Golden Sands

Golden Sands is one of the largest Bulgarian coastal resorts, developed from the 1950s along about three and a half kilometres of wide sand beach north of Varna, with a dense wall of hotels behind it and the wooded Golden Sands nature park rising immediately inland, which is why the resort is narrow and has forest at its back. The beach shelves gently and the water is warm from late June. It is a package destination with the full range of that: water sports, bars, clubs and a summer season that runs from June to September and effectively closes outside it. The Aladzha rock monastery is in the park behind, and Varna is twenty minutes down the coast.

History

Pliny wrote of the old forests between Odessos and Dionysopolis as the home of mythical dwarfs visited by the Argonauts, a Byzantine fortress called Gerania left ramparts and a basilica of the 4th-7th centuries on the edge of the Franga plateau, and under the Ottomans the long sands, Uzunkum, were known as a hideout for outlaws. The area stayed largely uninhabited until the 1950s; building began in 1957, and within about two decades it became a large holiday complex, first planned for 13,000 hotel beds (Wikipedia, Golden Sands).

Highlights

• Three and a half kilometres of sand - the wide beach the resort is built on.
• Forest directly behind - the nature park rising inland from the hotels.
• A gentle shelving beach - shallow warm water for a long way out.
• Aladzha monastery in the park - the rock-cut site a short walk inland.

When to go

June to September; the resort closes almost entirely outside that. A week is the standard package. July and August are the busiest and most expensive. June and September are warm and quieter.

Practical notes

It is a package resort with very little local character and heavy nightlife. The beach is crowded and sunbeds take most of it. Prices are high relative to the rest of Bulgaria. Everything shuts from October.

Nearby

Aladzha monastery is in the park behind; Varna lies south.