BULGARIA: on the road to Sandanski -- sign of the upcoming parliamentary elections

As we were heading to our (very brief) spa getaway in Sandanski, I noticed the campaign posters.

There are early parliamentary elections coming up March 26th  (a week from today) -  and we saw campaign posters everywhere.

After the Socialist-backed, Pro-Russian (and newcomer to politics) candidate won the presidential election in November, the Bulgarian Parliament was dissolved and early elections called for March 2017.

 Here are a few links that will provide more background to the upcoming elections:

 http://www.dw.com/en/bulgarian-president-appoints-interim-prime-minister-calls-for-early-elections/a-37260853

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/world/europe/bulgaria-trump-russia-putin.html?_r=0

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/03/23/look-at-political-blocs-in-bulgaria-general-election.html

Here is the Sofia Globe's Fact File about the parliamentary elections:  http://sofiaglobe.com/2017/03/23/bulgarias-march-2017-parliamentary-elections-factfile/

 Here is the IFES election guide for Bulgaria:  http://www.electionguide.org/countries/id/34/

Another travel-related note: the currency.  Bulgaria is in the EU but not in the Eurozone. The currency is the Bulgarian lev (BGN). (1 Bulgarian lev is roughly .55 USD)  It looks like this:

Unfortunately we were not in Bulgaria for very long - and - truthfully - could have used just our credit card at the resort. But my daughter has a special photo album that we converted to a currency album - that has currency from all of the countries that she has visited.  Of course we wanted Bulgaria to "count" in the matrix - so we made sure to get some lev.