Devil’s Throat - The Mystery of the Rhodope Mountains
picture source
Hello, my fellow Steemians.
Today I decided to do something different than all the time posting only art, and I decided to share with you one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to, right here in my Home Country - Bulgaria. Recently my family and I, were on a holiday in one of the most picturesque places in the whole country called Rhodope Mountains. It is truly a breathtaking place, a place where Mother Nature ran wild and created one of the most impressive and beautiful formations you could imagine. I feel saddened by the fact that I can’t show you the place in it’s full splendor, because pictures really don’t do it any justice, to witness something so beautiful you need to be there on the spot.
As for the journey itself we made the most of our 3-day visit, almost non-stop going around breathtaking sights. But today I won’t go in full detail about all the places that we visited. I will focus mainly on one of the caves, that we went ot, that left me just breathless and lost for words.
It was raining non-stop those days and here is a view from the hotel that we were staying in with a very beautiful rainbow:
On our second day in the mountains we were off to visit one of Bulgaria’s most famous caves, called “Devil’s Throat”, later in the post you will see why this name is indeed so fitting for it.
On our way there, as everywhere in the Rhodope Mountain there is a small 2 lane road, which is cut right into the mountain itself, curving everywhere with huge turns. Above the road you just witness mountain slopes as high as 10 to 30 meters, on some places the rock is even horizontal with the road, or creating rock terasses over the road. All of these sights just takes your breath away. I remember feeling the whole way scared that the rocks will just crash on top of us, but at the same time I couldn’t stop taking in the whole scene in front of me. During my whole travel, I never even once looked away, not even to check my phone, I was just hypnotized. I will post pictures of some of the places, just to give you even a slight idea of what I am talking about.
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Sadly, I didn’t take any pictures myself, since I am not much of a fan photographer.. My brother was taking pretty much all the photos, I prefer to live in the moment and enjoy it, instead of taking pictures, but in times like this I really do regret not taking any myself.
On the way there, right before reaching the cave is one of the most amazing rock formations I have ever seen, called the “Trigrad gorge”. It is one of the Hundred Bulgarian National Sights. The length of the gorge is 7 km, as the gorge itself is long around 2-3 km. It has a very narrow rock bed from between 100 up to 300 distance only and as you can see from the picture the rock is very steep with vertical slopes. The West wall of the gorge reaches height up to 180 meters, while the East wall reaches height as much as 300-350 m. The whole road from the gorge up to the Devil’s Throat cave is very narrow and it is very difficult for car to bypass each other.
Here is a picture of the Trigrad gorge:
After you pass the Trigrad Gorge, the rocks turn even narrower and they are leaning over the road, you have the constant feeling that they may collapse on top of you any moment.
Here is a picture on the way to the cave, after the Trigrad Gorge:
After which you need to pass through a narrow passage, which is carved right into the rock itself:
The main entrance of the cave’s is located on the East Wall of the Trigrad gorge, right at the bottom, in the rock:
-This is not the natural entrance of the cave, this one is carved overtime for ease of access into the cave.
About Devil's Throat
Devil’s Throat cave is one of the biggest mysteries of the Balkan peninsula. People don’t visit it for it’s rock formations, since the cave is quite young, it’s still in the first stage of cave development,aprox. 175 thousand years old, which may seem a lot of years, but not for a cave. If we have to measure it in corelation to human age, the cave is as old as a 7-8 y-old child.
It is the result of the collapse of the rock formation, which results in still no present stalactites, stalagmites or stalactones.
What is most fascinating about this cave is the history and legends behind it. The only way to enter the cave is together with a guide. Before going into the cave the guide gives a thurough history background of the cave together with the legends behind it.
-The Trigrad Gorge together with the cave have been formed due to the constant stream of the Trigrad river. The cave was formed due the river collapsing entirely inside the rock, which results in a huge hallroom,creating the cave. The river flows into the cave in the form of 18 waterfalls, the highest of which is 42 m. Due to the collapse a huge hallroom has been formed inside the cave with the size of 11 m. length, 40 m. width and 35 m height. This hall is called the “Echoing chamber”, because the water that is flowing inside is echoing all around the interior of the cave. The whole river streams down a narrow funnel inside the cave. The length of the funnel is 150 m after which there is a 60m gallery, after which the river resurfaces outside of the rocks again.
The Echoing Chamber
The funnel itself and the way the river travels before it resurfaces is the whole unsolved mystery of the cave. The name of the cave “Devil’s Throat” comes from the fact that whatever falls down the stream and into the funnel never appears again. Even when the river resurfaces out of the rock no items are carried through the stream outside. Everything disappears somewhere unknown along the path of the river inside the rock. The cave has been flooded numeral times, dragging in its depths tons of cubic meters of wood, but it never appears, it’s as if it has never existed - hence the name “Devil’s Throat”
The Famos Legends
*Apart from that the cave is famous with the legend regarding the Thracian singer Orpheus from the Greek Mythology. According to the legends right here in this cave the mythical musician has tried to get back his beloved Eurydice from the realm of the dead. Thanks to his lyre and his incredible song, he manages to reach Hades and to negotiate with him. In order to save the soul of his wife, Orpheus must follow Hermes to the exit of the underworld, followed by his lover Eurydice. The only condition is for the singer not to turn around and not to look at his beloved during the whole way back, because otherwise she will return to Hades again in the underworld. When the exit was already visible, a loud thunder (the location of this happening is believed to be the Echoing Chamber) silences the steps of the woman, Orpheus, worried, forgets everything, and turns to check if she has lost herself. He extends to her, but her shadow begins to move away and the singer turns numb. He has been crying and crying for seven days, forming the know to date to spring, on which today is the altar with the Virgin Mary figure. According to the legend, Orpheus remains faithful to his wife, even four years after her death. This raises the anger of the bacchantes. They kill him with stones, tear his body, and his soul goes to the underground kingdom where his beloved Eurydice is waiting for him. From that moment on, they never get separated. *
Some time ago National Geographic did a movie about the cave and its mystery. You can watch it here:
Here is a picture of the the spring created from Orpheus tears:
The natural entrance of the cave is used as an exit now for the adventurous and people with stamina, because to reach that entrance of the cave, the visitors need to climb a 301 steep stairway, which is the equivalent of a 22 story building. In the end my whole family decided to climb the stairs so we can see the other half of the cave as well as the natural entrance of the cave. The staircase was very steep and dangerous, looking back if I knew it I wouldn’t have made my parents climb it with me. It was slippery and you could hit your head on the rocks if not careful.
Picture of the stairs in the cave:
At the exit of the cave you can see a devil’s head carved into the rock, symbolising the cave. Inside the cave itself there is also a carving of Orpheus:
This is one of the few pictures that I took back then together with my mom, it is from inside the cave but the quality is kinda bad:P
Thank you all for taking the time to read through this. I hope you could get even an ounce of the awe that I experiencing during this whole trip and visit.
Cheers!
