One of the things that we did during our visit to Sofia in Bulgaria was to take a walking tour of the old city center, which included a traditional breakfast. We truly enjoy walking through the old city centers of historic towns and often do a self-guided tour, but in this particular case we chose to use a local guide to ensure that we learned as much of the history as we could. The history of Sofia stretches back thousands of years and like many Eastern European cities it has been transformed and conquered many times throughout the centuries. From the Trojans, Romans, Ottoman Empire, and Communist regime, it has seen a wide variety of cultural and architectural influences.

There are many fascinating sites all throughout the old city center, starting with the Saint Alexander Nevsky Cathedral. In addition to the cathedral, the walking tour will also take you to the Saint Sofia Basilica, Banya Bashi Mosque, Church of St Petka of the Saddlers, and Saint Nedelya Church. You will also enjoy seeing many historical and cultural buildings such as the Ivan Vazov National Theater, Regional History Museum of Sofia, Sofia City Court, and the National Palace of Culture. As with any city center, you will also see many statues and monuments including several interesting ones such as the Tsar Samvel Monument, Monument to Tsar Liberator, and the Monument to Stefan Stambolov.

One of the most interesting sites along the tour is the archeological excavations at the Serdica Ancient Cultural and Communicative Complex. It will provide some insight into the period when the Romans controlled the city and used it as a stronghold in the region. Walking through the various zones, both inside and outside, at the complex is quite fascinating and was definitely one of the highlights of the walking tour. In the middle of the tour, we stopped for a quick breakfast that included Baklava, Banitsa, and Ayran, which is yogurt mixed with water and salt. The Banitsa is another layered pastry made with filo dough and cheese.

We were fortunate to have wonderful weather on the day that we did our walking tour, which certainly added to our enjoyment. We walked through several parks with beautiful greenery in the heart of the city. Another interesting thing were the cobblestone, brick roads that were painted yellow to resemble gold in an attempt to demonstrate the wealth of the city and its leaders. The entire tour took a little less than three hours and if you decide to do the tour on your own and go inside more of the museums than we did, you can make it a full-day activity. It is certainly a must-do when visiting Sofia in Bulgaria.