Hotel Royal Park Reviews

We have just got back from a 14night holiday to Bulgaria. Here is my opinion of the place, I hope it helps!!!

Hotel: Excellent choice as it was nice and secluded and a good distance from Sunny beach. The resort consists of 3 hotels only and Royal Park was by far the best!! It was definately 4star to look at but some aspects of the hotel were a 3 star!!! We had a one bed suite which was very spacious and kept clean by the maid. She spoke very little english but was nice. There were only 2 sets of lifts and alot of time was spent waitng for the lifts( be careful of the lift doors as there were a few incidents!). The hotel was very beautiful to look at , and the grounds were beautifully kept with a tame deer and peacocks roaming around.The reception staff were ok - not brilliant, but then I had to keep reminding myself that english was their 3rd language after bulgarian and russian! The pool was far too cold, but the sea was great!!There were plenty of sunbeds if you got to the beach by 10.00am.

Entertainment: The FC reps did a splendid job to keep everyone entertained, there was a kids disco at 8pm(which my daughter loved!), and various other shows that they put on.The animatoruim could get really smoky though, so as soon as the disco finished, we would go and take her to the bouncy castle which was across the lawn on the beach. The irish bar was ok, the bar at the reception was always busy and you'd find people hogging chairs!!

Food and Drink: COULD DO BETTER!!! We are veggie, and the first 2 evenings we ate chips and more chips, there was NO veggie option until we filled a request form in. The very next day we got a lovely veggie cottage pie. The veggie food would only appear evey other day, so, it was back to chips. I am a fussy eater and I did not like their salads and I personally think that that considering the chefs were ' british', they cooked more like bulgarians!!!In the end, we used to go to Sunny Beach where we discovered a lovely Indian restaurant called ' Taj Mahal' and ate to our hearts content!!

Breakfast at the restaurant was nice, we would have an omlette and some bread (only 2 toasters), the baked beans were the strangest I'd ever seen and the scrambled eggs were lumpy!!
We never bothered with lunch at the restaurant, but the pizza place on the beach was great, fresh hot slices of pizza's - you couldn't manage more that 2 as they were very generous in size.
The restaurant was quite dull and they were forever running out of cutlery. All in all , if you love your meat/fish then you could have a feast at the restaurant,as there were about 3/4 meat of fish dishes.
The soft drinks were watered down. We made the mistake of giving our little girl coke for the first day, and she was running around climbing the walls....she then stuck to watery sprite or water.

We took the bus to nesseber(you have to change at sunny beach), and although it is a pretty town the shops were more or less selling the same stuff as the shops in Sunny beach.I loved sunny beach - it had loads of shops, bars and plenty of bouncy castles.We would go to Sunny beach every evening and get a bite to eat and have few drinks and just roam the shops. It's about 20levs by taxi one way to sunny beach and about 1.80levs by bus!!!

There is a taxi stand outside the main gates of our hotel. We used the same taxi guy for the entire 2 weeks we were there for, as we had to venture further out of Bourgas to visit friends. The guy's name is Niki and his number is 0898 606 555. He is extremely reliable and will not rip you off ad really nice. I had a couple of outing to Bourgas and sunny beach on my own and I felt really safe all the time. He'll pick you up from anywhere you want and will never let you down. He has a brother called Stan who also is really nice. Please use him as he will make a difference to your journey!!!

All in all I did have a great time in Bulgaria - you have to remember it is not spain and that they are fairly new to this.
I would definately go back to Elenite and Royal Park. We met some fantastic people who have become our friends and the bulgarian people, too are extremely nice and polite. Have a great holiday......

We stayed at the Royal Park with another family of 4 and like almost everyone else was very concerned after seeing the Holidays from Hell programme. All in all we had a great time and although i note so many people saying the hotel has well earned its 4 stars we all felt 3 was more like it and it has a long way to go to earn higher than this.

It is a very large hotel, spectacular to look at when you first arrive, lovely marble floors, large electric gates etc..we were told by a taxi driver it took 7 months to build with everyone pitching in which is probably why a few things seemed to have be forgotten. We were unfortunate enough to experience the mother of all thunderstorms which turned into 3 evenings of constant heavy rain. We were lucky to have a balcony with railings so the rain drained off ok, unfortunately for our friends they had a bricked-in balcony.

Now the problem in this was the floor was slightly sloped with a drain for the water to go down which is fine if the floor sloped in the right direction, need I say more!! 4 inches of rain water later we asked reception if it could be cleared as it was starting to seep through the door, we were told the cleaners were starting at floor 1 and working their way up to us which may be the next day as we were on floor 7! My friend and i managed to 'borrow' a broom from the cleaner's cupboard and do it ourselves (hilarious sight!!)we then went to leave but was unable to lock the room, subsequently maintenance came and banged it with a hammer (the way everything is repaired in the Royal Park), a few days later my friend was locked IN the room, the hammer returned!! Once the water was drained it went down the drain pipe and stopped short of about a foot of the downstairs patio area with no drain to take it away, hence a brand new swimming pool!!!

The restaurant we struggled with but i have to honest here there were 8 of us and 2 found no problem with the food whatsover so i suppose it's what you like the only thing i would say i didn't feel there was much choice for the kids and it was a worry when they hardly ate a thing for 2 weeks. The outside bbq is worth a go though we went there 3 times and they have their own entertainment. As for crockery, cutlery etc (do a nice range in builder's mugs with chips around the edge) in the main restaurant i think they need to go shopping and while they're there buy some milk for the coffee machine!!

Beach is fantastic Elenite is very quiet so there was nowhere to walk to in the evening but you can catch the bus to Sunny Beach around 5 levs for 4 but this price seems to vary and if you get the alcholic bus conductor she does like to give herself a little extra in her wages it seems!! Nessebar is a must we went twice, took a taxi (30 levs each way) for an evening meal at the Old Anchor(just find the English sausage man)the food and staff are lovely and it's cheap!

Highlight for us was the Jeep Safari, fantastic day we went day after the storm and it never went to plan was always getting stuck in the mud but the drivers were fantastic just towed each other out banged the jeep with the hammer and off we go again. Get mischevious Nikkoli he made our day. Can buy a DVD at the end cost 75 lev but well worth the money. Also recommend Khans Tent great location and the entertainment was amazing there is a contortionist which only seeing is believing never seen anything like it. We did the reps night but found this a little disappointing but having said that the First Choice reps are great. If you need medical assitance make sure you see the rep they give you a number and the doctor comes and collects you, takes you to clinic in Sunny Beach, one in resort is very expensive apparently. Weirdess moment was seeing the hotel deer sunbathing by the pool with holiday makers!! Oh and i would just like to say after the balcony and door incident, during the night, while our friends were in bed a member of staff walked in with a bowl of fruit and a bottle of champagne which was a nice touch.

Fake designer stuff available everywhere get a Dolce and Gabbana t-shirt for around £5 and perfume costs around £7 a bottle. We did have a great time afterall it's what you make it and we did have a few laughs, wouldn't go back especially not to Elenite but then we like going somewhere different each time anyway. Take it as you find it and you'll be fine, i wouldn't say cancel if you've booked because what doesn't suit one is not the case for the other all i would say if you're thinking of going bear in mind it is a large hotel in a quiet location very much for young families , music and entertainment going on throughout the day and the all inclusive in my opinion wasn't the best. Happy holidaying

Very impressive when you first drive up.Building is falling apart already.Rooms fine apart from uncomfortable sofa beds.Swimming pool freezing and too many chemicals. Staff always cleaning. Food ok. Chipped and cracked crockery in restaurant and never enough knives and forks.Some staff a bit surly.FC reps try hard but entertainment gets a bit repetative after a while.Beer completely alchohol free unless you buy your own.We had a good holiday but there's no way this is a 4 star hotel. Sunny beach very lively 20 Levs each way in a taxi or 1.80 on the bus.

August 26-sept 10th. 2 weeks.
2 adults 2 kids.

We were worried after reading some reviews here on the site about going to Royal Park but things were not too bad.
The food in the main hall however is rather bad, in that it's practically the same chioce day in day out, There is a huge cup, cutlery and glass shortage and if you leave your seat to get another drink the waitress takes away your plate so you then have to go get more food.Take my advice and book for the three A La Cartes as often as you can, but be there early or you will miss out, you can book them any time between the 10am and 11am on the day that you want to eat there but get there for 9.30 to ensure you get in. The Talyana is the bbq and its quite nice. The sozopol which is situated in the lobby area of the main Elenite village is very tasty but the sunshine was my favourite by far which was absolutly fab.

We ended up going into sunny Beach a few nights to eat at a place called 'Condor' which was amazing, very cheap indeed. 7 people ate and drank well for no more than 40 quid. (about 90lev.)

The rooms were spacious, some people grumbled that thier rooms were dirty and not cleaned regularly but we had no complaints, the cleaners were overworked and obviously underpaid as we gave our cleaner a 35 lev tip which is about 15 quid i think and we were treated like royalty. The locals are wonderful people and again we heard people complaining they were grumpy,however i witnessed alot of these people actually not even saying please or thanks to the staff, and generally being quite snotty with them, i wouldn't be too happy with that either and would be quite grumpy too, I found the staff were great with my family and very attentative to the kids.

The beach was a bit dirty though, there would be alot of empty cups and stuff lying about on the sand of a morning as the entertainmemnt is outside until, september, although that is the fault of the tourists who have no respect, there were bins everywhere but some ignorant people chose to chuck things on the floor. The staff were fighting a losing battle with some guests who had graffitied the walls i felt ashamed to be British. also fag butts and enpty drinks bottles littered the stairs and a handful of bored teenagers who came into the dinner hall and made a mess for the fun of it. Obviously their parents were too busy getting tanked up on the all inclusive ale to bother where they where, as i say i was ashamed to be British at times.

The first choice reps were wonderful and put their hearts and souls into everything they did, the mini discos, the caberets and various game show type quizes, something all the time, not to mention a daytime program too, day time quizzes and bingo, volleyball, polo and freanch bouls, pool and darts and much more. the kids club staff were great too, let your kids go to the chocloate party they have a ball and get very messy, trips to sunny beach just for them (4 hours peace for mums and dads) well organised and plenty of reps to help.

The Bulgarian nighht to the Golden Barrel awas great (again though the food there was awfull my kids chicken was raw)
The lemonade they provided was disgusting so take some extra levs for them to get icecream chocolate and drinks, they will need it.

We took a boat into Nessbar and i really enjoyed that it was 20 levs each which works out at around 9 quid a person return, the bazzaar there is full of fakes which are really good quality, Bourgas is rubbish for shopping though i've thrown better stuff away. Sunny Beach is Blackpool with sun so don't say i didn't warn you, great for grub though.
The Aqua park was great but not enough rubber rings to go on the various rides with as people tended to walk around with them like they owned them.

On the whole not bad and we got a good deal so bargain holidays where you've paid bargain prices you can't expect the ritz can you? Bulgaria is a developing country which is very poor so its worth remembering this. if you are expecting English standards stay in England. This is a holiday village geared towards kids mainly, again read the holiday brochure it says it in black and white, if you want clubs and bars go to sunny beach as Royal park is not for you.

We would consider going back in a few years as i feel that most of these minor niggles would have been addressed and that soon the village wil be top notch.

Where do I start. We have just returned from the Royal Park in Bulgaria to be thoroughly disappointed with both the resort and the hotel.

We arrived at night and the hotel looked very impressive, but our opinion of the place went downhill rapidly. In our party was 2 families with kids of varied ages. First of all the room we were given was small our girl of 13 years and boy aged 10 were made to share a sofabed which we didnt think very suitable considering their ages. The rooms were cleaned every day by an overworked and probably underpaid cleaner who was lovely. Our 1st morning at breakfast was terrible, first of all you had to look all over the dining room for a cup and cutlery, the next thing was to find a plate without a chip or crack in it, then find some food that was warm. There was limited selection of food available. This mealtime experience was the same at every mealtime everyday throughout the 2 weeks we were there.

Once there you are left to do what you want the 'entertainment' was ok for the very small children in our party but there wasnt anything there for our daughter and son.

The beach is the best thing about Elenite very clean and not cluttered.
We had to go to Sunny Beach to find something different to occupy us as there was nothing at the resort. We walked from one end of the beach to the other in 20 mins at a leisurely stroll.
Beware of the steps all over the place my sister in law and daughter both had accidents falling down them!

The bar staff were very rude and we were told that we could only have 2 drinks per guest, which wasnt very good when there were large queues and they often ran out of drinks. (One night there was no red or white wine no cola and the beer went off for about an hour!!!) Make sure the kids drinks are checked as my daughter was given vodka and orange when she asked for orange this happened on 2 occasions!!!!
We have stayed at All-inclusive hotels before and would certainly not rate this as a four star hotel!!!

Bulgaria is ok but still very far behind other holiday destinations standards.
I dont think we will return to Bulgaria in a hurry - very disappointing holiday.

We have just returned from the best 2 week holiday we've ever had! The hotel is beautiful, spacious and clean. The staff are very friendly and work extremely hard(tips are appreciated). If you experience any problems we found it best to speak to a rep as the reception staff are not that helpful.

Day trips - Monster trucking is a great trip for dads and lads.
Nessebar is a lovely family day out with great bargains to be had, but take the boat one way and get a taxi back if you want to get the most out of it and definitely have a meal there.
Sunny Beach is a place for 18-30's, plenty of shops and night life.
Dolphin trip is one I would'nt recommend. It's a 2 hour trip to get there, you have 2 hours shopping in Varna (dirty and quite scary) and the Dolphin show only lasts 45 minutes.

The entertainment on site is good family fun. The first choice reps work hard every night and under 11's and parents will enjoy it. Our teenagers disappeared after dinner every night and didn't come back until about midnight. They liked the animation hall.

Food in the main restaurant is fine but try them all out. Pools are lovely but the small one is very cold. The sea is warm and the beach is clean. Do buy bottled water though as our son had an upset tummy in the last week.

Overall, don't stress over the little problems you may find and you will have a great time. We can't wait to go back!

Well just got back from the nicest looking hotel i have ever stayed in. Yes it looks great we arrived at night it was lit up fantastic almost breathtaking. But dont be fooled although the accomodation was great the veiw of the bay and the beach great. the food was almost as awful as the lager. the first week we was there we couldnt get a sun lounger unless we got up at 6am. the dining room was very busy and the staff did try to keep on top but there was never any knifes folks or cups,and if you can find a plate that isnt chipped then you are very lucky. The food isnt great but you could always find something you like.

Well now i finished having a moan i will tell you about the good points, we visited the water park, the kids thought it was great. If you catch a bus into sunny beach you can get a free bus that takes you to the waterpark. The clothes there are copies but really good ones wish i had took a empty suitcase, everything so cheap. Went to Nessabar another great place to shop very relaxing. well not much else i can tell you i let you decide, almost end of the season maybe they get it right next year.

just got back from first time in Bulgaria, everyone had a good holiday.Royal park very impressive when you first drive up,quick check in and no problems with room, sofa bed very uncomfortable though.All buildings seem to have been thrown up, don't think they'll last long.people always cleaning but don't seem to actually do much. Staff a bit surly, food a bit poor but we didn't go hungry, plates all cracked, never enough cups or knives and forks.Health and safety poor, covers left up for manholes with no warning, mad deer running around free attacking people.entertainers try hard but a bit limited, poor when it rains. All inclusive beer very weak.

All these things are just nit picking, lovely place, don't be put off , well worth a visit while it's still cheap(ish).

Whe you enter the hotel you will be stunned as it is beautiful. The rooms we were in were bigger than you normally get in the costas and fitted 2 adults and 2 kids in easily. If there is any fault then there is a lack of storage for 4 people.
you need to go for the sunbeds early, the main pool does get very busy, however the smaller pool by the hotel served us fine.

the first choice team were excellent and the kids club was brilliant, especially as our 6 year old was far more suited to the lower age group club and they were more than happy for him to join this club rather than stick to the age rule.
there is not a lot to do at night other than watch the shows put on by the F/C team or the local animation team, however we were not bored at all, if we didn't feel like watching a show then we went to the irish bar and talked, played cards, made friends.

i would recommend this resort and hotel if you have kids in the ages we have as you can be 100% sure of their safety as they can run off without being run over! we are going to go back again.

Please do not read the first couple of lines and think the place is bad, what we will try to do is put a balanced review across and i am not going to moan about things that were out of any body's control, ie weather etc.

We Flew by Bulgaria Air from Stansted, Great flight times,unfortunately the same cannot be said for the staff on board, rude and unwilling to help is probably the best that can be said, Flying home was however, a completely different story the attendants were great, polite, helpfull, A can of coke light costs £2 on the plane a dizzy height that not even the British airlines have managed to attain, so take your own!

Bourgas airport is very small we arrived just prior to A liverpool flight, but on a monday 12 flights can arrive, even for our flight there was not enough baggage trollies but the coach park is only 20 yards from the front doors of the airport which in turn are only ten yards in front of the baggage carousels,

The approach to the Royal park at 12.30am realy does have the wow factor when lit up. The walk through the courtyard into reception does as well, bell boys meet you at the front steps and will take you and your cases up to your room and show you where everything is, I asked the rep what the standard rate for tipping was, and she told me a couple of Levs, I gave him ten as I had no smaller and I honestly thought that he was going to kiss me, after a while you realise just how poor the country is and how much that tip and any others you leave mean to the person that you have given them to.

One thing that you will see in the resteraunts and the bars are boxes for tips, I personnaly think that tips are earnt through good service, and a waiter/waitress or barmen are rewarded accordingly, a waiter that doesn't clear, clean and layup tables doesn't desreve a tip, just the same here as there.

English is the third or even the fourth language, behind Russian and German and you will need to speak fairly slowly to the reception staff, some are good and will help some will play the i don't understand card, forgetting you have already had a conversation with them.

The welcome meeting was quite informative but if i have one message for the reps and yes i understand that they have to make it sound exciting is DON'T SHOUT and SPEAK NORMALY and not at 400 miles an hour!!!!

We had a room with a kids den, which a was very good size probably the best beds that i have ever slept on in a hotel, When we went to the welcome meeting we had a chair bed in the kids den, when we came back it had gone and took five days of asking to get it back, no explaination or request to take it.

We went to the reps show on the saturday night, a good night out, they are not proffessional and that should be remembered but they were still very good. It gave us a good insight into sunny beach where the venue was and if dancing on tables and young girls collapsing in the street absolutely mullered is your thing then that will be the place to go.

The bulgarian night was alright but you sit side on to the folk dancing and can't see properly, the fire walking was good but space is very limmited and it is possible to be burnt when he kicks the coals as he is walking, cutlery and glasses are the same here as every where if you get clean one celebrate a little success.

The entertainment staff from first choice work very hard to ensure that there is something for every one, the mini disco and party games for the kids is good, Tom is great with the kids and very funny Faye the same, if you don't want 40 kids round your table screaming applaud at the end of each of the kids dances, this is called the screamy game, you learn quickly that 10 seconds applause prevents three minutes of ridicule, no choice realy, Stu and Becca have exceptionally good voices and are a pleasure to listen to, look out for these two, they have enough talent to go a long way, this is not to say that the others don't but kelly and leanne and wayne all do a good job as well.

Main line reps the ones you see in reception, will always do their best and try hard to resolve any problems that you have.

Over all you will find all sorts of reasons to moan and some of them are very small but moan the british do. overall we had a fantastic holiday and if you are expecting a 4* costas hotel forget it, this is more like a 3*, the bar service is good although machinery breaks down but you have to look at the volume of use that it gets, The restaurants provide something that will sort all tastes, Sean and Jim still have a big job to do but they are working hard with the catering staff. and improvements can be seen, go to breakfast at 9.30am at your peril, it is like a free for all, 8.30 is best, 6 to 7 in the evening is best as well, lunch time is no real problem, I am Diabetic and diet coke is seen as a premium drink as smirnoff etc, absolutely everything is loaded with sugar so if you have the same condition be careful, they did start to provide coke light after i spoke to the reps, but obviously nearly everybody wants it so the limmited supply doesn't last very long!

This was a great holiday, but one word of warning, DO NOT BUY THE DVD'S quite obviously they are copies and they will all work when he shows you the beginings, but they do not work in the middle, you take the chance, we did and got caught, we bought 6 got 2 free all do not work.

after seeing all the bad press for this hotel last year, we were really wary of going. but just to let you know the hotel is very nice, just a few problems left, which are:

the lack of cups, glasses and knifes and forks at busy times in the restaurant.

the floor in the restaurant can be very slippy on occasion, everybody ice-skates!

the staff at the pool bar can be miserable!

and the good points:

the resort is quiet and aimed at families, a few people complained about this and went to sunny beach at night which is more lively!

the first choice entertainers put on a mini-disco, bingo(3levs a ticket) and some sort of entertainment every night, also quiz, football, killer darts, treasure hunts etc in afternoon. (10/10 for effort!) - if it rains kids disco is moved to the irish bar which can be stuffy when busy, no air-con. the staff in the irish bar are very friendly, worth a visit.

nessebar is worth a visit 20lev return on water taxi

we went on the trip to bourgas and waterpark, bourgas is'nt very good (one street, not much choice), but waterpark is worth a visit, ( you pay according to height of child, 90cm,130cm, but if you buy a child wristband they are not allowed on big slides, so worth paying adult price if you dont want tears!)

shops in hotel are reasonable (lacoste stuff cheap)

a lot of people also had tattoos done in hotel, apparently very talented and cheap.

rooms are very clean, maid service good, avoid toilets next to restaurant though, always being mopped so very wet and slippy!

food in main restaurant very good, meals can be very english (pie and chips etc),plenty of salad choices and also two soup choices every day, icecream is also available at dinner time and in the evening in the main restauant. there is also a kids section which my 7 year old thought was very grown up! (ps. toasters are not very good, take ages.)

pools are cleaned every morning but be warned it is very cold! but sea is very warm and shallow, and beach is lovely.

hope this has been some help!

Nice hotel would be better if they had more sunbeds on beach and pool area.Could do with having snacks in the evening,and more entertament for adults. Could do with making sure there is enough plates in the resteraunt. The irish bar by the shopping arcade is good but could do with air-con.

Would go back again but not for a few years.

just arrived back from 2 weeks at the royal park. definately a 4* hotel.

The food was outstanding and we had a great selection, bulgarian and English and they even had a kids corner for the kids to select their meals. The hotel and our room were kept clean by the overworked maids, which seemed to be constantly cleaning from the time you open your eyes in the morning to the time you go to bed at night. My only complaints were ,that i found the staff in the pizza/Bar on the beach quite rude and kept asking the kids for tips, saying ";no tips, no pizza";, since when do young children take money to the beach? You do have to be careful of broken sticks and glass on the beach.

Two days into our holiday, my daughter trod on a broken pint glass and had to have 4 stitches in her foot. They do clean the beach most evenings with a tractor and i dont blame the hotel for the glass on the beach, i blame the louts for leaving their glasses there. Be warned if you do have a medical emergency find a rep to sort you out, as we used the private clinic on site and got skanked big time.

The kids entertainment team were great especially smelly kelly, whacky wayne and leanne. didnt think much of the actual kids club though and i did complain when my 5 year old daughter was crying for me and they didnt bring her back and was telling her to just go to sleep and i would fetch her quicker. (She only went the once, need i say)

We booked the off road adventure for our second week which was quite expensive for the 6 of us,(About 400 lev) but proved to be worth every penny. a good full day out. Also we went on a trip to nessubur, which is very pretty. Didnt think much of our trip to sunny beach though, far to commercialised, but good for changing money as better exchange rates 34 lev difference to the hotel. good for shopping, but that was about it.
The weather was quite hot and only had 3 bad days out of the 14 but we all come home with a good tan anyway.

Wouldnt go again, not because the hotel wasnt up to scratch, but because having been there for a fortnight you could get a little bit bored and we never go to the same place twice anyway. To much of the world to see. we have booked lanzarote for next year!!!

Returned from our weeks holiday august 6th after staying at the Royal Park Hotel in Elenite.
The Hotel on arrival was very impressive taking less than an hour from the airport. Check in was very quick and we were shown to our spacious, very clean room ( we had a failmy room ) with a balcony overlooking the pool and beach which was lovely.

I strongly recommend paying to use the secure box in your room ( 40 levs ) for 1 week as reception often took too long to locate passports if you wanted to exchange your trvellers cheques or money.
The resort was very clean with everything on hand, there are 3 restaurants on site which you can use if you don't fancy dining in the main dining hall ( after a few days it felt like school dinners ) we tried the sunshine restaurant which is good but has same menu every night and the Talyana which is BBQ style, both a welcome relief from the food hall.

Even going at the height of season we did not have to wait long to be served drinks at the bar, I recommend the spirits as the wine is definately watered down!! The Irish Bar serves drinks in real glasses, also the bar in reception, elsewhere everything else is served in plastic beakers which doesnt keep your drinks cold.

The nighlife for us was like Butlins, which is great if you like that sort of thing and we therefore think this resort is bettr suited to familes with smaller children. Teenagers were not very well catered for in entertainement as it was mostly Bingo or singing(? !!! ) by the reps with nightly shows not much differing from another! However as the resort was secured by large iron gates there was no chance of kids wandering off or locals accessing the area also which made for a secure 'feel' something which we have not always had a pleasure of whilst abroad.

We would strongly recommend the boat trip th Nessebar leaving from the peir daily for 20 lev per person. We had a great day out there, there were loads of shops/market stalls and good places to eat. We went to Hemmingways fish restaurant and were treated like royalty costin about £40 for all of us which included starters, main meal sweets for kids and all drinks.

In hindsight, due to our kids ages and how we like our holidays I think Sunny Beach would have been a better resort for us to stay at as it was more lively to say the least. There is a hotel bus daily for 10 levs per person ( under 12s travel free ) and this lesves and returns every 2 hours. We took advantage of that most days but wished we had gone later in the day and returned on the last trip at 9.30pm for a drink back at the hotel. The 'all inclusive' was not bad but it was great to go to Sunny beach for its markets, grill bars ( real food, even had a macdonalds for fussy kids who wont try anything different! ) and rows of bars offering endless happy hours on cocktails, we liked the Happy Duck Best which overlooked the sea, also having cold drink served in real glasses really felt like you were on holiday !!

Elenite Village adjacent to Royal Park, and where you can share facilities looked tatty and worn, with mountainous steps absolutely everywhere...dont go if you have wheelchairs, walking probs etc as this would be very difficult ( none of which is in brochure )

We loved Bulgaria and would definately return but to Sunny Beach, your money goes a long way which is always a bonus.Weather for the whole week ws brilliant.

The only major downside for us was the coach not turning up to transport us back to the airport and eventaully turned up an hpur late ( nearly 1am ) the latest check out is 8pm which costs an extra 40 lev so waiting around without a room was tiring with kids..there was no rep available to advise us why the coach never turned up so everyone was panicking we had missed check in. We had extended our room and felt sorry for people who checked out at 12 noon. All in all loved Bularia and would reurn without a doubt but stay in Sunny Beach.