Sofia in 2 days: 15 stops matched to opening days

A Sofia 2-day plan of 15 stops from the NomadSwipe app's place data. Thirteen have stored opening hours and every start time fits them; the Rotunda Church of St George and Vitosha Mountain have none stored. Day one works from Wednesday to Sunday, day two from Monday to Saturday.

Disclosure: I built NomadSwipe (Android), and I wrote this guide. Ratings, review counts, addresses and opening hours are the values stored in the app's Sofia place data, read on 7 November 2026. Every Sofia row was last written on 9 May 2026, so the hours are about six months old: treat them as a snapshot and check before you go.

The plan at a glance

• Day 1, the old centre on foot: the Amphitheatre of Serdica, the Sofia History Museum, the Rotunda Church of St George, the National Institute of Archaeology with Museum, the National Museum of Natural History, lunch at Staria Chinar, St. Alexander Nevski Cathedral and dinner at Bistro Pesto.
• Day 2, the far edges first and then the centre: the National Museum of History, Vitosha Mountain, lunch at Olio D'Oliva, The Red Flat, Cake Lab, the Museum of Illusions and dinner at Pastorant.
• Days of the week: I assume Friday for day one and Saturday for day two. Day one works on Wednesday to Sunday and day two on Monday to Saturday, so Wednesday and Thursday or Thursday and Friday also work.
• Distance: day one is tight, about 3.4 km in total by straight line between stored coordinates. Day two adds up to about 23.7 km, almost all of it in two legs of 8.47 and 13.06 km. These are not travel times.

A Sofia deck with 75 sights, and only 29 of them rated

The Sofia data in the app is one destination row with 494 cards and 494 distinct place IDs. 474 of the cards sit inside my city box; the other 20 are far away, and 12 of those have United States addresses. Of the 474, 257 have a stored rating and 224 have stored opening hours. Among the in-city cards, 78 are sights by my grouping, in nine stored categories: museum (19), art gallery (19), tourist attraction (17), historic site (6), theater and concert hall (6), park (5), amusement place (3), garden (2) and church (1). Three of the 78 are the same place stored twice, which leaves 75 distinct sights. Only 29 of those have a stored rating, 38 have stored hours and 13 clear my line of 4.0 or higher with at least 100 stored reviews. Three of those 13 are bars. This plan uses the other ten.

• Ratings are thin. 46 of the 75 sights, mostly small art galleries and monuments, have no rating at all. That is why the plan leans on the few sights that do.
• Two stops have no hours. The Rotunda Church of St George and Vitosha Mountain are among the best-reviewed cards, but neither has stored hours, so I could not match them to a weekday. They are flagged in the plan.
• Prices, tickets and transport are left out. I read no official page or transit source this run, so check each place's own website the day you go.
• Add your own pins. Anything you want that the data lacks is yours to add on the map yourself.

Which days of the week work

I parsed the stored weekly hours of the 13 stops that have them with a script, set a suggested start time for each, and tested every weekday. A stop fails a day if its stored hours are closed, do not cover the start time, or leave less than one hour before closing. The Rotunda and Vitosha Mountain have no stored hours, so the script cannot test them.

Closed days bite harder for sights than for the city as a whole. Of the 224 in-city places with stored hours, 67 show at least one closed day, 45 show Sunday as closed, 32 Monday and 18 Saturday. Of the 38 sights with stored hours, 24 show at least one closed day: Monday is closed for 15 of them, Sunday for 10 and Saturday for 5. Six of the 12 museum cards with hours are stored as closed on Monday, including the Sofia History Museum, and the National Polytechnical Museum is stored as closed on Saturday and Sunday. The three museums that stay open every day in this plan are the Archaeology Institute, the Natural History Museum and the National Museum of History, plus the Museum of Illusions and The Red Flat. That is why I put the Monday-closed stops on day one and kept day two free of weekday traps except for the Sunday bakery and restaurant. Hours also change with the season and on public holidays, so confirm before you go.

Day 1: the old centre on foot

Day one never leaves a patch about 1.4 km across. By straight line between stored coordinates, the farthest pair, Staria Chinar and Bistro Pesto, is 1.44 km apart, and going stop to stop adds up to about 3.4 km. The longest leg is the 0.99 km from the cathedral to dinner. I read no transit or road source this run, so I give straight-line distances only and no travel times. Times below are my suggested start times.

1. 9:00, Amphitheatre of Serdica: stored as a historic site at ul.Budapeshta 2 (the stored address names a residence hotel), 4.1 from 472 reviews. Stored hours are 9 AM to 7 PM every day, so 9:00 is the opening time.
2. 10:00, Sofia History Museum: stored as a museum at Ploshtad Banski, 4.0 from 359 reviews, open 10 AM to 6 PM from Tuesday to Sunday and closed on Monday. 0.44 km from the amphitheatre.
3. 11:00, The Rotunda Church of St George: stored as a historic site at bulevard Knyaz Aleksandar Dondukov 2, 4.3 from 1,751 reviews, with no stored hours, so I cannot match it to a weekday. 0.28 km from the museum. Check its hours before you rely on an 11:00 start.
4. 11:45, National Institute of Archaeology with Museum: stored as a museum at Ulitsa Saborna 2, 4.4 from 671 reviews, open 10 AM to 6 PM every day. 0.15 km from the Rotunda.
5. 12:45, National Museum of Natural History: stored as a museum at bulevard Tsar Osvoboditel 1, 4.1 from 200 reviews, open 10 AM to 6 PM every day. 0.33 km from the Archaeology Institute. A second card for the same place, 1.4 m away, has no rating or hours.
6. 13:45, Staria Chinar: stored as a restaurant at Knyaz Al.Dondukov Blvd 71, 4.5 from 1,021 reviews, open 10 AM to 11 PM every day. 0.77 km from the museum.
7. 15:15, St. Alexander Nevski Cathedral: stored as a church at Aleksander Nevski Square, 4.5 from 6,734 reviews, the most reviewed in-city sight. Stored hours are 10 AM to 5:30 PM from Tuesday to Sunday and closed on Monday, so a 15:15 start leaves 2 hours 15 minutes. 0.47 km from lunch.
8. 18:30, Bistro Pesto: stored as a restaurant at Str. Angel Kanchev 18 a, 4.6 from 788 reviews, open 1:15 PM to 10 PM from Wednesday to Sunday and closed on Monday and Tuesday. 0.99 km from the cathedral.

Day 2: the south-west and the mountain first, then the centre

Day two has two shapes. The National Museum of History and Vitosha Mountain are each a long way from the centre, so the first two legs are 8.47 km and 13.06 km by straight line between stored coordinates. After lunch the four remaining stops are all within 0.82 km of the one before. The farthest pair, Vitosha Mountain and the Museum of Illusions, is 13.37 km apart, and going stop to stop adds up to about 23.7 km. The middle of day two sits about 2.9 km from the middle of day one. Times below are my suggested start times.

1. 9:30, National Museum of History: stored as a museum at ul.Vitoshko lale 16, 4.2 from 479 reviews, open 9:30 AM to 7 PM every day, so 9:30 is the opening time.
2. 11:30, Vitosha Mountain: stored as a park with the address "Sofia", 4.6 from 1,252 reviews, and no stored hours. It is a single pin on a mountain, 8.47 km from the museum by straight line, and I read nothing on how to reach it or what is open there. Treat it as a half-day wild card.
3. 14:00, Olio D'Oliva: stored as a restaurant at Ulitsa William Gladstone 32, 4.7 from 559 reviews, open noon to 11 PM every day. 13.06 km from the mountain pin.
4. 15:30, The Red Flat: stored as a museum at Ulitsa Ivan Denkoglu 24, 4.6 from 287 reviews, open 10:30 AM to 7:30 PM every day. 0.49 km from lunch.
5. 16:45, Cake Lab: stored as a bakery at ul.Karnigradska 14, 4.8 from 356 reviews, open 8 AM to 7 PM from Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 7 PM on Saturday and closed on Sunday. 0.06 km from The Red Flat.
6. 17:30, Museum of Illusions Sofia: stored as a museum at Knyagina Maria Luisa Blvd 16, 4.9 from 1,194 reviews, open 10 AM to 8 PM every day, so a 17:30 start leaves 2 hours 30 minutes. 0.82 km from the bakery.
7. 19:00, Pastorant: stored as a restaurant at ul.Tsar Asen 16, 4.4 from 694 reviews, open noon to 10:30 PM from Monday to Saturday and closed on Sunday. 0.82 km from the Museum of Illusions.

Where the stored hours bind

These are the stops whose stored hours decide the day or the start time.

What I left out, and why

Unlike a city with a long list of qualifying sights, Sofia leaves no swap pool: the plan uses all ten sights that clear my line and are not bars. If a stop is closed or does not suit you, pick from the near misses below, and read the flag on each.

• Three bars stored as tourist attractions. Delta Blues Bar (4.2 from 594 reviews, open from 3 PM to 3 AM, closed Monday), Patches Blues Bar (4.2 from 443 reviews, no stored hours) and Karaoke Bar Versus (4.1 from 425 reviews) all meet the 4.0 and 100-review line, but they are nightlife, so I kept them out of a day plan. Of the 17 tourist-attraction cards, at least five have bar, disco or karaoke in the name.
• Near misses on rating or reviews. The Museum of Socialist Art (3.9 from 543 reviews, closed Monday), the Monument to the Deity All-Holy Sofia (3.8 from 653 reviews, no stored hours) and the Earth and Man National Museum (4.1 but only 45 reviews, closed Sunday and Monday) fall just short. The Battenberg Mausoleum has stored hours (8 AM to 6 PM every day) but no rating.
• Cards outside Sofia. 7 of the 85 sight cards in the Sofia destination are outside my box: the Houston Zoo (4.4 from 5,321 reviews), the Oklahoma City Zoo (4.4 from 2,276 reviews), a Fort Worth Zoo store, Seven Rila Lakes, the Underground Mining Museum in Pernik, a tourist information centre in Samokov and the clock tower in Botevgrad. The two US zoos rank second and third by review count if you do not filter.
• Other restaurants. Six restaurant cards in the city meet 4.4 and 500 reviews and five have stored hours. I used four of them. The fifth, Etnoteka Hushove (4.4 from 978 reviews), is stored as open only from 8 PM to 3:30 AM on Thursday to Saturday, so it is a late-night stop, not a dinner at 18:30 or 19:00. The sixth has no stored hours.
• Sights with no stored hours. 37 of the 75 sights have none. I used two, the Rotunda and Vitosha Mountain, and I flag both.

Getting around between the stops

• Each day has a different shape. Day one is a single cluster in the centre, so it is a walking day on paper. Day two starts at the National Museum of History in the south-west, jumps to the Vitosha pin in the south, then returns to a dense centre block. The first two legs are the ones to plan rides for. I read no transit, taxi or parking source, so I give no travel times, fares or access advice.
• Straight lines understate the trip. Roads and hills make each real leg longer than the straight-line figures above, and that matters most for the Vitosha leg.
• If you drop Vitosha. The National Museum of History to lunch at Olio D'Oliva is then 5.97 km instead of 21.5 km in two legs, but day two is left with six stops, and I found no other in-city sight with a rating of 4.0 or higher and stored hours to add.
• In the app: each card shows its distance and opening status, and the list sorts by rating, distance or A to Z.

How I would swipe the Sofia deck

I built NomadSwipe, so this is the method I would use, not a trip I already took. I would open the Sofia deck and swipe right on the museums, historic sights and the few well-reviewed places to eat, and left on anything with a United States address, because the deck holds a dozen of those, and on the bars filed as attractions. I would check any card without a rating or hours before saving it, since 46 of the 75 sights have no rating. Then I would open the map to see which saved places cluster. In this data they fall into a tight old-centre group that day one uses whole, a handful of far pins to the south-west and south, and a block of galleries, cafes and restaurants west of the centre that day two ends in. The closed-day pattern above is the part to check last, because a good cluster can still be shut on a Monday. NomadSwipe is Android only.

Planning another city? See the full list of guides, the 2 days in Athens, the 3 days in Budapest, the 2 days in Yerevan, the 2 days in Vienna, the printable travel itinerary template, how to find things to do in a new city, how to save places for a trip, an app to plan a trip on a map or a travel swipe app.

Questions about this Sofia plan

Which days of the week work for this Sofia plan?

By the stored hours, day one works from Wednesday to Sunday and day two works from Monday to Saturday, so the pairs that work are Wednesday and Thursday, Thursday and Friday, or Friday and Saturday. Day one fails on Monday because the Sofia History Museum, St. Alexander Nevski Cathedral and Bistro Pesto are stored as closed, and on Tuesday because Bistro Pesto is stored as closed. Day two fails only on Sunday, when Cake Lab and Pastorant are stored as closed. The Rotunda Church of St George and Vitosha Mountain have no stored hours, so they are not tested. The hours were stored in May 2026 and read on 7 November 2026, so confirm them before you go.

Do I need a car for this Sofia plan?

I read no transit, taxi or parking source, so I cannot say what is available. Day one is compact, with legs of 0.99 km or less by straight line between stored coordinates. Day two is not: the first two legs are 8.47 km and 13.06 km, because the National Museum of History and Vitosha Mountain are far from the centre. Treat the start of day two as rides and check your own options.

Why does the app's Sofia deck contain a Houston zoo?

Of the 494 cards stored under Sofia, 20 sit outside my city box, including 12 with United States addresses, among them the Houston Zoo and the Oklahoma City Zoo. I do not know how they got there. I removed them before counting, and in the app I would swipe them left.

How were the 15 stops chosen?

I picked by hand from the cards inside Sofia: sights with a stored rating of 4.0 or higher and at least 100 stored reviews, restaurants with 4.4 or higher and at least 500 reviews and stored hours, and one bakery from a looser pass. That gave ten sights, four restaurants and one bakery. Each suggested start time was then tested against the stored weekly hours for the 13 stops that have them.

Findings, method and sample

Sample and method. I read the NomadSwipe app's place data on 7 November 2026 with read-only queries. Sofia is stored as one destination row with the country code BGR and 494 cards, 494 distinct place IDs and 490 distinct places by case-insensitive title and address. All 494 rows were written between 17:59 and 18:02 UTC on 9 May 2026. The data is not limited to the city, so I defined "in Sofia" as a card whose stored coordinates fall inside a rough box (latitude 42.55 to 42.85, longitude 23.15 to 23.5), without using the address text. That keeps 474 cards (474 IDs, 470 by title and address) and drops 20. The counts below are of the 474 in-city cards unless stated. I defined sights by stored category name, counted case-sensitively: tourist attraction, museum, art gallery, historic site, theater and concert hall, park, amusement place, garden, zoo and church. Across the whole destination that is 85 sight cards in 10 categories; zoo exists only outside the box, so inside it the count is 78 sights in 9 categories. All 78 have different place IDs, but I merged three pairs by hand that are the same place under two IDs, so the sight count is 75: the two Natural History Museum cards (1.4 m apart), the two National Gallery cards (identical coordinates) and the Monument to the Tsar Liberator and Statue of Tsar Alexander II cards (about 11 m apart, at the same Parliament square). Where I merged, I kept the card with a rating and hours. An empty or missing hours list counts as no stored hours. I measured distance in a straight line between stored coordinates.

• Of the 474 in-city cards, 257 have a stored rating, and 193 of those are rated 4.0 or higher. 95 are rated 4.5 or higher. The median stored rating is 4.3. 224 of the 474 have stored weekly hours.
• Of the 75 distinct sights, 29 have a stored rating and reviews, 38 have stored hours and 37 have none. Rated 4.0 or higher with at least 100 stored reviews: 13 sights, of which 10 have stored hours. Three of the 13 are bars stored as tourist attractions (Delta Blues Bar, Patches Blues Bar and Karaoke Bar Versus). The other ten are six museums, two historic sites, one church and one park, and eight of them have stored hours. The 100 line is mine, not a rule in the app.
• The raw ranking is misleading. Among the 85 sight cards in the destination, the three with the most reviews are St. Alexander Nevski Cathedral (6,734), the Houston Zoo (5,321) and the Oklahoma City Zoo (2,276). The Rotunda Church of St George (1,751) is fourth.
• The 20 cards outside the box include 12 with United States addresses, one in Montenegro and seven in other parts of Bulgaria (Pernik, Samokov, Botevgrad, Sapareva Banya and one Sofia address far to the west).
• Of the 224 places with stored hours, 67 show at least one closed day. 45 show Sunday as closed, 32 Monday, 18 Saturday, 13 Tuesday, 7 Wednesday, 4 Thursday and 1 Friday. Of the 38 sights with stored hours, 24 show at least one closed day: Monday 15, Sunday 10, Saturday 5, Tuesday 3, and Wednesday, Thursday and Friday 1 each. Compared with the Tucson deck, where 105 of 482 places with hours (22 in 100) show Monday as closed, Sofia places are less often closed on Monday (32 of 224, about 14 in 100) but a sight is far more likely to be: 15 of 38.
• Of the 184 restaurant cards in the city, 110 have stored hours, six meet 4.4 or higher with at least 500 reviews and five of those have stored hours. I used four of the five. I also ran a looser pass for rated 4.4 or higher with 300 to 499 reviews and picked one bakery from it (Cake Lab, 4.8 from 356 reviews), so the fifteenth stop does not meet the 500 line.
• I chose the 15 stops by hand: ten sights (lowest rating 4.0, fewest reviews 200), four restaurants and one bakery, across five stored categories (museum, historic site, church, park and restaurant, plus bakery). They are not simply the 15 highest-rated cards. Thirteen have stored hours.
• Using straight-line distance between stored coordinates, day one totals about 3.4 km (longest leg 0.99 km, farthest pair 1.44 km) and day two about 23.7 km (longest leg 13.06 km, farthest pair 13.37 km). The middle points of the two days are about 2.9 km apart. These are not driving times.
• Weekday test: with a one-hour margin before closing, the 13 stops that have stored hours pass on Wednesday to Sunday for day one and Monday to Saturday for day two. The test script is mine and was run on the stored values.

Limits: the ratings, review counts and hours are stored values written in May 2026 and may have changed since. The Rotunda and Vitosha Mountain have no stored hours and are not weekday-tested. The suggested start times are mine and are checked only against stored hours. The city box and the three hand merges are my own definitions and were not checked card by card, so a few duplicates or misplaced cards may remain, and the museum category also holds galleries and similar places. I left out fees, tickets, transport and travel times because I read no official page for them, and I did not copy any third-party review text.

Sources

• Place data: the NomadSwipe app's Sofia places (names, categories, ratings, review counts, addresses, coordinates and weekly hours as stored), read 7 November 2026. The Tucson comparison figure comes from the NomadSwipe Tucson guide. No third-party pages were used.