, not so? And the Germans can divide by, roughly, two to get the euro price and the Brits divide, roughly, by three to calculate the sterling equivalent. God help the Bulgarian tourist industry if these people detect a rip-off.



TO Balchik, a short drive north of Albena, to see Queen Maria's Palace, a worthwhile expedition, to stroll the buildings designed by two Italians and the gardens designed by a Swiss, at the instance of her late majesty, whose heart was buried here, until the day came in 1940 that possession of the town passed from Romania to Bulgaria and the heart was recovered by two emissaries, a short while before the lines on the map shifted. Entrance fee, a single lev for Bulgarians, five leva for foreigners.

"The Quiet Nest" she named the place. The sense of serenity remains, notwithstanding the video-camera-wielding tourists, whose numbers probably will swell later in the season. A pause to sit for some time in the rose garden beneath the Nymphaeum and watch the waves roll gently in. At the adjoining botanical garden, there is an extra charge to go into the snake house. We decline.

Lunch at a waterfront restaurant in Balchik, eavesdropping on a Brit at an adjoining table giving his real estate sales pitch to a compatriot client. So all those stories about Brits settling here to sell property to other Brits may well be true. After four years living here, his Bulgarian is not very good, so his young Bulgarian assistant, quietly sharing their table, is essential to engaging with the bureaucracy. I wish seller and client both well.



A FINAL anecdote. The spoken English and German of staff at the resorts often is better than the written version. To my collection of menu howlers from Bulgaria in the past two and a half years, I add the following, from the menu of the Bistro Dionisius in Albena: a langoustine dish rendered as "linguists in poiquant sauce".