By Nicole Gluckstern
All photos by Lincoln and Sevi Frager
Though the official written language of Bulgaria, the EU’s most recent (with Romania) addition, is Cyrillic, there is one word which pops up quite frequently in Roman script and that word is “Non-Stop.”
Non-Stop tobacco kiosks and snack stands dot the city streets, and even the sole combination toilet/shower stall at the campsite near Belogradchik is, the proprietor assures me, also non-stop. It hadn’t occurred to me it would be
otherwise, but I am grateful for the clarification. What isn’t really non-stop in a lot of Western Bulgaria, much of which is decidedly rural, is the nightlife, particularly in mellow Melnik, a village of about 300 permanent inhabitants, located in the extreme south, just ten miles from the Greek border.
Melnik
In Melnik, everyone gets pretty well tucked into bed by 10 p.m., but during the day, the single main street hums with activity — the clattering plates and bad pop music accompaniment of mehana meals spilling out onto shaded terraces, the clicking high heels of Sofian socialites with photographers in tow, the patient footpads of well-fed strays who follow in their wake. And what has brought us here, the socialites, the strays, and me? Certainly not the ticky-tacky T-shirt and postcards shops which also line the cobbly street, nor even the dramatic folded ridges of tawny cliffs which tower above and around the scattered red roofs and white walls of modest Melnik domiciles, but rather it is the regionally unique wines which really put Melnik on the map — and have been doing so for centuries.
It’s been suggested, in fact, that this outermost tip of the Thracian empire was the first wine-producing region in all of Europe. First or not, there’s no doubt that the Mel-niks have been at it for quite awhile — and I’ve come here to find out for myself what all the fuss is about.