The Lines of the Dragon
 

Day 1 – Arrival at Varna airport. Transfer to hotel near Varna. Accommodation. Free time. Dinner. Overnight. 

Day 2 – Breakfast. Departure : Varna – Pliska -Preslav – Madara. On the way walking
tours in Pliska and Preslav. Accommodation in hotel. Lunch. Walking tour around Madara.
Dinner. Overnight.


Pliska: Pliska was the capital of Bulgaria between 681 and 893 AD. Ac-
cording to a Bulgarian chronicle, it was founded by Khan Asparukh. It is
called Pliskusa by Georgios Kedrenos and Anna Comnena. It had an area
of 23 km. and was surrounded by a moat and earthwork ramparts. The
walls of the inner fortress were 2.6 meters thick and about 12 meters high. 

In 892, the city became the scene of a pagan revolt led by King Vladimir. 

After the crushing of the revolt, Vladimir was dethroned and the third son
of Boris I, Simeon, was installed into power. One of the first steps of the new

ruler was to move the capital to Preslav, a fortified town in the vicinity of Pliska, probably because of the
steadily strong pagan influence in the old capital.


The importance of Pliska gradually waned throughout the 10th century
with the concentration of power and resources in Preslav. The city was de-
stroyed during the assaults of the Kievan Rus' and the Byzantine Empire
between 969 and 972 and was not rebuilt again.

The ruins of the city of Pliska lie 3 km north of the modern village of Pliska.
The site of the city is currently a National Archaeological Reserve.

Preslav: The pagan revolt of the Pliska nobility led by King Vladimir in
892 was decisive for the future destiny of the city. In 893 Vladimir was dethroned and the new ruler,
Simeon the Great, decided to move the capital of the state from the still somewhat pagan Pliska to Preslav.
In the following 80 years the city developed rapidly, turning into a centre not only of Bulgarian politics and
diplomacy, but also of culture, literature and the fine arts. A chronicler mentioned that it took Simeon 28
years to establish and build up his new capital. Archeological excavations have, however, proved that the
city continued to develop also during the 930s and 940s and reached the peak in its growth and magnificence
in the middle of the rule of Tsar Peter I of Bulgaria.

Madara Horseman:

is a unique centre of energy.  A lot of ancient civilizations have left traces on the small rocky patch. There

exist traces of the primitive people. Traces of the Thracian mysteries can be found in the caves. The big
cave, being a natural amphitheatre, has been used for concerts due to its mystical acoustics from the re-
mote past to this day. In the past the site was called the temple of the three nymphs, patrons of the water
and nature. . The ancient rocky church “St.
Panteleymon” was preserved there at the crossroads of the civilizations. The saint has been a patron of the
healers and prophets since the remote past. The rocky bas-relief of the Madara Horseman lies in the centre
of this magic site.

Madara Horseman might not be a specific image of a Bulgarian khan, as some historians suggest, basing

their arguments on the legends on the bar-relief which obviously were made later. The new research of
Bulgarian, Russian, and Chinese historians found out that this was
probably the image of the God of the Sun and of the god Tangra him-
self.
The ruins of an ancient priest temple and a horizontal observatory are
found several meters away from the horseman. And some more mysteries …
In Madara there is a mystical stone surrounded by a fortified wall. Its healing power was well known even
to the medieval Europeans, which can be read in the Vatican chronicles. Pilgrims from all over Europe
congregated at the site of the stone even in the XIII century. Its power derives from the site and the interrelated
energy influence.



Day 3 – Breakfast. At 10.00 am departure: Sveshtari – Demir Baba. Visit of the
Thracian tomb and the Alian temple. Departure for St. Vlas resort, on the way -
Lunch. Arrival in hotel. Accommodation. Dinner. Overnight.

Sveshtari, Demir Baba:

Thracian tomb of Sveshtari

It is situated 2.5 km south-west of the village of Sveshtari, 42 km north-
east of Razgrad, in the north-east of Bulgaria.. It is a
Thracian-Hellenistic tomb from the first half of the 3rd century BC.
The Getic ruler Drumihed was probably buried in this royal tomb.
 

The tomb excavated at Sveshtari is not a solitary construction. 26 other
tombs of various sizes have been preserved along a 2 km stripe. The whole
region has been declared an archaeological reserve.

The Thracian tomb of Sveshtari was included in the World Cultural and
Natural Heritage List at the World Cultural and Natural Heritage Com-
mittee session of 1985 in Paris, France



Day 4 – Breakfast. At 10.00 am departure: Begliktaj – Maslen cape – Ropotamo.
Visits of each place. Lunch in Primorsko. Departure: Sozopol – Nessebar -
Varna. Tours in Sozopol and Nessebar. Accomodation in hotel. Dinner.
Overnight.

Sozopol:

Sozopol : is one of the oldest towns on Bulgarian Thrace's Black Sea
coast. The first settlement on the site dates back to the Bronze Age.

The town, at first called Antheia, was colonized in Thrace on the shore of
the Pontus Euxinus, principally on a little island, by Anaximander (born
610-609 BC) at the head of Milesian colonists. The name was soon
changed to Apollonia, on account of a temple dedicated to Apollo in the
town, containing a famous colossal statue of the god Apollo by Calamis,
30 cubits high, transported later to Rome by Lucullus and placed in the

Capitol. At various times, Apollonia was known as Apollonia Pontica (that
is, Apollonia on the Black Sea, the ancient Pontus Euxinus) and Apollonia
Magna (Great Apollonia).
The town established itself as a trade and naval centre in the following centuries.
It kept strong political and trade relations with the cities of Ancient Greece – Miletus, Athens, Corinth,
Heraclea Pontica and the islands Rhodes, Chios, Lesbos, etc. Its trade influence in the Thracian territories
was based on a treaty with the rulers of the Odrysian kingdom dating from the fifth century BC.

Occupied in turn by Byzantines, Bulgarians and Ottomans, Sozopol was assigned to the newly independent
Bulgaria in the 19th century. Almost all of its Greek population moved to Greece to be replaced by Bulgarian
refugees from Eastern Thrace.

 


Nessebar:


Originally a Thracian settlement known as Menebria founded
in the 2nd millennium BC, the town became a Greek colony
when settled by Dorians from Megara at the beginning of the
6th century BC, and was an important trading centre from
then on and a rival of Apollonia (Sozopol). Remains from the
Hellenistic period include the acropolis, a temple of Apollo, and
an agora. A wall which formed part of the Greek fortifications
can still be seen on the north side of the peninsula.

 

Monuments from the Middle Ages include the 5-6th century
Stara Mitropoliya ("old bishopric"; also St Sophia), a basilica
without a transept; the 10th century church of the Virgin; and
the 11th century Nova Mitropoliya ("new bishopric"; also St
Stephen) which continued to be embellished until the 18th cen-
tury. In the 13th and 14th century a remarkable series of
churches were built: St Theodore, St Paraskeva, St Michael
and St Gabriel, and St John Aliturgetos.


Day 5 – Breakfast. At 10.00 am departure: Stone shore – Kaliakra -Balchik.
Lunch in Balchik. Visit of the botanical garden. Back to hotel. Dinner. Night.
STONE SHORE:

Kaliakra:

Kaliakra is a nature reserve, where dolphins, cormorants and pinnipeds can be observed. It
also features the remnants of the fortified walls, water-main, baths and residence of Despot
Dobrotitsa in the short-lived Principality of Karvuna's medieval capital.[2] The cove Bolata
with a small sheltered beach lies just north.

Name and history

The name "Kaliakra" is of Byzantine Greek origin. It is a combi-
nation of "....." ("beautiful") and "...." ("headland" or
"fortress") and is traditionally translated as "Beautiful Head-
land".
Probably the most popular legend about the place is the one about 40 Bulgarian girls, who
preferred to tie their hair together and jump into the Black Sea instead of the prospect to be
captured by the Ottomans. An obelisk dedicated to this legend is placed at the entrance to
the cape, called The Gate of the 40 Maidens.

A third legend is about Lysimachus, a successor of Alexander
the Great, who seized the royal treasure and escaped to Kali-
akra, dying in a major storm along with his whole fleet



Balchik:

The ancient Greek colony of Krounoi (also known as Dionyso-
polis, after Dionysus), later a Greek-Byzantine fortress, stood
on the site of an older Thracian settlement. Under the Ottoman
Empire, the town came to be known with its present name,
which perhaps derived from a Gagauz word meaning "small
town" [1] (as opposed to the "large town" of Varna).

1919-1940, Balchik was part of Romania.

During Romania's administration, the Balchik Palace was the
favourite summer residence of Queen Marie of Romania and
her immediate family. The town was the site of Marie's Oriental
villa. Today, the Balchik Palace and the adjacent Balchik
Botanical Garden are the town's most popular landmarks.
Currently, three 18-hole golf courses are being developed

around town, two designed by Gary Player and one by Ian Woosnam.

Day 6 – Breakfast. At 10.00 am departure for Aladzha monastery /near Golden
Sands/ visit of the monastery. Lunch. Departure for ‘Pobiti kamani” ( Stone for-
est). Dinner in tradional restaurant with folkloric dances and ‘Nesstinars”. Back
to hotel. Overnight.

Aladzha Monastery; Aladzha Monastery  is a medieval

Orthodox Christian cave monastery complex in northeastern Bulgaria, 17 km north of cen-
tral Varna and 3 km west of Golden Sands beach resort, in a protected forest area adjacent
to the Golden Sands Nature Park.The monastery caves were hewn into a 25-m high vertical
carst cliff near the upper edge of the Frangen plateau on several levels. The complex also in-
cludes two small nearby catacombs.Dedicated to the Holy Trinity, it was an active hesychast
monastic community of the Second Bulgarian Empire since the 12th century and perhaps
survived until the early 18th century. As late as the early 20th century, the forested hills sur-
rounding the monastery and known as Hachuka (Mount of the Cross) or Latin, were re-
garded by the locals as sacred and inhabited by a mythical chthonic daemon and treasure
keeper, Imri Pop or Rim-Papa


Pobiti kamani “the Stone forest”:


The mystery of the Bulgarian Stonehenge is expected to be
solved. The secrets of the energy sites in Bulgaria challenge the
scientists to make new hypothesis and findings.

In the vicinity of Varna

One of the energy and powerful sites is situated less than 20

km from Varna on the way to Shoumen – Pobiti Kamani/The stone forest/. The phe-

nomenon in this site can be compared to the popular Stonehenge

but it is a rather older formation. There exist about tens of hy-

potheses about the stone columns, well arranged like in an ancient

temple, as if grown in the sandy soil so far from the sea. The ques-

tions challenging the scientists are too many. Why there is sand at

the site. How the mysterious stone “trees” each with a hollow in it
grew. Were they formed by the nature or left by an unknown civilization?

 It is strange that in the circumference of 60 sq. km there are
about 15 more similar stone formations but much smaller ones. As-
suming that these are the remnants of an ancient civilization, 50 mil-
lion years old, how old are the homosapiens then? The mysteries are
a lot, as well as the solutions but none of them is the only one and the
only true for the time being.



Day 7 – Breakfast. Tour of Varna , free time. Dinner. Overnight.

Varna:

Varna is among Europe's oldest cities. Miletians founded the
apoikia (trading colony) of Odessos in 570 BCE (in the time of
Astyages) at the site of an earlier Thracian settlement. The
name Odessos, first mentioned by Strabo, was pre-Greek, per-
haps of Carian origin. Long before the Thracians populated the
area by 1200 BCE, several prehistoric settlements best known
for the eneolithic necropolis, eponymous site of the Varna cul-
ture and the world's oldest large find of gold artifacts (mid-5th
millennium BCE radiocarbon dating), existed within modern city limits. Odessos was the
most important member of the Pontic Pentapolis and a contact zone between the urban
Ionians and the Thracians (Getae, Crobyzi, Terizi) of the hinterland—a mixed Greco-
Thracian community (see also Darzalas).

In 339 BCE, the city was unsuccessfully besieged by Philip II but surrendered to Alexander
the Great in 335 BC, and was later ruled by his diadochus Lysimachus. The Roman city,
Odessus (first included into the Praefectura orae maritimae, then in 15 CE annexed to the
province of Moesia, later Moesia Inferior), occupied 47 hectares in present-day central
Varna and had prominent public baths, Thermae, erected in the late 2nd century, now the
largest Roman remains in Bulgaria (the building was 100 m wide, 70 m long, and 25 m high)
and fourth-largest known Roman baths in Europe.


Odessus was an early Christian centre, as testified by ruins of
perhaps ten early basilicas [2], a monastery, and indications that
one of the Seventy Disciples, Ampliatus, follower of Saint Andrew (who, according to the Bulgarian Orthodox Church legend, preached in the city in 56 CE), served as bishop there. In 442, a peace treaty between Theodosius II and Attila was done at Odessus. In 536, Justinian I made it the seat of the Quaestura exercitus including Moesia, Scythia, Caria, the Aegean Islands and Cyprus. Theophanes the Confessor first mentioned the name Varna, as the city came to be known with the Slavic conquest of the Balkans in the 6th-7th century. The name may be older than that; perhaps it derives from Proto-Indo-European root we-r-(water) [3] (see also Varuna).
In 681, Asparukh, the founder of the First Bulgarian Empire, routed an army of Constantine IV north of the Danube delta and reached the so-called Varna near Odessos. Recent scholarship has suggested that the first Bulgarian capital was perhaps located around Varna before it moved to Pliska. Asparukh for tified the Varna river lowland by a rampart against a possible Byzantine naval landing; several 7th-century Bulgar settlements have been excavated



Day 8 – Brakfast. Transfer to the airport.
End of the program!!!

Including:

• 7 overnights in hotels 3 and 4*.
• 7 breakfasts, 6 lunches and 6 dinners.
• One special dinner in traditional restaurant with program.
• Professional historian and astrologer for guide.
• Transport.
• Lectures for every landmark.
• Transfers from/to airport.
• Taxes for museums are not included

Experience that you will never forget!!!

ARKAIN-TOUR


Varna,
Bulgaria,

 

Www.arkain-tour.com