Stairway to Heaven????

It's only 5:30 here and we've put in a full day already ..... Jack's resting (is he making a habit of this or is it just me?) and I'm posting. We had breakfast at 8 and then headed out to pick up the Social Worker and Gabriela. When we arrived at Gabriela's she came running for hugs along with her adorable little sister!

The plan for the day .... we would see the National Historic Archeological Reserve -Madara. It is about 45 minutes away - we did find out that Gabriela does feel car sick when driving. Petco said that she has not been in a car very much ... think we will be bringing Dramamine when we pick her up.

Madara is located in the mountains -- it is a tourist attraction that many people from Germany and Italy come to see. Today there were very few people there so we were able to enjoy everything. We started at the base of the mountain, here is Gabriela all set to start our trip up the mountain .... and yes, it's the mountain behind her ....


We climbed many, many steps to reach The Rock Chapel - it is said that there is a strong power centre that benefits human health -- unfortunately it's blocked off so you can not enter the chapel anymore.

There were many caves in this area -- if you chose to explore it was at your own risk -- considering the falling rock signs that were posted everywhere we only looked in from the outside.


After more stair climbing we stopped to admire the pretty view:


More stair climbing and we looked up to see how much farther we had to go .....


There is a great amount of history to this mountain -- it was a prehistoric settlement dating back to 3rd BC -- the mountain shows a lot of the way people lived then ....

Here is Rossi, Gabriela, Social Worker Lady (seriously, that's what they call her)and Petco during a short break to catch our breath .... have I mentioned that there was a lot of stair climbing??


I don't know if you can make it out - but there is a rider on a horse with a lion below the horses' hoof -- it is chiseled into the mountain, the inscription around the rider states that the rider is from the time of Khan (701-717 AD) -- it represents the victory of the fights with their enemy Byzantium.



After this was our last major climb of the day -- 356 additional steps up the mountain to see the The Madera Fort -- it dated back 1300 years. Gabi and I had climbed probably a little over a 1/4 of the way up the stairs before Petco said that the stairs were becoming unsafe for Gabi to travel. He was right, as we made our way up the mountain the steps were becoming more uneven, broken and steep. Gabi and I made our way back down to wait at the bench, while the others made their way to the top.

Jack said it took over a 1/2 hour to climb the stairs -- it was a hard climb for all of them. The stairs were so steep that they had to stop every few flights to catch their breath. At the top were the ruins of the fort. According to Jack it looked like you were on top of the world, you could see everything. Jack said that it gave him chills to think of all that happened at that fort -- all the battles that were fought ....

The last picture for the day ..... the steps down ..............ahhh, going down was not as hard as going up .... thank goodness!


Gabi and I had a lot of fun waiting for everyone to return .... I learned she can count to 30 - she did this while jumping from one large brick to another so she understands what she's doing, knows the ABC's to J, knows many more words than we thought originally and seems to understand quite a bit of English. I would tell her what something was (zipper, fingers, ears, pants, leg, etc) in English and she would tell me Bulgarian. She told me I was Mama and Papa was up ..... when she heard Papa coming down to us she waited until she saw him and then took off with a running leap into his arms. How can this happen in such a short time? It's amazing how much of a bond there is - it was my greatest worry! Another positive -- we also learned that she can read well in Bulgarian ... at lunch Petco started to read her the choices -- she took the menu and told him she can read her menu and decide what she wants to eat. (hmmm, perhaps a little bit of an attitude)

She loves to climb in our laps, grabs our hands when walking, sat between us in the car and fell asleep on our shoulders with her arm linked in Jack's and there is joy in her face when she sees us --- it is right!

It was another great day .... it will be hard to leave her here tomorrow!

Well, I have to get the gifts for everyone together before we meet at 8 for dinner so I should be going.

Hailee -- while we were waiting Gabi was looking at pictures on the camera -- she saw you playing basketball and had no idea what it was -- you are right, you will have to teach her. Gabi right now is a girly-girl, BUT remember she has not had the opportunity to do any sports - we won't know what she likes or what she's good at until she gets home and can try them. There will be lots of new things for her to learn .....

We were able to take a short video today (I wish we brought the cords along so I could post it) -- in it she says "Hi Lisa, Hi Jonathan, Hi Amanda, Hi Hayden, Hi Hailee - I am Gabi, your new sister." She did a great job!