The Balchik Botanical garden and palace are one of the most magical places along the Black Sea coast in Bulgaria.
I remember going there as a child with my parents mostly through a funny photo of me posing on a stone throne. I cannot believe it took me so many years to go there again, but I am to surely change that for the future.
In fact, if all goes well with the current situation, two of my closest friends are to get married in the beautiful green and flowery botanical garden adjacent to the so-called Balchik Palace.
Like everything in this peninsula, this so-called “palace” too has a complicated history starting with a political marriage, an urban legend love story and ending up in separation of the Palace from the Botanical garden due to administrative hurdle and maintenance issues.
Nonetheless, it is a wonderful place to visit either for a few day family vacation, or for a day trip from Varna (44 km) or resorts in the area.
But let’s go back to the story.
The official name of the palace was the Quiet Nest Palace. It was constructed between 1926 and 1937, during the Romanian control of the region, for the needs of Queen Marie of Romania, wife of Ferdinand I of Romania.
It was the queens decision to build the palace and a small town infrastructure around it, because she was a free spirit, who needed a place to express her artisticity and love of culture and the sea.
The whole complex also kept remnants of its previous inhabitants such as old wooden mills and water fountains which in the old tradition were build to memorize a deseased person who was highly praised for his lifetime achievements, status or contribution to society.
So it is just fitting that the style of the place is a mixture of Bulgarian, Western and Oriental urban and rural traditions of the time. Some even believe that Marie was influenced by the Baháʼí Faith – a religion teaching the essential worth of all religions, and the unity of all people.
To add to the mystery of this magical place, locals still pass on urban legends of the heartaches of Marie and the healing powers of the place.
Where the truth lies, we will never know, but Marie brought mystery and culture to Balchik, which we can still enjoy and admire nowadays.
And her heart would have stayed there, if the borders between Bulgaria and Romania had not shifted yet again and it was not brought to Bran castle in Romania.
But after all that is how the Balkans work – like a true family that shares similar history and identity, but also forever holds grudges towards the other.
Never have I ever 