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Montana Travel Itinerary

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MONTANA - largely rebuilt in concrete - is a drably modern town with a revolutionary tradition. Originally called Kutlovitsa, the town was known as Mihailovgrad for much of the postwar period in memory of local revolutionary Hristo Mihailov, a leader of the Communist uprising of September 1923 . Socialist historians always overestimated the importance of the revolt - a short-lived farce that never enjoyed popular support - but the way in which the right-wing Tsankov regime put the uprising down, massacring 30,000 Bulgarians within a couple of weeks, ensured that it was remembered as one of the most bloodily heroic episodes in Bulgarian history. After a local referendum in 1993 the town was renamed, ostensibly because a Roman settlement called Montana existed here in the first century AD.

Montana merits little more than a fleeting visit, to use its onward transport connections to more appealing destinations in the shadow of the mountains, such as Chiprovtsi and Lopushanski Monastery. If you've time to kill between buses - the terminal is diagonally opposite the train station - head through the fruit and veg market next to the bus station to reach a park where you'll find a small history museum (Istoricheski muzei; Mon-Fri 9am-1pm & 2-5pm), housing Chiprovtsi carpets and local costumes. Of the latter, several belong to the Karakachani , Greek-speaking nomadic herders common throughout the western Balkan Range until the 1950s, when a combination of settled lifestyles and intermarriage with local Bulgarians hastened their disappearance as a distinct group (although

they're still very much in evidence in eastern Bulgaria). There are plenty of cafes a block south of the train and bus stations on Montana's flowerbedded, fountain-splashed main square, where you'll also find a brace of hotels : the high-rise Zhitomir (tel 096/29186; US$18-36), which has comfortable but characterless ensuite rooms; and the slightly snazzier Ogosta , ul. Peyu Yavorov 1 (tel 096/42338; US$36-60), which has the edge in terms of comfort and service.

Your Tips For Montana

• Sofia Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  According to its motto, SOFIA "grows but does not age" ( raste no ne staree ): a tribute to the mushrooming suburbs occupied by one-tenth of Bulgaria's population, and a cryptic reference to its ancient origins. - Bulgaria
  

• Rhodopes Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  According to Thracian mythology, the mortal lovers Hem and Rhodopis dared call themselves after the divine Zeus and Hera, who duly punished the couple by turning them into mountains separated by the River Maritsa - him the Balkans and she the Rhodopes . - Bulgaria
  

• Kazanlak Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  Forty kilometres beyond Kalofer, KAZANLAK is the capital of the rose-growing region, although you wouldn't necessarily realize that unless you pass through town during the first weekend of June, when the long-standing but fairly lacklustre Festival of Roses ( Praznik na Rozata ) takes place. - Bulgaria
  

• Black Sea Coast Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  The Bulgarian Black Sea coast has quietened down a bit since its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s, when it served as the playground for the entire Eastern bloc, but it is still a magnet for hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians and foreign visitors. - Bulgaria
  

• Shipka Pass Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  For drama and majestic vistas, few routes in Bulgaria match crossing the SHIPKA PASS . - Bulgaria
  

• Plovdiv Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  Lucian the Greek called PLOVDIV "the biggest and most beautiful of all towns" in Thrace; he might have added "and Bulgaria", for the country's second-largest city (with a population of 360,000) is one of its most attractive and vibrant centres, with arguably more to recommend it than Sofia, which the proud locals tend to regard with some disdain. - Bulgaria
  

• Sredna Gora Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  ? So, proudly you may gaze Unto the Sredna Gora, the forest's single queen, And hear the ring of swords, and all this song can mean ? - Pencho Slaveykov, The Song of the Blood The Sredna Gora or "Central Highlands" stretch from the Pancharevo defile outside Sofia almost as far as Yambol on the Thracian plain. - Bulgaria
  

• Balkan Range Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  The Balkan Range cuts right across the country, a forbidding swathe of rock known to the Bulgarians as the Stara planina - the "Old Mountains". - Bulgaria
  

• Stara Zagora Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  STARA ZAGORA means "Old Town Behind the Mountain", an apt name for this settlement on the far flanks of the eastern Sredna Gora, with a history of occupation stretching back some 7000 years. - Bulgaria
  

• Southwest Bulgaria Travel Videos
  Bulgaria Travel Itinerary
  The landscape of Bulgaria south of the capital is dominated by the River Struma, which rises on the southern slopes of Mt Vitosha before sweeping west then south through a series of arid gorges and fertile flood plains. - Bulgaria