Day 14 Friday 17 May - Plovdiv

Friday 17 May,  Day 14

We left home about 9:30 for a full day on the town.  The pond for the ‘singing fountains’ was empty, so we continued through the park to the southern end of the town plaza, where they are still laying the paving.  It is about 2km long, and leads to the tourist info office.   

 At 10:20 we picked up 2 audio-guides, and 2 tickets to see the video about the Roman stadium.  This stretches buried underneath the plaza and was discovered during excavations in 1923.  It was built at the end of C2 by Emperor Hadrian, was 240m long, 50m wide, seated 30,000, and was used for Olympic style games.  

 Where else does a 2019 washer woman empty her bucket?

 Thumbs down for a gladiator.  Only trouble is there were none here.  They fought at the theatre.

 What you would have seen coming into the stadium through the entrance arch.
 
At the northern end there is a market street, and we had time for a walk through before the video started. 

 

 
We followed the numbers on our guide through the old town  ...

 When I found out that Plovdiv had a Roman theatre that was still being used for performances these days I was determined to go.  But, despite being the European Capital of Culture 2019, there was nothing on for the 2 days we were there.  But instead they were setting up for tomorrow when we will be gone.

 Lamartine's (French poet) House

 Where the dervishes whirled.

 

 Saints Constantine and Helena Orthodox church.

 ...  until we’d spent all our money. so had to go back into the modern world to find an ATM and lunch. 

Then we continued, up to the top of Nebet Tepe, the hill with archaeology dating back through civilisations over years, 

 

past the Ethnographic Museum in the best house in town, 

 

 

 the Hisar Kapia gate

 

the Small Basilica from C5

and its cruciform baptistry

 and the Large Basilica, outside the cathedral, which is under wraps for archeological preservation work

and finally the Trakart mosaic centre, with mosaics and early glass work, also found accidentally.

So we got back to the plaza in time to return our headsets by 18:00.  Their recommended time is 3 hours.

We sat about in the plaza, exhausted, and watched a rather strange spectacle of ladies wearing very big, fancy hats coming out of the crowd, milling around a guy with a fake nose and a speaker, then parading off down the mall and around the block then dispersing.  We had no idea what it was all about.

Since there were no cooking utensils in our house, we had to eat in town, McD, then came back to wifi.