Across the Black Sea by Cargo Ship

Three days on a cargo ship. We spent 3 days from Batumi in Georgia crossing the Black Sea to Varna in Bulgaria. This wasn't so much a ferry as it was a cargo ship that took passengers on. We watched his endless trucks loaded onto the ship and truckers Gathering their things and heading to the purser's office to obtain keys to a large assortment of very plain cabins..

The coast of Turkey as seen from the ship

And arriving at the ship was itself an adventure, being dropped off by an Uber at the entrance to a cargo ship terminal meant that we had to walk through past trucks and security guards and actually walk onto the ferry ultimately using the ramp that the trucks used.

There were four Suites on board and we took one of them. It was a trip back into the late 1980s. This cargo ship, built in 1989 for service originally in the Baltic Sea based out of Lithuania had been repurposed late in life to this cargo ship run back and forth across the Black Sea. We were determined to be comfortable on this trip owing to the Spartan nature of the ship itself.

We're very glad we booked the cabin we did because it was quite comfortable with a sitting area and a bedroom area of large and spacious bathroom that fully functioned.

Meals were served three times a day and included in the fair but the caveat was that one needed to be sure to be on time for each of the meal calls as they were announced across the PA system. Failure to adhere to these rules would result in one missing a meal. And there wasn't a choice of meals either. When one arrived at the prescribed time at the dining room, one found their dinner or breakfast or lunch depending upon the time, laid out squarely upon the table. Often a large pot of soup was also available for a communal sharing and a basket of bread. Meals were tasty and somewhat plain but certainly palatable and occasionally unusual. One unusual offering that was consistent across the three days of meals was a hot dog being presented on the plate at breakfast. Most of the passengers on board were Truckers and they seem quite happy to gobble down hot dogs for breakfast. Apparently this is standard fair.

Anthropogenic Breakfast

Our table mates have not arrived yet but the food is already set out for us

This was actually a very tasty chicken and potatoes

A communal pot of soup was often available on the table in addition to lunch

As we work crossing the black sea, I was somewhat nervous since you crane was just to the north and ships were being attacked. My fears were alleviated the next morning as I realized that the coast of turkey was readily in view. In fact we were not more than a dozen miles off the coast, squarely just outside Turkish waters. Any sort of attack here would certainly invite the Turkish military and I'm quite sure that Russia did not need to get involved with turkey.

On the third day, we were scheduled to arrive in varna, Bulgaria at 1:00 p.m.. we were in the dining room at the time enjoying lunch and watching foreign a pass by the window as we ate. I was sure that the ship was going to stop at the cargo ship terminal near the city center but it did not! Instead, after lunch we went out on Deck to find that we were traversing the Inland river system to a far-flung cargo ship terminal about 30 km inland!

We reached Varna and kept on going up the river!

When we finally talked about 2:00 p.m., it was another hour easily while we waited down on the truck deck for the authorities to give us the green light to actually proceed to customs and immigration. It was clear that the customs and immigration people did not have a clue as to how to deal with people walking off the ship since almost everyone else was in a vehicle or a truck. We presented passports and received pieces of paper with stamps that we were told to hand in to people that never took them. We unloaded our luggage as requested to show the contents which were never looked at as we did so. It was quite the comedy show.

By about 3:30 p.m., we had made it out of the facility and found ourselves surrounded by trees in the middle of nowhere. Fortunately one of our shipmates, a German man, had called a taxi and asked if we would like to share the ride into town. Without a question, we said yes, for without a taxi it was miles to the nearest train station and there was no way we would be able to walk it with our heavy backpacks. After a short time, the taxi did arrive and after dropping our German friend off at the bus station for his next leg, we were subsequently dropped off at the door front of our airbnb.

Those of you who may be reading this might be saying, I'll take the plane instead next time, but in all reality this was great fun and we had some wonderful table mates at our meals, enjoyed a beautiful calm Crossing across the Black Sea and really enjoyed the nostalgic hokiness of it all. If we return in the spring in our travels back to armenia, we will likely take this again, being better prepared of course with transportation expectations.