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The Best Beach Resorts in Bulgaria

The Bulgarian Black sea coast is about 400 kilometers long with large and small resorts. Sun-seekers have a wealth of choices for accommodations and beach activities.

Most of the hotels are privately run and maintain Western standards of health and safety. Quite a few include spa centers in addition to access to the golden sands of the Black Sea beaches.

Among the most popular resorts is the northern Black Sea coast resort of Golden Sands (Zlatni Piasaci), which has 61 hotels, many recently fully renovated. The resort, 17 km north of Varna, is an attractive combination of a calm and warm sea, forested slopes near the beach, mineral springs and a tempting choice of good quality restaurants. The area is famous for the purest sand on the Black Sea coast.

Also on the northern Black Sea coast, close to Golden Sands, Riviera Holiday Club has six hotels located on the beach in a nice and quiet park. Sunny Day tourist complex, 10 km north of Varna, has four hotels ranging from five stars to two. This resort has two well-equipped spa health centers, offering treatments from mud baths and laser therapy to aromatherapy.

Thirty km from Varna, Albena has a total of 14 900 beds in 43 hotels, ranging from two to four stars. Nestled in a picturesque bay, the resort has a temperate climate and boasts a wide sandy beach. Water sports, a children's amusement park, and many fine restaurants complete the picture. Scuba and sailing lessons are available at very reasonable prices.

Golden Sands beach, near Varna, is famous for the purest sand on the Black Sea coast.

On the southern Black Sea coast, Sunny Beach has more than 100 hotels, 2 campsites, over 130 restaurants, taverns with folklore shows, bars with floor shows, night clubs, casino, discos and cafes. (ED NOTE: But be warned if you're taking the family. Sunny Beach is a great singles' scene and one of Bulgaria's best "party" beaches.)

Sozopol, about 30 km south of Bourgas, has a smaller range of hotels, with about 1,800 beds between them. Sozopol is one of the oldest of Bulgaria's coastal towns. It is founded in 610 BC by Miletian Greeks. Today, this charming place is a popular tourist resort best known for its casual ambience, sandy beaches and distinctive nineteenth-century stone and wood houses.

Nesebur, named a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site in 1983, draws about a million visitors annually, and its narrow, historically venerable streets, are often choked in mid-summer with tourists sampling its culinary delights and shopping for memorabilia. The town, which dates back about 9,000 years and is famed for its beautiful medieval churches, has a competitive range of hotels and private accommodation.