Sunny Beach (or will it ever stop raining in Bulgaria?)

I haven't been on a cross-country bus in years.  I wasn't sure what to expect, but except for the rain, it wasn't a bad trip.  And it meant one less round through airport security.

The Bulgarian countryside is pretty, but a whole bunch of nothing.  Few settlements and even fewer exits.  It was pretty much a straight shot to the coast.  We made two stops at the cluster of cities in the middle of the country, but that was it.  And the rain continued off and on through the entire journey.

We arrived at Burgas bus station, a pretty yellow building, and I sat down to wait.  My host had agreed to pick me up at the station.  Except it wasn’t this station.  I’m thinking he was to pick me up in Burgas, but he meant to pick me up from the Sunny Beach station once I’d taken the shuttle from Burgas.  Instead, I just sat waiting in the light rain and gathering dark for 1 ½ hours for nothing.  I’m an idiot.

Just as I set off to find a bus (using Google Translate to read the Bulgarian bus signs), a man approached me.  He’d been sitting in a cab across the street the entire time I’d been there and he must have seen my frustration.  He offered me a ride and after figuring out the address and the cost I agreed.  Anything to end the waiting.

Realizing that Burgas was an hour away from Sunny Beach, I understood why the host wouldn’t want to drive so far.  He did greet me at the hotel next to the apartment, got me in the building, and showed me around.  As for my new place … yeah.  It was clean and had most of the amenities.  But it was cold and impersonal unlike the place in Sofia which was very cozy.  The faux marble floor always looked wet when it was just shiny and could benefit from some throw rugs.  There is no microwave and the provided towels were kind of funky.

While the building itself is almost deathly quiet, from that first night to every night afterwards, there was a party going on somewhere else on the property.  I would discover later that the clubs and bars are not far from the apartment and there was loud music playing every night up until around midnight.  Annoying, but I got used to it.  Then, in the morning, the masses of seagulls in the area would wake me up with their incessant squawking.  With all the noise from the birds, it felt like I was visiting Jurassic Park. Oh, look.  There’s a dinosaur.

First morning there and ready to explore – but the rain continued.  What was worse was all the standing water everywhere.  The sidewalks, the street – it was a struggle to navigate around the puddles while still being mindful of the cars passing by and stirring up more water.  

My first view of a Balkan Beach – completely deserted and rainy.

I know it was raining and this is Bulgaria (party capital of the world), but the place feels half-dead.  Like the resort aspect of the place is well past its prime.  There are plenty of hotels here, restaurants, supermarkets, and pharmacies though half of them were closed. 

The dinosaur pictured above was fronting one of two dinosaur parks that were both closed.  A lot of the buildings I walked past were obviously residential and there were people walking around with their families, but very few appeared to be tourists.  It’s the end of May.  My first day in Bulgaria was on American Memorial Day, traditionally the beginning of summer and yet there’s no one here.  I ate out twice on that first day.  Two other tables filled while I ate breakfast, but for dinner, I had the entire restaurant to myself.  How do these people stay in business?

I have to mention something else about the weather.  I knew the rain was cooling everything down, but it was still May.  No, I don’t know anything about Bulgarian weather patterns, but it felt way too cold to be the beginning of summer.  I went online to check.  Yep.  I knew it wasn’t just me.  According to Microsoft on 5/30/23, at 74 degrees F, there was a record low temperature in Sunny Beach.  So much for getting in some beach time.

By Wednesday, though, the sun finally showed itself.  I could shed the hoodie and the umbrella and really get a sense of the place.  Oh.  There are the tourists.  The rain had kept them hidden, but they were there.  Not enough to sustain the place in my opinion, but at least the boardwalk was a lot livelier. 

There were the usual cafes, souvenir shops, clothing stores and the like on the very long strip.  Also a bunch of tattoo parlors and fish spas.  I’d first spotted one of these in Lisbon and thought it unusual.  There are at least five of them here.  You pay a small fee to sit with your feet in a fish tank while the fish eat away dead skin.  Interesting to look at, but I didn’t indulge.

By the end of the week, the temperature had risen enough to lay out on the beach.  The water was still freezing, but that didn’t stop others from getting in.  The beach offered jets skies, parachuting and speed boat rides.

I have to say that the Brits really get around.  In every location I’ve visited, there have been plenty of British tourists.  Their presence is so strong here that nearly every restaurant has a version of the full English Breakfast.  It became a goal of mine to find the best one on the strip.  This one had the best coffee. 

But this one had fries.  For breakfast 😊.

Being a resort town, there were also plenty of bars and happy hours everywhere.  The place took any opportunity to get you drunk.  I attended a couple of two for one drink specials.

And I am a sucker for an interesting cocktail.

Despite the slow decay of the resort, the beach was still nice.  And since the Bulgarian lev is worth about 50 cents on the American dollar, you can get a decent bang for your buck here.