暗网禁区

Have you also been recently?

Was the PCR needed because the airline insists as Romania is happy with a vaccination certificate, or at least that's what I'd read?

Thanks again, really useful I didn't realise about uploading the vaccination certs to Ryanair I'll do that and I'm guessing no problems entering BG with the certs and no test?

No problems at all. At Sofia airport, they just glanced at our certificates and let us continue. They didn鈥檛 have time to read them or anything. I鈥檓 assuming they just saw the NHS and a blue header with a bar code and just accepted that. The lady at passport control was a bit more official. Where had we come from and why had we come to Bulgaria.

Thanks very much for that xx

I think that passport control asking why you were entering was just a general question. It was likely because they were working out if you had residency or not so if they needed to stamp your passport. I work in security at an airport and sometimes alongside border force in arrivals. Often the questions asked are for a more practical reason. Unless they suspect you are human trafficking, coming in with a false passport, without the required paperwork聽 or something similar, they won鈥檛 just refuse entry if everything is in order. It鈥檚 a load of unnecessary fuss and paperwork for them apart from anything else. Passport control are just normal people that go home to their families after work! I鈥檝e even seen them get people to sort out their test bookings on the spot which should have been done prior to returning home. If Bulgaria started randomly refusing entry when an agreement has been made with Romania that any nationality can enter via the border then this would violate the agreement.

Anyway, I think we can agree that as it stands it appears to be fairly straightforward to cross from Romania to Bulgaria as a fully vaccinated UK citizen.

I didn鈥檛 think you needed a translated NHS cert. was this just an extra precaution you decided to do?

I think there鈥檚 some confusion. I came here directly from the uk, having residency, and all necessary paperwork I had no problem whatsoever.

Yes Loutollhouse, we just thought it prudent to get certificates in Bulgarian- makes it easier for the staff checking.

Going into Romania. No, we didn't need to do a test,聽 but as I have access to lots of flow tests, we both did one and uploaded the results to the nhs site just for good measure.

Thanks. Your posts have been very useful as I鈥檓 planning a trip next month!
So:
UK to Romania vaccine certificates only
Romania to Bulgaria vaccine certificates only
Bulgaria to UK PCR ( althought the UK are reviewing this on October 1st if you鈥檙e fully vaccinated)

Thank you for all the information. Very helpful.

I believe Bulgaria has different rules for those with residency entering from a red zone country and for those who don't yet have residency. So you need to be clear which set of rules apply to you. Those without current residency CAN'T enter the country directly at this time.

I plan to go in January via Romania if necessary so am keen to know how many days successful trips have spent between countries and what means of travel were used so please keep posting

Pretty sure it鈥檚 12 days

Big update鈥�

The Bulgarian Ministry of Health has published the latest risk assessment regarding Coronavirus, classifying countries in three categories (red, green and orange) depending on their infection rate during the last two weeks.

However, regardless of the origin country, travellers who have been previously vaccinated, recovered from the virus, and those with a negative test result for COVID-19 in the recent hours, are allowed to enter Bulgaria free of entry quarantine and testing requirements. The same rule applies to all EU Digital COVID-19 Certificate holders.

Awesome news for us all !

Yesssss 馃憣馃徎馃憣馃徎馃憣馃徎

denerobt wrote:

Big update鈥�

The Bulgarian Ministry of Health has published the latest risk assessment regarding Coronavirus, classifying countries in three categories (red, green and orange) depending on their infection rate during the last two weeks.

However, regardless of the origin country, travellers who have been previously vaccinated, recovered from the virus, and those with a negative test result for COVID-19 in the recent hours, are allowed to enter Bulgaria free of entry quarantine and testing requirements. The same rule applies to all EU Digital COVID-19 Certificate holders.

Awesome news for us all !

Can you give us a link to this?

It will help fellow travellers.

SimCityAT
暗网禁区 Team

I'll try to find the update on the ministry pages later - just worked a night shift sorry !!

As I understand it. This update is about quarantine rules only. UK is still Red and you still need residency to enter

That鈥檚 how I read it too

That's not how I read it, but perhaps optimistically missed that statement, can you please screen shot here? Thanks

The article does appear to contradict itself. But it seems to be clear that even for red zone travellers where quarantine is required, quarantine can be reduced to 24 hours with a negative test.
It does still read to me like entering from Romania is the safest bet.
Hmm, wonder if I can convince hubby to get by without me for a week, while I go make sure the shack still has a roof before winter hits?

Hi all,

Booked to go to amsterdam for 1 night from UK and then fly to Sofia the next day for work.

The rules say:-

10.聽 For the purposes of this order:

10.1.聽 "Country (territory) from which the person arrives" means the country (territory) - the starting point of his departure, regardless of the stay associated with his transit through other countries during his movement.

So for me that means if my starting point is Amsterdam then arriving from that country should be fine as it 'regardless of my stay with my transit'.

What do you think?

Thanks,

I'm thinking of doing the same via Vienna, I hope someone can answer this please...

@Adam 9911 - do you read the wording and understand it the same as me?

I do and agree but it would be nice to know if someone's tried it! Better be safe than sorry.

We'd read that as meaning your actual first journey point so in your example uk with Amsterdam being a transit point, but it's so confusing and ambiguous who knows.

For that reason we're going via Bucharest but staying there 10 days, it'll be interesting to see how you get on with a much shorter stay outside of the UK.

Best of luck 馃挌 and please post an update.

I thought it meant outside of a quarantine period, so you鈥檇 require 10 days in Amsterdam鈥�I was going via Bucharest like ThomsonTitterton.

Well this is it. Surely your departure point can only be the place in which this journey started as there is no definition as to when your departure point resets in terms of the 10 day etc. For example what if I moved to Amsterdam to live but then the next day was doing this trip - where is my departure point then?

The 'regardless of the stay associated with his transit through other countries during his movement' for me basically says we are not concerned about where you have been or for how long we simply care about where you have come from today.

Would be good to know if anyone has an experience of this.

I am assuming you have to be Rumania for 10Days. First ?
Rob

That would be common sense but the way they have written it doesnt give any indication of this.

@thompsontitterton we stayed for about 4/5 days after coming directly from stansted airport

@CharlotteB18 so you did UK > Romania - stayed 5 days then entered BG?

Did you fly into BG?

Did they check / ask anything about how long you stayed outside of UK?

Appreciate your help!

Yes I'm also interested in hearing Charlotte's experience聽

@ CW1421聽 Hey we went directly from London to burachest the airport was chaos it was like cattle being directed with everyone pushing and shoving, pretty awful. We booked an air B and B for 14 days as I wanted to be prepared if they had Covid police etc, they didn鈥檛 care at all. We got poorly and decided to leave early and risk it, at the Bulgarian boarder they weren鈥檛 particularly happy but we had a native speaker with us so they had little choice to let us through, only passports and a negative rapid flow tests were shown, we weren鈥檛 residents then this was a few weeks ago.

I鈥檝e also heard people flying directly into Romania to then fly directly to Sofia. I think it鈥檚 more scare mongering

Very interesting and thanks for sharing x
We're travelling from RO to BG by bus, how did you travel and were you challenged at all regarding originally coming from UK?

Finally can I ask did you have a PCR test to enter Romania and Bulgaria?

Thanks 馃挌

@thompsontitterton

No worries happy to share and help where I can! Bus is a brilliant idea (the least you have contact with boarder the better) we would have taken that route but the kids are so loud I feared being kicked off haha. They asked us what we were doing at boarder control in Romania I said we were transiting to get to our house I think honesty is the best policy and they let us through, grumpy as they were though I understand why it was heaving! We entered via ruse who were equally unfriendly but the driver just explained we were going home. All will be well! Try not to worry, they just like ticking boxes it seems.

Also you don鈥檛 need a PcR crossing through we used rapid flow to keep the price down, but we are unvaccinated so if your jabbed up you may not even need that!