Description:

7 days along the most challenging high mountain route in Bulgaria. This is the place where every step is worth and sometimes getting out of breath is not a bad thing.

It starts directly from the capital city Sofia and along the route we will cross two of the three National parks in Bulgaria. The total length is 250km, with 13500m D+. Highest point 2914m – Vihren peak, highest in Pirin and second highest in Bulgaria.

In this video you can see how I ran the route in 51h08min!

Difficulty

Total distance of this route is 250km with 13 500m elevation gain and 14 000m elevation loss! It is suitable for experienced people able to complete up to 50km per day with around 2000 – 3000m D+ in around 10-12 hours (4.5-5km per hour average speed). A large part of the terrain in Rila and Pirin is rocky and technical. Previous experience in multi-day ultra distance routes (more than 42km per day) is highly recommended.

Accommodation

One night is in a guest house and all other nights are in mountain huts.

When to do it?

The most suitable time to do the route is usually from late June til late September. July and August are the busiest and therefore it is very important to speak with the huts in advance in order to deal with the accommodation and food.

Problems along the route… Planning of the luggage, logistics, food supplies, accommodation and weather are extremely important. Knowing the route and navigating in bad weather can be difficult. Water along the route is usually not a problem, but in Verila and southern Pirin sometimes the water can be hard to find.

Animals in the mountain could be an issue only in case of a surprise. There are some sheep herds and they usually are accompanied by big dogs! Other domestic animals can be herds of horses or cows – they usually don’t have dogs with them.

Among the wild animals the biggest danger is to surprise a mother bear with its cubs. Good news is that usually they hear you from a large distance and they run away. But making some noise or hanging a small bell on your bag pack is a working solution. Wild boars can be dangerous also if they are surprised and they have small piglets. This can be the case from May till mid July.