Around the town of Kazanlak in central Bulgaria, a “vast plain” unfurls between two mountain ranges. It is known as the Rose Valley for its “pink-blooming” fields, but also as the Valley of the Thracian Kings, for its many ancient tombs.
I found my recent trip there enchanting, says Julia Buckley in The Times, partly owing to the area’s rich artistic and archaeological heritage – and partly thanks to the recent opening of its first luxury spa hotel. Built around one of the thermal springs for which the region is also known, the huge Kings’ Valley resort offers “five- star” accommodation and treatments at “three-star prices”. The combination of top-class pampering, art and ancient history makes for a wonderful break – and yet Kazanlak and its surroundings are still blessedly free of tourist crowds.
Little is known about the Thracians, an ancient tribe who “fanned out west” from the Black Sea, and were admired by their neighbours, the Greeks, for their martial prowess. The thousand or so royal tombs around Kazanlak, believed to have doubled as temples, lie within grassy mounds that turn the “pancake- flat” plain into something resembling “Teletubbyland”.
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Several dating from the 4th and 5th centuries BC are open to the public, including Golyama Kosmatka, which has carvings of Medusa and Helios, and Ostrusha, painted with mythological scenes and human faces. But most beautiful of all is the hilltop Kazanlak tomb, with frescoes of galloping horses, and of a man and woman reaching out “to hold hands across the void” – a depiction of “eternal love” nearly 2,400 years old.
The town of Kazanlak itself is not pretty, in the way the Bulgarian “big hitters” of Plovdiv and Veliko Tarnovo are. But it is “bursting with culture”, including a fine art gallery and a history museum, the Iskra, which houses “troves” of Thracian gold. And it’s always a delight to return to the spa, where the menu includes both “relaxing woo woo” and medical consultation. I had “magnet-resonance therapy” – perhaps it was a placebo effect, but my arthritic knee was pain-free for months afterwards.
