Staying in Velingrad might be a bit boring if you are not a big fan of soaking all day in a warm mineral pool (we have a nice Bulgarian word for this activity – “platsikam”). I don’t say it is not relaxing and soothing but for a certain time after that I feel like I have given up on life or I have became a jelly fish. To avoid this transformation process I and my friend decided to explore some places nearby and when we got tired to join the bathing team. So the plan was simple like always – see as much as you can until you got bored, tired or both.
The daily route was clear - The Pliocene Park in Dorkovo, Cepina Fortress and the town of Batak.
We left Velingrad and drove to the village of Dorkovo, Rakitovo Municipality (it took us about 20 min to reach). I really enjoyed the road trip to Dorkovo as everything was so picturesque and peaceful. Of course I have seen many beautiful landscapes in Bulgaria but each time I visit such places I realize that life in the big city gives opportunities, but also overtakes your tranquility and spoils the internal connection with nature.
Following the signs to the Pliocene park we saw a lot of people on the streets selling homemade fruits, vegetables and jams in front of their houses. I guess that they spent the whole day there and didn’t do this occasionally, but quite often. Indeed passing cars were stopping next to the small so called “shops” to buy one kilogram of pepper, two kilograms of apples or a honey jar. There is nothing like the taste and smell of tomatoes and cucumbers grown in a Bulgarian village. If you have ever tried you will understand what I mean!
Here comes the Pliocene Park hidden in a big wooden shed!
At the entrance we met three nice old ladies who asked me to make them a photo, because as the one said “We are always separated on the photos, two by two, please make a photo of three of us!” I though to myself maybe you have not discovered the selfie mode yet!
The admission fee for the museum was 5 BGN per person and they advised us to keep the receipt as we could use it also for entering “Cepina Fortress” which was located nearby. Well noted!
I though the shed was bigger inside but not at all. A huge life-size model of a mastodon was placed in the middle of the hall which covered almost half of the area. Screaming sounds of wild animals filled the room. There were many exhibits, but as I was not a fossils specialist for me it was a bit difficult to understand everything. The good thing was that a lot of information was provided not only in Bulgarian, but also in English.
Let me share some basic info about the place itself.
The Pliocene Park was established in 2013 and presents a great collection of animal fossils that are found around the village of Dorkovo from the Pliocene geological eras (CA 5 to nearly 2.5 million years ago). Firstly the fossils were recognized in the 1930s by the local teacher Manol Cholev. Later in the 1980s the fossil locality was rediscovered by geologists from the company “Redki Metali”. The discovery gained attention due to the numerous fossils found during the Bulgarian-French excavations (1985-1987). It is considered as one of the key localities marking the beginning of the Pliocene in Europe.
When I saw the mastodon in the shed the first thing that came in my mind was the movie “Ice Age” and the kind and helpful mammoth Manny. Don’t you find some similarities? But the mastodon from Dorkovo is more ancient (mammoths popped up about 2 million years ago, but this pal appeared 5 million years ago or more).
What is a mastodon? People use this word quite often for describing something huge, enormous, not in the standard size. Mastodons are animals that are distantly related to the family of the modern elephants and the mammoths. Some people think that they are a separate family. I don’t see a large difference between any of them only the size of the body and the tusks maybe. So the mastodon is an elephant with huge tusks simply said!
The mastodon from the Dorkovo locality is one of almost 200 known species relatives to the modern elephants which walked the Earth for the last 60 million years. All mastodons, mammoths and other prehistoric elephants appeared after the demise of dinosaurs, they didn’t live together as it is shown in some movies. The surprising thing is that these giants evolved from tiny (rabbit-sized) animals that popped up in Africa and didn’t resemble elephants at all.
Both mastodons and mammoths went extinct after the last Ice Age (some people think that it was a result of human hunting pressure, I wonder how many people dressed up with the fur of this giant…)
The landscape and fauna near Dorkovo and the Balkans 5 million years ago was presented on a huge board on the wall.
Dorkovo is one of the richest early Pliocene fossil localities in Europe. What makes unique the locality in Dorkovo is not just the huge number of specimens but their variety.
It is believed that a natural disaster killed off an entire herd of mastodons near the shore of an ancient river. Possibly a major drought caused their death near the last water sources, their bones then “trapped” the bones of other dead animals swept away by a later spate of waters.
More than 600 bones of large mammals were found – mastodons, rare ancient monkeys, primitive horses, tapirs, rhinos and etc. Two new species of birds were described based on the findings in Dorkovo.
With its rich fauna Dorkovo reveals previously almost unknown environment of Southeastern Europe 5 million years ago.
Can you imagine how old is our land? Many people will say: “Just a pile of bones, what is so interesting?”. Yes …bones, plenty of bones here and there…but these bones bring knowledge for the past to the world.
I read one curious story about one finding in the USA. The first American mastodon was discovered in New York in 1705. A farmer found a huge fossilized tooth and traded it to a local politician for a glass of rum. After that the politician gifted it to the state’s governor who shipped it to England with the label “Tooth of a Giant”. I wonder how this scenario will end up in Bulgaria?
Entrance fee: 5 BGN for adults, 3 BGN for kids. With the same ticket you may also enter Tourist Information Center “Cepina Fortress”.
Working time: Monday – Sunday 10.00- 19.00 o’clock (May-October)
Monday – Sunday 10.00- 19.00 o’clock (October – February)
Estimated time to spend: 15-20 min
Location: Dorkovo, Bulgaria
Type: Museums and Memorial Houses
Curious facts: The name “Mastodon” means “nipple tooth” which refers to the specific shape of the Mastodon’s molar teeth.
