What's it like to travel in southeastern Europe - Balkans, Romania, and/or Bulgaria?

I'm thinking about backpacking and staying in hostels. Mostly I'm wondering what the buses are like - do they run on time, bumpy, slow or reasonably fast in the different countries. On the same note I'm wondering about ferry services in Croatia. My secondary concern is which hostels anyone would recommend?

Of course, I'd love to hear memories or experiences you'd enjoy passing on, too!

My route is Zagreb - Dubrovnik - Macedonia - Sofia - Bucharest - on to Hungary & NE Europe.

I can tell u something about Romania. It`s a great country, nice people, good clubs etc.
If u wanna stay for some days in Bucharest it`s great but not for a longer time. And DON`T take the bus. They are slow, bumpy, stinky and with a lot of strange people. Take the train from Bucharest to Hungary, but not the normal one, the Intercity. It`s clean, safe and the food in the restaurant is good. Hope I could help.
Have a nice trip

If you're not sure about the southeastern go to the northern! Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia-great and extremely cheap countries. I live in Lithuania, and can tell you that nobody regrets visiting ours. We got a sea, great old-towns, extreeeeeemely beautiful nature and warm people.

http://www.hfhs.hr this is the link for the Croatian hostels, bus and ferry services in Croatia run without problems, during the season country is occupied by tourists so must be good.
Tip for the bus, if you want good fast bus always book direct connections which doesn’t stop in every town.

I only know about Romania. I took a bus from Bucharest to Sinaia. Don't take a bus in Romania cause it seems Romanians can't drive. Then I took a train back to Bucharest from Sinaia. It was nice except there was people kept coming to me begging for money. Romania is a very cool country and overall Romanians are very cool as well.