Pazardzhik

Pazardzhik (Пазарджик) is a city in Central Southern Bulgaria, on the banks of the Maritsa river in the north-eastern corner of the horn-shaped Upper Thracian Plain, relatively close to the northern slopes of the Rhodope Mountains. With a population of about 55,000 in 2022, it's the administrative centre of Pazardzhik Oblast (Province/District).

Understand


While the region has been inhabited since prehistory, the history of modern Pazardzhik starts in the 15th century, when it shows up as a market town in the registers of the Ottoman Empire. It used to be known as Tatar Pazarcik — "small Tatar market" — in Turkish. The name was shortened to its current form after the Liberation, in 1900.

By train
Pazardzhik is a major station on the main line between the capital Sofia and Plovdiv, and the latter provides connections to the rest of Southern Bulgaria and the Black Sea Coast. There are multiple daily direct trains from Sofia (about 2½ hr) and Plovdiv (25-40 min), as well as a few direct trains from Burgas (5 hr) which also pass through Stara Zagora (about 3 hr) and Dimitrovgrad (about 1½ hr, and close to Haskovo). There are also a couple of direct daily trains from Svilengrad on the border (2½ hr, via Dimitrovgrad and Plovdiv).

The last surviving narrow gauge railway in Bulgaria, which climbs up the Rhodope Mountains, starts at, 10-20 min away on any train in the direction of Sofia (more than a dozen daily).

See

 * Ethnographic Museum (House of Nikolaki Hristovitch)
 * House-Museum and Gallery of Stanislav Dospevski (pseudonym of Zafir Zograf, 1823-1877). Both his father and his uncle (Zahari Zograf) were famous icon-painters of the so-called "Samokov School"; he was one of the first academically trained Bulgarian painters.
 * Old and new clock-towers
 * Church of the Dormition of the Mother of God
 * Grand and Small Synagogues
 * Island Park Svoboda (Liberty): a large island in the river, with fountains, playgrounds and various forms of public art, including statues of children's books characters (The Little Prince, Pippi Longstocking, etc) and dinosaurs.
 * Island Park Svoboda (Liberty): a large island in the river, with fountains, playgrounds and various forms of public art, including statues of children's books characters (The Little Prince, Pippi Longstocking, etc) and dinosaurs.

Do

 * Football: FC Hebar play soccer in First League, the top tier. Their Stadion Georgi Benkovski (capacity 13,000) is 2 km north of town centre.

Septemvri
Septemvri (Септември, lit. 'September') is a small town about west of Pazardzhik, with a population of about 7,000. It's notable mostly for being the starting point of the Rhodopes Narrow Gauge Railway. There are also a few ancient ruins nearby, though they are unimproved and reaching them requires either a car, or hiking along country roads. The unusual name was given to the town by the Communist regime in 1949, in honour of the failed September Uprising of 1923. Like Pazardzhik, it's on the same standard-gauge railway line and National Road 8 that connect Sofia and Plovdiv.

150 m/yd almost directly north (and a bit to the east) of the railway station there's a small pedestrian square with benches, a fountain, and an open-air stage. Exiting the square to the north-west is Bulgaria Blvd, leading to the museum and the Municipality building. There's a number of small restaurants and cafés around town. Probably the largest one: