Rila Monastery
Frescoes from floor to ceiling under striped arcades, in a mountain valley.
Duration
3 hrs – 5 hrs
Best time
Early morning
Open
Every day
Entry price
Free
Rila Monastery was founded in the tenth century by the hermit Ivan Rilski and is the largest in Bulgaria. It was entirely rebuilt after a fire in 1833: what you see therefore dates from the Bulgarian National Revival, not the Middle Ages — except Hrelyo's tower, from the fourteenth century, which survived.
The black and white arcades and the twelve hundred exterior frescoes are the work of nineteenth-century painters, among them Zahari Zograf. The monastery preserved Bulgarian language and culture through five centuries of Ottoman rule, which explains its standing as a national symbol.
Getting there
A hundred and twenty kilometres south of Sofia and an hour and a half from Bansko, at the head of a mountain valley.
What to bring
- Covering clothes
Rules on site
Shoulders and knees covered, and photography is banned inside the church. It is a working monastery: keep quiet in the courtyards, and monks live there.