Sonia Arova was born as Sophie Errio on 20 June 1927 in Sofia, Kingdom of Bulgaria.
They eventually caught a ship to Plymouth from Bayonne; reputedly the last ship to leave, after Andrée Ratcliffe, with three children on her passport (her son was at school in England) refused to leave Sophie, as she was then called, alone on the dockside.
She danced with Rudolph Nureyev in their American debut with Ruth Page's Chicago Opera Ballet troupe in New York City (1962).
In 1996, the pair returned to San Diego, California, where her daughter, Ariane, lived.
In a ceremony at the United Nations, she was made a Dame by King Olaf V of Norway, becoming the second woman so distinguished.