The Rhodopes: the back story

About The Rhodopes: the back story

By the ULTIMATE Sofia Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

The Rhodopes, south of Plovdiv, are rounded, forested mountains of deep gorges, caves and villages, the legendary home of Orpheus. They are famous for their music, their bagpipes and their landscapes, and for Bachkovo Monastery, the second largest in Bulgaria.

The mountains of Orpheus

Greek myth placed the birth of Orpheus in the Rhodopes, and the mountains still have a strong musical tradition, with the deep sound of the kaba gaida, the Rhodope bagpipe, and their own style of singing.

Bachkovo and Asen’s Fortress

Bachkovo Monastery, founded in 1083 by the Byzantine general Gregory Pakourianos, is the second largest monastery in Bulgaria, with frescoes in its churches and refectory. Nearby, above the town of Asenovgrad, Asen’s Fortress stands on a crag above a gorge, with the Church of the Holy Mother of God still intact.

In the Rhodopes, a hundred bagpipes once played together on a mountain meadow.

Shiroka Laka

Shiroka Laka is a village of white Rhodope houses and stone bridges, and home to the National School of Folk Arts, where young musicians learn traditional instruments and singing.

Gorges and caves

In the south-west, the road passes through the Trigrad Gorge, with sheer walls of rock, to the Devil’s Throat cave, where a river plunges underground in a great waterfall inside the mountain.

Our advice: visit Bachkovo and Asen’s Fortress as a day trip from Plovdiv; for Shiroka Laka, Trigrad and the Devil’s Throat, stay at least two nights in the mountains.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with The Rhodopes: the back story before you go.