News from Free Sofia Tour

As the year is coming to an end, it’s time for recaps, resolutions and lists… We already did that back in August for our birthday so I will try to be short this time. We were waiting at the Palace of Justice for our guests 738 times in 2011. 51 times nobody showed up, 70 times there was only 1 or 2 of you but we still did the tour. We did 687 tours in total. 9265 guests from 105 countries. Not just a tour but an experience: Something very special indeed; freedom, fire, passion and erudition all masqerading as a leisurely stroll that even the weariest of souls can accomplish. Gerry Foley (guest from the United States) Since I love quotes, I would also quote one of our team members: Free Sofia Tour, the best thing that happened to me in 2011! Thank you! We don’t plan on stopping. As we speak, the last tour of this year is taking place (6PM on the 31st of December), after 23 people from […]

Free Sofia Tour will be running as usual (both 11AM and 6PM) on both holiday weekends – 24th and 25th of December as well as 31st of December and 1st of January. Every day, twice a day, 365 days a year! We are looking forward to meeting everyone who decided to spend the holidays in our capital! Here’s some of the highlights of what’s going on in Sofia these days: Christmas retro tram running up and down the pedestrian-only section of Vitosha Blvd – 12:00-16:00 every day till 24th Green Christmas festival in front of the National Theatre, including an ice-skating rink – till 10th of January The biggest ice-skating rink on the Balkans at the Ariana lake – open 24/7, entrance fee 4BGN, renting skates 4BGN

Можете да прочетете тази статия на български език в Actualno.com. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Bulgaria to the United States of America – Her Excellency Elena Poptodorova – paid a visit to the Free Sofia Tour today. Her Excellency joined the tour in the middle of it when the guests were in front of Bulgarian National Bank. She joined a group of 19 visitors from seven different countries, including USA, UK, Belgium, Spain, Czech Republic, Italy and Bulgaria. Since there were some friends of Ambassador Poptodorova among the group, we were quick to find out that she was born on the exact same day. Therefore the whole group of Free Sofia Tour’s guests sang “Happy Birthday” in her honour. Free Sofia Tour organizers would like to express their gratitude that Ambassador Poptodorova found time to join them on this special date for her. Ambassador Poptodorova listened carefully the stories of the Sofia free tour at the next couple of stops, including the presentation of one of the most cherished Bulgarian […]

There couldn’t have been a better present for our first birthday than the fact that on the exact day of the anniversary we welcomed our guest number 5000. Given that we never know how many people would show up, it’s quite the challenge to figure out who exactly is this guest. Fortunately, just like last time with guest 1000, our visitors made the task easier. This time it was not a couple but a whole Maltese family 🙂 All the guests at the evening tour got birthday cake but guest 5000 received a special gift – typical Bulgarian presents – small handmade table cloth and a traditional Bulgarian bell, called ‘чан’ (chan), that is used as a musical instrument and an ornament for different celebrations like kukeri dances. It is believed that this bell could scare away evil spirits. Now we are getting ready for guest 10000 🙂 We will keep you posted!  

As you may have heard, on Saturday we celebrated our first anniversary. What’s a birthday without a “Happy Birthday” song and a cake? There were Free Sofia Tour cakes with three different flavours for all of our guests both at the morning and the evening tour. We ordered the branded cakes at Take a Cake cupcake bakery. We were also extremely lucky and happy to welcome our guest N5000 at the exact same date of our birthday! How cool is that? Read more about this part of our anniversary here. You can see more photos of the joyous occasion in the album on our Facebook page.

Already one year the numerous guests of Bulgaria’s capital enjoy the free walking tours around Sofia, guided by our non-profit organization. One year later, we would like to share with you what we’ve accomplished so far and how it all started. If we look back today, here are the key achievements of this year: 5000 guests from 87 countries and 6 continents. Most come from Europe and North America. Top 5 foreign countries visiting our tour are USA, UK, Germany, Spain, and Australia. However, we’ve had visitors from a lot of countries Bulgarian consider ‘exotic’, like Paraguay, Iceland, Singapore, New Zealand, and Rwanda. 5000 people who fell in love with Sofia and Bulgaria because of us; Around 450 tour groups. We had babies and grandparents, kids and teenagers, students and workers, backpackers and businessmen. 42 reviews on TripAdvisor and not a single negative one! TripAdvisor granted us their 2011 Certificate of Excellence, because of the consistently excellent ratings of our guests. Only positive testimonials all over the world; 2350 fans on Facebook, growing […]

140 guests in one day. A new Free Sofia Tour record. 23+ countries. 4 continents (so far we’ve had guests from 5 different continents at a single tour, we are now aiming at 6… why not even 7). As you may know, we prefer smaller groups. This way the Free Sofia Tour experience is more personal and better for both sides. That’s why if you are coming with a bigger group, let us know in advance, so that we can provide more volunteers to show you around. Fortunately, this time we expected the bigger group for the morning tour on 16th of July. 85 students from a English-language summer school, organized by the American University in Bulgaria (AUBG). Apart from them, there were also 30 “regular” guests at 11AM. This was the second big group from AUBG for us. The week before that (9th of July) we revealed Sofia’s secrets to 94 AUBG students from the same summer school. We have already established good relations with AUBG. Free Sofia Tour Association […]

Dear folks, today the morning Free Sofia Tour will begin with a little delay of 30 min. at 11:30 a.m. If you missed the tour because of our delay, you could come again for the evening walk at 6:00 p.m. We are really sorry for the incocvinience and wish you a pleasant rest of your stay.