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hippietrail

06:51

good morning oh ye survivors of numerous travel stories

Roflcoptr

07:04

morning

what did you do this night? :D

hippietrail

i stayed at the most eccentric place of my whole trip and i've slept outside in parks and behind petrol stations on this trip (-:

Roflcoptr

omg

that sounds werid

weird

hippietrail

i'm dying to review it on tripadvisor. i got photos and this time i also have the phone number and at least the street name if not the street number

Roflcoptr

can you send met the link ;)

when its done

hippietrail

here's the only other review of the place i could find, if you weren't here when i was talking about it last night: members.virtualtourist.com/m/p/m/18fdd2

it will be a few days at least because trip advisor has to do some checks to add a place they don't already list

Roflcoptr

07:20

a yes i saw it

hippietrail

after i got back from chatting with you guys and went to bed he banged on the window and brought a new guest to join me, a "profesor" - "no problem!"

that's after getting back and nobody around not being able to find my room but found another room with guys sleeping in it that i didn't know was there before

Roflcoptr

oh

and how was this professor?

was he a real professor??

hippietrail

well i tried to indicate that i would expect half my money back if i now only had half the room

for which i lacked the words in albanian, italian, and greek, and for which he lacked the words in english

Roflcoptr

yes that would be fair

but difficult to explain :D

hippietrail

i won (-:

of course he or somebody kept coming back to the area outside my room which involved lots of chain rattling and turning lights on and off and for some strange reason sounds of something sloshing in a bucket

at 8am it was time to bang on the window again and tell me it's time to leave but i did manage to convince him i didn't have a specific bus to catch and was able to have a shower that while not hot was a teensy bit better than my last hostel

hippietrail

07:51

no diamonds around?

Roflcoptr

08:01

ok sounds weird :D

do you stay there another night?

no the diamonds are gone

hippietrail

08:31

nah (-:

the annoying bit is if i want to see the old town i have to carry my huge backpack up teh slippery cobblestone hill

was gonna ask a diamond to make cellphone and mobile-phone synonyms. nonamericans dont say cellphone habitually

Roflcoptr

yes

hmm btw

how are the diamonds chosen?

hippietrail

there were nominations in meta that we voted on after the private beta then the stack exchange people chose some contributors based on that. they are called pro-tem moderators

Roflcoptr

ah ok i see

hippietrail

09:13

0

Q: What's the address of this guesthouse in Bulgaria?

A few weeks ago travelling with friends in Bulgaria we stayed at a guesthouse of an older lady named Rosa who basically accosted us and climbed into our car when we arrived in the old town of Veliko Tarnovo. I have been reviewing all the accommodations I've stayed in on my trip to help future tr...

there's a bulgaria one to challenge @MartinTapankov

Martin Tapankov

09:39

On it

hippietrail

i'm trying to hunt down at least the church but i only know what it looks like from the back. i might have a pic of that actually...

Church St. St. Konstantin and Elena!

Martin Tapankov

Рождество Богородично (Велико Търново)

Катедрален храм "Свето Рождество Богородично" е православен храм във Велико Търново. История Патриаршеската катедрала "Рождество Богородично" се намира в старата част на Велико Търново, в т. нар. "Болярска махала" и е издигната върху старата църква "Рождество Богородично". Старата църква е построена от Уста Кольо Фичето в периода 1842 г. - 1844 г. Изградена е от дялан пясъчник, като характерни особености на църквата са големият главен корниз и двойната, фичевска кобилица от камък и червени тухли. Украсена е с четири колонки и елипсовидни прозорци, които придават особена оригиналност ...

is this the one?

it would help if you have other photos to get an idea of the overall look

Свети Константин и Елена (Велико Търново)

„Св. св. Константин и Елена“ е източно-православен храм, разположен в стария център на Велико Търново, строен през 1872 г. от майстор Колю Фичето. При земетресението от 1913 година претърпява значителни разрушения. През 20-те години на ХХ век храма е възстановен под името „Свети цар Борис“. Известна е още и като църквата с въртящите колони. История Историята на храма е разделена на 2 периода: първият е до началото на 1870-те год., вторият — по времето на Екзархата. Категоричните алтернативи на възрожденските идеи започват все по-настоятелно да рефлектират върху формите и изм...

most likely is this one, actually.. the scaffolding seems right

it's been in a state of renovation for years, I believe, due to lack of funds

hippietrail

10:07

woah big connection problems while moving inside the cafe for electricity

yep now to figure it out by the maps

now to find it on google maps. there's no english wikipedia article and the bulgarian one doesn't include latitude and longitude

Martin Tapankov

got it, will give you the coordinates shortly

Martin Tapankov

10:24

goddammit, I never knew it's so difficult to find the address of a church.. everybody is helpful to give directions how to get there, but not actual address

hippietrail

amazing isn't it

Martin Tapankov

I managed to pinpoint the approximate location

25.64125, 43.08208

(don't ask how)

I don't really want to search for the sex shop..

I couldn't find anything on Rosa either

not too much information to go for

there's no listing of "rosa's guesthouse" (or variations that I could think of in Bulgarian)

hippietrail

10:40

there's also a restaurant nearby with a view whose name i will recognize if i hear it (-:

Martin Tapankov

hmm, these are not the right coordinates

I must have done something right -- these sent me in the middle of Saudi Arabia

hippietrail

that seems to be taking me to somewhere in the arab world

Martin Tapankov

do you know how can I get the coordinates of a location in google maps? e.g. click somewhere and get the numbers?

hippietrail

yep wrong wrong wrong d-;

hmm i dunno! you can ask on webbapps.SE though! i always do that now

Martin Tapankov

huh, that will take some time.. will take a look though

hippietrail

10:45

if you right click on a spot that isn't marked and zoom in you seem to get coordinates

asynchronous and synchronous questions can be worked on simultaneously (-:

i think you had lat and long switched

Martin Tapankov

yeah.. but for some stupid reason the map I found them listed them in this order!

you are right, I just realized that when I got the coordinates from Mr. Googles

hippietrail

it could be ul. Mitropolit Panaret Rashev

Martin Tapankov

exactly

this is the street name I found, but was unconfirmed

now it is

hippietrail

there are overlapping and crisscrossing streets though so i want to be sure of which one has rosa's on it

Martin Tapankov

yeah, this is in the old town, and the streets are crooked like snakes

is it on the same street?

hippietrail

10:52

this isn't the right church here on openstreetmaps is it? openstreetmap.org/…

when i go to satellite view i can't even tell which blob is the church

Martin Tapankov

Рождество Пр. Богородица?

nope

it's not listed on osm.org

hippietrail

aha fount it on lonely planet thorn tree! she did mention that she was in french travel guide books

wrong name or wrong church?

Martin Tapankov

wrong church

I see only one, but it's a few hundred meters to the east -- not the one you are looking for

hippietrail

i can't spot the parking lot either. bing maps gives better images but i'm still not sure what i'm looking at

it could be that we drove NW on stambolov then sharply SEE on mitropolit then left where it joins maksim raykovich onto Ivanka Hr Boteva where there seems to be a parking lot south of a church

Martin Tapankov

hmm, so this is the street?

any other photos with landmarks, shops, restaurants, other hotels, etc.?

on the same street, I mean

hippietrail

11:06

ok this might be the walk from the carpark to roughly the guesthouse

maps.google.com.au/…

Martin Tapankov

(sigh) should I start with the sex shops?

hippietrail

the sex shop was on the main road where you turn into the road leading to the guesthouse and parking lot. if you didn't turn and went past the sex shop on the left is the restaurant we went to whose name i forget but will know if you say it

maps.google.com.au/maps/…

that's the sex shop

Martin Tapankov

so from the sex shop you descend?

hippietrail

yes

Martin Tapankov

hmm, so it must then be on the SE side, which makes ul. Kolyu Ficheto (or 10th february) the most probable one

can't be on the other side, because of the hill

from google earth seems that there is indeed a descend on these streets

hippietrail

11:17

TADA! lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/…

it's on the SW side

Martin Tapankov

yeah, SW I meant

hippietrail

Роза Григорова

the LP post mentions two addresses though and one looks like polish \-:

Martin Tapankov

or Роса (pronounsed with "s")

(also a common Bulgarian name)

couldn't find a street with name Stefan Denyew so far.. will search some more

restaurant "Shtastlivetsa"?

hippietrail

11:34

oh yes last time i did look for both spellings of Rosa in cyrillic actually

that's the best bet i can find for the restaurant yet i seem to remember something based on an italian or english word and we would've had trouble even pronouncing that one

Martin Tapankov

vinarnata?

hippietrail

i think i can understand the thorn tree post now saying that is the previous name no longer official but there must still be a sign with the old name there

no that's not it

we had gyuvech there i have some photos from the restaurant too...

Martin Tapankov

(sigh) allright, let's see them

I actually wondered how you managed to find the sex shop

hippietrail

Martin Tapankov

shopska salad

hippietrail

11:41

hmm only photos of the food, not the interior or the view or the menu. i often take a photo of the menu but i hate flash and i think the lighting was very subdued

Martin Tapankov

not listed in the phone book either

hippietrail

i think i found the sex shop using the "search nearby" feature on google maps

Martin Tapankov

which raises interesting questions as to why sex shops are listed, but churches are not..

anyway, I'm done with this for now.. I hope I was able to help

hippietrail

my guess is they get randomly submitted rather than methodically sought

or they scrape certain types of sources

ok i've submitted rosa's to tripadvisor (-: thanks for your help by the way!!

Martin Tapankov

always welcome.. felt like a detective trying to hunt down a suspect :)

If I manage to get my grubby hands on a dead-tree phonebook of Veliko Tarnovo, I'll be able to find the exact address (I'm pretty sure they must have wired phones, as almost everybody in Bulgaria, but is not listed online if they didn't opt-in)

anyway, I should get a rest before going back to aortas and biomech

hippietrail

11:59

ok happy biomechanical aorta resting

Roflcoptr

13:42

roflcoptr is back

rofl "rofl* rofl

I just skipped trough the last conversations... I think I have missed something... just spotted sexshop a few time

Martin Tapankov

15:25

sexshops are uhh.. important landmark locations, apparently.. and actually helped us crack this case

hippietrail

16:39

@Roflcoptr: look on the bright side, at least we weren't talking about naked urls

Martin Tapankov

17:27

/facepalm

Mark Mayo

19:20

naked urls!

Roflcoptr

^^

hippietrail

20:51

yeah baby

Roflcoptr

22:19

low activity today in Travel

hope it will be better tomorrow

cya guys

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