Hi Elise,

Welcome to the board.

Varna is a reasonably large city - if you enter the coordinates 43 12 59.92N 27 54 42.50E into Google Earth & zoom out, you will get an overview of the city and many photos of different areas of the city by clicking the displayed blue square links. Many rental villas tend to be to the North of the city, in the vicinity of Vinitsa/Evksinograd/Sveti Konstantin, which overlook the Black Sea.

As far as meal prices are concerned, what do they cost in your local area? A pretty wide range of prices, I suspect - the same is true of Varna or any other town/city in the world.

You can (especially if you read & speak a little Bulgarian) eat very cheaply. For example I had a 3 course meal with a large (500ml) beer last year for significantly less than 10 Leva (worth approx. £4 at that time).

If you take a look at prices on the Happy Bar & Grill Menu (click the 'EN' symbol at the top right of the page to change from Bulgarian to English - if then taken back to the main BGMenu webpage, click the "Happy Ново Меню" image on the left of the page), you will get an idea of prices at a relatively 'cheap & cheerful' chain which has a couple of branches in Varna.

For example, from the above 'Happy' menu, "Roast Beef" (baked veal bon fillet (you rarely see real beef in Bulgaria, even when the English menu says 'beef') with pasta, garnished with crisp potatoes) is 20.29 Leva; Pork loin in Pepper sauce is 8.49 Leva; Cajun chicken is 8.69 Leva - desserts: Crème brûlée with strawberries or raspberries is 2.09 Leva; Tiramisu is 3.89 Leva.

A bottle of local gin, costs around 7 or 8 Leva - or did last year in Dobrich, from memory (I have a neighbour in my village who frequently pops in for a gin, so have to keep some handy, when I'm there).

I am going to Bulgaria for a couple of days at the beginning of next month, so will try to check out latest prices while I am there.

Baldur

Thank you for your reply it was very helpful, we will have a look at all you suggest and let you know what we decide. I don't mind about beaches as long as we have a pool but husband does like the sea, so got to please both!!!

I don't mind about beaches as long as we have a pool but husband does like the sea, so got to please both!!!

You've probably got the best of both worlds in Varna, a fairly cosmopolitan city with its own stretch of beach, as well as other beaches/resorts very close at hand, e.g. Galata, Asparuhovo, Sveti Konstantin i Elena, Alen Mak, Golden Sands, Sunny Day - even Albena is only a 5 Leva bus ride away.

That sounds really nice, just waiting to get a reply from the villa letting people

We have been offered a nice villa in the village of Zornitsa, anyone know it? Would appreciate any information?
Elise

Hi Elise,

There are 6 villages named Зорница ('Zornitsa') in Bulgaria.

Presumably the one in which you have been offered the villa is the one in the Aksakovo municipality? If so, it's about 23 kilometres North West of central Varna, off the Varna-Dobrich road on the Southern part of the Dobrudzha plateau which overlooks Varna Airport - probably around 300-500 metres above sea level.

It depends what you want from a holiday, not really my idea of a holiday location but it may be yours, if you want a bucolic idyll - it's a bit 'off the beaten track', so public transport may well be quite limited. I believe that a number of Brits/Western Europeans have purchased properties in the general area, which probably explains why a rural property has a pool (presumably, as that was one of your stated requirements). There were 150 inhabitants registered in the village, as at 1st January 2007, so eating/drinking/shopping facilities are likely to be limited without travelling elsewhere - my own village had just under 200 inhabitants on 1/1/2007 and is quite limited in terms of resources.

Copying & pasting the following coordinates into Google Earth will take you straight to the village's location - 43 19 46.74N 27 43 53.30E. Zoom out to get an idea of its location relative to Varna and the coastal resorts.

Hope this helps.

Baldur

Thank you
You are being so helpful, all it says is that the village is 10km from airport and nearest beach is 15km so sounds like it is very peaceful and we can maybe travel at night if need to socialise outwith the chickens and donkeys lol, new to this forum or i would pm you the details if i could find the pm button lol
Kindest Regards
Elise

Hi Elise,

The PM button is at the bottom of every post alongside the profile button (it may not be available to you until you have made a few more posts).

You'll see Zornitsa's location in this map (green flag), central Varna is indicated by the red flag.



Both of the distances that you have been given appear to have an element of 'poetic licence' about them. As you can see, the airport is farther than half-way from Zornitsa to Varna - the distance given by the route planner between the flags is 22.998 km.

I can't, by any stretch of the imagination (even as the crow flies), think of what any reasonable person would think of as a beach closer than the stretch in Varna itself, which is clearly more than 15km away (the darker blue water shown on the map is the Varna ship canal, which serves the power station, many chemical/mineral factories, and Varna docks, so 'the seaside' it's not.... ). Varna beach really starts just left of the top of the 'V' in 'VARNA' on the map, level with the top of the nearby anchor symbol, then continues in a North Easterly direction towards the coastal holiday resorts.

Baldur

Hi
We have taken the plunge and going for the Shabla choice, hope we have made the right choice, it does sound like it, owners sound really nice and helpfull. Thank you once again for all your advice it really helped greatly
Elise

Hi Elise,

Glad to hear that the owners are helpful.

As I said, in our exchange of PMs, I haven't been to Shabla itself, but it certainly has the potential of being a better bet for a first visit to Bulgaria than Zornitsa.

You will find some information on Shabla HERE and find some photos of the coastline (hopefully no snow when you are there!) and other stuff HERE. The latter website is that of the Shabla obshtina (municipality) and is in Bulgarian - but photos are universal....
Baldur

Once again you have come up trumphs with all your information and help. Thank you once again