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Living here
The current owners, Richard and Katy, have spent the winters of 2006-07 and 2007-08 in the apartment. We thought you might find it helpful to know how we have spent our time, and our personal impressions of the Castle and of Pamporovo. Not 'estate agent-speak', just our own feelings.
Skiing
One thing we love about the skiing here is the scenery. You're not on a bare, featureless mountain but instead you ski through beautiful pine forest.
Of course, with the location of the apartment in the Castle, we have also enjoyed the advantage of being able to roll out of bed, put our gear on, strap on our skis about five meters from the apartment door, and ski straight down to one of the lifts. From there, we head up to the middle station at Studenets and catch the lift to the top of the mountain.
Katy has been doing this routine for both winters. Richard, he has to confess, only did it for the first year. Why? Because he fell and broke his arm right at the start of the 2007-08 season - not just painful but hugely embarrassing! At least he knows that the medical centre is well equipped and the doctor knows what he's doing.
The other advantage of the apartment for skiing is the view out of the window. Through much of the day, though especially from about 3pm onwards when people are finishing, there is a stream of people skiing past only about 20-30 meters away. It's fascinating to compare the levels of ability and confidence displayed - even if you are watching with your arm in a sling!
There are lots of places to eat and drink on the mountain and like everyone we have our favourites. One of the best is Peter's Hut, which is located part way down the main green run, conveniently close to where both a blue and red finish. They have a roaring hot stove to warm yourself by, and serve proper big mugs of tea and great food at the cheapest prices around. How do they charge less? Because unlike a lot of places, they don't pay kickbacks to ski instructors for bringing in groups of learners.
At Studenets, we also like the Black Horse for its open fire and its fantastic grilled sausage, and Spider's for its overall efficiency and cleanliness - the toilets are the best on the mountain by a long way!
One tip - if you like hot chocolate and brandy to revive you after a session of skiing in the freezing cold, order them separately. You get more for your money that way.
There are a couple of other things worth mentioning. One is that if you're a learner, or perhaps have friends and relatives who want to learn to ski, then Pamporovo is a great place to do it. Private instruction is just fantastic value - if you're on your own, you pay 25 leva per hour, which is only about £9.50. If you're in a couple, then it's only 20 leva per hour each. With the intense instruction, you will be skiing much, much sooner than if you were in a large group. And having been here a while, we have also found places where you can hire everything you need for 15 leva per day, rather than the standard 25 leva or more.
The other thing is the snow. In 2005 and 2006 we were here for just a week and there was a lot of snow - almost too much in 2005 when we could barely get out of the hotel. However in 2006-07, the first full season we spent here, like most of Europe it wasn't great, though there was always enough to keep us going. Then, in late March, there was a huge snowfall that was just fantastic to ski on and lasted well into April.
Last winter, the snow was generally much, much better. There was plenty of snow from mid December onwards and conditions were fantastic - in early February Katy described them as the best she has ever experienced and she has been skiing in several countries. A warm spell set in later, but the snow returned at the end of March and Katy was out again in April.
Social Life at the Castle
Much of our social life revolves around the Castle. Many evenings (too many?) have started with half-price cocktails at happy hour in the Lobby Bar and ended several hours later in the Castle Pub, with thankfully only 20 meters to stagger back to the apartment.
The more you stay in one place, the better you get to know the people. One of the great characters in the Castle is Chris, who works in both the bar and the pub. He is totally larger than life, speaks excellent English and you have to drag him away from the microphone to stop him singing late on!
If you stay at the Castle, you may also come across Ian and Katherine, British expats who not only bought an apartment here but liked the the place so much that they set up their own business. Ian and Katherine also frequent the Bar and the Pub quite regularly - they were the ones who suggested not only happy hour, but the now-famous Curry and Quiz nights on Tuesdays.
For some reason, some of the nearby hotels and apartments don't seem to have the atmosphere or facilities of the Castle. We frequently meet 'refugees' from the surrounding establishments who love the friendliness of the place and end up spending most of their evenings here, drinking and eating - even if they have already paid for their food elsewhere under a package deal.
You meet all sorts of interesting people as well. Recently, we talked to a backpacking snowboarder who was over here not just for the powder, but also to look for a house to renovate and turn into a backpackers hostel. Among other things, he told us that the best way to buy an old touring campervan in New Zealand is to hang around the short-stay car park at Auckland airport. Apparently, you can pick one up from backpackers who haven't had time to sell it properly and are prepared to dump it for very little money. We shall have to check this out...
Down Town
One of the things you must take advantage of in Pamporovo is the free transport laid on by some of the restaurants. They will happily come and collect you from the Castle and bring you back again once you have finished your meal, all for no charge - though a couple of leva for the driver is a nice gesture.
On the down side, the reason the restaurants offer free transport is because the taxi drivers overcharge horrendously. No one is quite sure how they get away with it, but their rates are about the same as central London, which is ridiculous.
Not surprisingly therefore, the restaurants we go to most in the town are those that offer this service such as the Red Sun Chinese and the Chanove. The former is pretty good, considering it can't be easy to get the ingredients - now all we need is someone to open up an Indian! There are actually two Chanove restaurants - we prefer the original one for its 'local' feel while the newer one is aimed at the karaoke market.
Other restaurants we like are The Old House, which we think does the best Bulgarian food, and the Italian in the Hotel Perelik - though order the pizza as the pasta, like everywhere we have ever eaten it in Bulgaria, is like cheap tinned spaghetti!
Our favourite bar is the White Hart. This is a 'British' pub, but don't be put off by that label. It has a lively atmosphere - especially on Monday (first stop on the 'official bar crawls') and Friday (skiing certificate and party night) - but we've never found it too raucous.
Among its best points are the live music (every night except Saturdays), the variety of beer (they even have draught Guinness!) and the pool tables at the back where we have spent many hours locked in competition (Katy's the better potter, but Richard keeps it tight with tactical play). You may be wondering why there is no live music on Saturday, of all nights. That's because much of the resort still operates on a Saturday changeover day, so it's always much quieter that evening as people have only just arrived or are tired after their journey.
The only real negative about the White Hart is that they charge you 50 stoytinki (half a lev) to go to the toilet - that's a really old-fashioned Bulgarian way and seems totally out of place in a modern bar. We heard that the woman who runs the toilets pays thousands of leva a year for the concession - given the number of people using them on a busy night, she should be retiring to the Bahamas in a couple of years!
We're not really club people, so we can't really comment on what they're like. However, we've seen people roll out of them in the morning, eat some breakfast then head for the slopes, so they must be pretty good.
Trips out
One thing we have found is that you don't need a car to get around. As well as the free transport to restaurants, it's easy to walk down to the centre of Pamporovo - we go via the ski run down to Ski Centre 1 which is a nicer walk and cuts off a big corner.
We have also become devotees of the local buses to nearby towns. The official buses go about every hour to both Smolyan (20 minutes) and Plovdiv (90 minutes). In addition, there are what appear to be semi-official minibuses that run on both routes - they just turn up, you ask them where they are going, and hop on.
Smolyan is small but has a good-sized pedestrian shopping area. The shops are small and typically Bulgarian, but we have found a couple of good mini-markets and a nice little butchers. You might have to look a bit, but you can get most of what you want - we even found a computer shop which knocked up an extra-long internet cable for us so we could use the laptop in bed if we wanted!
Plovdiv is a lot further away, but is a lot bigger. There is a large supermarket called Billa, which is comparable to the ones you get in the UK, and a huge cash-and-carry called Metro where you can get day membership and buy food, drink, clothes, hardware, electricals and all sorts of things at very low prices.
The centre of Plovdiv is very pleasant - again there is a large pedestrianised area for you to wander round. There are many more shops than Smolyan and they tend to be larger, with a greater range.
One thing you will notice in both towns is the prices. Pamporovo is a ski resort and as such, is relatively expensive compared to the surrounding area. In an up-market pizza bar in Smolyan last week, we paid only 50p for half a litre of draught beer and £1.50 for a large pizza. In Plovdiv, we went into one of the poshest cafe-bars we could see and paid only £3 in total for a large vegetarian omelette and a three-eggs-bacon-and-toast English breakfast.
For a final thought, you might be wondering why we are selling up if it's so great here. The answer is that we're not really doing so. Firstly, we will be travelling a lot in the next few years, starting with New Zealand from November 2008, so we won't be able to take advantage of the apartment. And secondly, we still own a studio and storage room at the Castle, so we intend to come back here for many more winters to come!