Everything that ends is sad! It can be a date, a coffee, a friendship, a love... I won't go any further with the listings because I get to even more painful events. Because there are irrevocable, definitive endings and endings that repeat themselves. Like the one I'm referring to now, the end of a season, coincidentally my favorite season, the summer!
Summer is generally the season for holidays and vacations. Summer is for the sea! That goes for me, of course, there are other options and choices, but here I am talking about me, the person I should know best.
We looked forward to the sea, with plans and hopes for a few short trips to the sea, of course. I don't know if this can be called fate, bad luck or stupidity, but I didn't manage to see the sea this summer, because..., due to impatience and intoxicated by the too warm and beautiful weather, I rushed to the sea when it was still spring! It was too early and something was missing, I was left with the nostalgia of the sea.
Well, there were three months of summer left to fix this little mistake and I failed. Because the journey to repairing the mistake of spring, when the sea season had not yet started, I will do it next week, when the sea season in my part of the world is already dying. After 15 September!
There's a saying that really annoys me and it goes something like this...
“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
It annoys me because it's exactly the opposite for me. Maybe I've upset the universe!
I have to go back to the most recent sea, and that was in Sozopol, southern Bulgaria, in May. It was very hot in May, I thought it was summer. I took my wife, a friend and we jumped in the car and after 360 km of driving, which meant five hours of our lives, we arrived at this small resort on the Black Sea.
I can't wait to see the sea, the beach full of children and beautiful girls, the cobbled, sloping, and narrow streets full of tourists looking for terraces, cafes, restaurants, shops with everything... Well, I arrived and was a bit disheartened by the sight!
We got to the beach but where are the people?
Not that I missed the crowds, no. To get away from the crowds at home I made the long drive to Sozopol but I needed the holiday atmosphere! I did however find a beach and a sea nostalgic after the effervescence of the holiday.
I dropped my eyes to the ground and saw and understood that spring was not yet over. It was just getting ready to leave.
The guilty parties for this carpet of petals are these wonderful and strange trees.
So it was at sea like in the mountains, at least that's what our friend looks like. Instead of beach and sea baths, we got long walks and the joy of late spring flowers.
Further proof that we were still in spring is these trees in which these strings, are hung. A custom in this part of Eastern Europe and it happens at the beginning of March. It marks the beginning of spring. I never thought I would talk about the beginning of spring when I tell about my holiday at the seaside. Or maybe that's because of global warming and the changing seasons.
I knew that if I was going to be on vacation with two women, my wife, and our girlfriend, there would be a commercial side to the vacation. One-sided trade, i.e. no selling and buying, just buy! Their greatest pleasure is to haunt the shops, of any kind (except fishing gear) and buy something, something they can't live without... until they get home and forget about those items bought after such a hard search. Actually, I know. It doesn't matter so much what they buy, it's the thrill of the search!
Especially since there was no room for sunbathing and swimming in the sea, there was still the search for shops, stalls, and whatever. In the town where people seem to have gone into hiding.
In the new town, nothing new. Empty streets and closed shops.
After seeing enough shop windows, the girls gave up and went to the Old Town, where they expected better luck. They were right. When are the ladies not right?
A few tourists showed up, in as much of a hurry as we were.
Lots of ceramics, and decorative objects. Quite hard to choose but we didn't leave empty-handed.
This was a hurried merchant too, but there weren't many like him. We found, instead, an art gallery and a painter patron bored with inactivity.
I would have loved to show you the inside of the gallery but, absolutely inexplicably, the owner wouldn't allow me to photograph. We got upset and didn't buy anything (actually, I didn't get upset about it, quite the opposite!).
Then I didn't have much luck shopping. Most of the known shops were still closed, a sign that the hordes of tourists had not yet set off for Sozopol as we had!
In general, when you don't get lucky in one place you might get lucky somewhere else and in this case, it was true. Having taken the worry out of visiting shops, we moved on to visit the town, the beach, and the harbor. I mean the old town, built on a peninsula on the Black Sea.
First, we went to the beach, a beach ready to welcome tourists. A very well-kept beach.
Someone's sunbathing! Maybe she's just resting.
There's something sad about an empty beach.
So that we wouldn't be sad too, we quickly left the place and looked for the harbor.
I am not a man of the sea, in the sense that I am used to boats. When I have to be in a boat I am not comfortable at all. That doesn't stop me from admiring boats. The shape, the color, the sleek and streamlined way they travel at sea.
I don't have much to say about these boats because I don't know much about them. I really like the visual effect and the lots of blue, both the water and the boats.
Right next to the port we discovered the Sozopol Archeological Museum. We discovered a closed museum, unfortunately. I really wanted to visit this museum, which I read that it houses extremely valuable exhibits.
There was nothing to do but look through the windows.
What I do know and what has aroused my curiosity and desire to visit the museum is that there are objects from a very long historical period, from the 6th century BC to the 17th century AD. Impressive! A place where I would have happily bought a ticket.
And finally, of course, the Black Sea. Owned more by seagulls than tourists!
It was a trip that is hard to define because I love this city with a millennial history but my mistake in choosing the timing of this holiday influenced the final perception. It was very beautiful but less beautiful than on previous trips. I learned from this experience that I need to be more careful when planning trips.
In the end always a flower. Now the flower is a whole tree.
For #MarketFriday by 
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