The town of Balchik at the Bulgarian Black Sea coast lies only about forty kilometers south of the place I recently described in the latest of my Via Pontica series.
My previous article (which, in turn, links to others) can be found here:
@manoldonchev/via-pontica-part-three-to-cape-shabla-on-bicycles
Balchik is also on the Via Pontica natural migration path. It is also on my biking path down south to the major port of Varna. It has a nice alley which connects it to the resort of Albena with its beautiful beaches and parks. Balchik was built among steep white cliffs and slopes. Its old-style rooftops make a pleasant terraced picture from the right angles. Fancy restaurants line the nice quay where people like to walk in their leisure.
But all those will not be my focus now.
I want to show you the one thing the town is most famous for - the almost century old palace and the botanical garden within its former boundaries. It was built between WW I and WW II for Queen Marie of Romania.
Prior to the research I made for this article I have been living with a self-made myth in my head. I thought the whole palace was some sultan's doing for a concubine of his. Since the Oriental style is present in the architecture of the place and since the main building also has a minaret. It turns out, thank you, Wiki, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balchik_Palace
... it was due to the queen's extravagant (for the time period) beliefs that religions could coexist as people should do near each other. Respect, Madam!
So the architecture is a mix of western and eastern influence.
Nowadays, it's part of the complicated explanations of people at the ticket desks. I've been in such discussions at least twice and only after my second time did I remember it. You have to pay two tickets to enter the complex. Each is worth about 3 to 4 Euro at present. One is for the garden and one is for the palace. But...
You may not reach the palace without going through the garden and that's obvious. What your mind tricks you into is that you may do the opposite, at least - enter the garden, but not visit the palace. At that point your mind may think of the main building as the palace. What you learn is that the palace and the garden are layers of the same whole. All of the landscape of the park is the palace and the garden lies on it.
Why two tickets, then? Since it's the same whole? Well, it turns out it is a matter of jurisdiction. The Balchik municipality administrates the palace grounds and the botanical garden is administrated and maintained by the University of Sofia 'St. Kliment Ohridski' which is... well, in Sofia, almost 500 kilometers away.
The garden hosts many exotic plant species and a lot of them require warmer climate. Balchik is well sheltered from inland winds and the region looks dry enough but if not for the special conditions at the Garden, you wouldn't be able to find those cacti and cypress trees in Bulgaria. Obviously they were my favorite part.
I hope you enjoy the photos and you take care,
Manol
