mountain munchkins

We love, love, LOVE living in Bulgaria. Mostly because we are in a fabulous location. Well, and we love our friends, too. And all the neat places we get to go to... But everyday life is pretty sweet. We love our house, our backyard is pretty much unsurpassable, and we're perched right on the side of Mt. Vitosha. A 15 minute walk with the tykes, or a couple of minutes jogging, without tykes, and you're in among the trees and streams. And some trash, too. I should have taken a trash pile picture. Bulgarians seem to love and take pride in the natural beauty of their country, but there's a little too much liberty taken in littering. It's blamed on the Roma, mostly, but they're blamed for pretty much everything. When we see trash, Nuala and Bran will ask, "why do people litter?" Then they answer the question themselves: "It's because they're selfish, right Mom? They're only thinking about themselves and not Heavenly Father's earth." Right-o.

Here they are, embarking on an adventure. This is the bend in our street, where it starts going up.

Stopping at a manhole cover to cram rocks down the little spaces. That's a lot of fun. The house to the left is in progress. It usually takes a long time to build houses here. For the most part, people do work in spurts. They'll save up money and work on their house until the dough runs out, and then it'll sit and wait until more funds have accumulated.

Ohhhhh, Nuala. I took this pic expecting at any moment that she'd go down. That's her M.O. She is actually quite athletic, and adept at physical stuff, but she and gravity have a little competition going on. So far gravity's ahead. That hasn't deterred her from racing full-bore down roads coated with slippery gravel.

Crossing a little stream on a cute little bridge, conquering the giant rock, hiking upstream, and just hanging out.

People are up here all the time filling up their giant water bottles and lugging them home. It IS refreshingly freezing mountain spring water. I love splashing it on my face as I'm out running. Brrrr! In the "unhappy Maeve" pic, she's complaining because that branch on the right kept poking her, hindering her progress through the stream. She loves getting wet. She actually got her pants pretty soaked while playing in the pipe picture, and it's cooooold water. Then she wanted to splash and play more, in the coooo-oooold water. She didn't complain a bit on the whole walk home, either. I brought along a baby carrier, but she wanted to walk the whole time.

This little hut says "гъба ." It's pronounced "guba," but the "u" is more of an "i/u" sound... anyway, it's Bulgarian for "mushroom." A friendly older man with several hound dogs was rebuilding this shell of a hut LAST summer. I'd see him all the time as I ran up the trail. I totally thought it was going to be a little mushroom-selling stand, albeit in an out-of-the-way location, but apparently it's just a little resting hut thing. The other picture is Nuala on the bridge again. It's a very charming little bridge.

Annnnd, the trek home. Bran's funny. He really likes to hike and camp and do outdoor things, but he always drags his feet when a walk up the mountain is suggested. He doesn't like to go uphill.

Nuala looks really old to me in this bottom shot.

THIS picture, going back down our street (we follow the bend and are a couple of houses down) makes it in, solely because of our neighbor there. You know, that almost-naked guy heading back into his house. He'd been out doing yard work, and tossing clippings next to the creek, etc. He's wearing what can be compared to speedo-esque Daisy Dukes. Maybe I was wrong to snap a pic, but I think not. At least I didn't crop and zoom. And sorry it's blurry. Or maybe, you're welcome that it's blurry! I was trying to catch him before he was safely back in his backyard. Not that he would mind, I'm sure, as that's typical summer attire for many a Bulgarian fellow. Speaking of which, I have a super awesome picture from last summer, that many of y'all have seen, but it didn't actually make it on the blog last year! Gasp. It's gonna go up.

We love our mountain!