Prima 1

Bogoridi Street

by iavormar

Walk along the Bogoridi Street downtown Burgas and enjoy the uncountable amount of cafes and bars on this street full with you people. Here you canm drink coctails and enjoy the evening breeze from the sea.

Waiting For Summer?

by johngayton

These jewellry sellers on the Troika Square certainly were being optimistic on a freezing cold February morning. They were there every day during my visit but I didn't see anyone even browsing their wares - a bit too cold to take the gloves off!

Burgas's Archaeological Museum

by johngayton

As with most Bulgarian museums this is primarily an educational and research resource but still makes for an interesting rainy day thing to do. The exposition chronologically displays locally-discovered artefacts from the Bronze Age to the period of Roman occupation.

Whilst most of the display is in Bulgarian there is a crib sheet available in several languages which gives you a sort of self-guided tour.

In winter the museum is open Monday to Friday from 9 am to 5 pm and in Summer from Monday to Saturday 10 am to 7 pm. Admission (Feb2010) is 2 leva and it appears that photos are allowed (well at least no-one told me otherwise).

Bulgaria Hotel

by ChristinaNest

There is a small park next to the Bulgaria hotel, at the corner of the two pedestrian streets, Alexandrovska and Bogoridi. It a great place to sit down and relax and let the kids play. There is a fountain too.

A Welcoming Railway Station and a Mini-bar Tale!

by johngayton

"People Make Places"

Unfortunately I only had less than 24 hours here in Bourgas on my first visit but that 24 hours was enough to leave me with a very favourable impression of the city. As with Varna I immediately felt welcome as I arrived at the railway station, and strangely enough the railway station here is almost identical to that of Varna, having been designed by the same architect.

Whilst the city doesn't present itself as a tourist destination as such, it is however a very attractive city with its wide spacious streets, interesting architecture, pedestrianised shopping areas and square, the Sea Gardens and its Central Beach.

As I say in my chapter title it is "People Make Places" and without exception I felt perfectly comfortable in all my minor interactions with local people, whether in the bars, restaurants, the smiling bus driver when I almost missed the bus to Sozopol (he had actually just started to drive off when I arrived but stopped to let me aboard), the woman in the ticket office at the railway station who double checked that I knew my train connection going back to Varna, the staff at the hotel, YEP! Everyone :)

In fact the only little disappointment that I had here was when I opened my hotel room's mini-bar - Ha! (But you'll have to go to the hotel tip for that tale;))

"A Local Brewery Always Helps Too!"

Bourgas is Bulgaria's 4th largest city with a population of just over 220,000 and is located on the Back Sea coast in the South Eastern corner of the country. The city seems to vie with Varna for which is actually the busiest seaport, as both city's websites make the same claim, but it is very much a working port and industrial city. In common with Varna, Bourgas has managed to avoid the obvious "rough and readiness" usually associated with docksides. Instead it comes across as a cultured, laid-back sort of a place where people have the time to stop and chat in the streets, where children play in the main square without coming across as yobs, and the old boys and girls can sit in the sun and do whatever old boys and girls do when left to their own devices.

With the sun shining on a mid-May afternoon the terraces of the bars and cafes come to life and I was pleasantly surprised to find that Bourgas has it's own brewery and so made my own little contribution to the local economy!

"And Pretty Girls Certainly Do!"

Yes there certainly is something special about Bulgarian women whose eyes smile as much as their mouths and are just naturally beautiful - here in Burgas is no exception!

UPDATE FEB 2010

A second visit has now been duly enjoyed, this time in the middle of winter. An excellent hotel, along with its superb restaurant and sexy waitress, discovered - one where the minibar actually had beer in it! The Sea Garden and the shoreline footpath made for an interesting wander and I became a fan of the Chernomoretz football club and am now an honorary "Shark".

And the girls are just as pretty, just wearing a lot more clothes ;(