Riu Helena Park Reviews

We arrived at 0130 am, to a very welcome cheap champagne reception, which if nothing else quenched our thirsts,and was'nt long before we were checked in and on our way to our rooms, the bell boy was on hand of course! as it must be payday to them when new guests arrive! - We paid extra for a "superior' room which I wish now we had''nt as the only difference was a bed settee (NOT REQD) and a coffee table! - we did ask for a double bed but ended up with 2 singles!. The following morning we arrived at the dining room for breakfast to a pleasant surprise with the plentifull choice & selection of hot? and cold food on offer, and as with every meal time throughout our 1 weeks stay, if you could'nt find something to eat, then you must be extremely choosy!! - Was'nt over impressed by the restaurant staff either, execept 1 (Maria) who went out of her way to help you and really excelled herself! The rest of the hotel staff were fine as was the cleanliness and quality of the furniture & fittings. Only went in the hotel pool once, which was enough as it was extremely cold, although other guests were having an occaisional dip just to cool off!. overall my wife & I agreed that we were glad we had only booked for 1 week, as once you had seen the same stalls selling the same old cheap tat! & the same beggers sat at the side of the road with tiny babys hoping that wealthy holidaymakers (brits) would sympathise and dig deep in their pockets!.1 other thing to be aware of is we actually booked for the Helena sands, but ended up in the Helena park, it would appear (information received from our rep) that once the Helena Sands is full, they automatically transfer the overflow to the Helena park,which I strongly disagree with!- I feel that should this occur, (as it did in our case)the guest should be asked if they were happy with the alternatiive. Don't be put off though, we had a great week.

We stayed at the Helena Park Hotel in early September. The transfer to the hotel was about 40 minutes. When we arrived there were complimentary drinks in the reception while a porter took our bags to our room. Our room was very nice, a fair size and spotlessly clean. We booked a pool view room but we were facing onto the road which was quite busy and noisy but did quieten down at night. There was a combination safe in the room which could be hired from reception.

We attended the welcome meeting which was ok but during the holiday we did not find the rep had much knowledge of the resort.
The restaurant was good. The food was quite good with plenty of choice, cooked
breakfasts etc; The Bulgarians seem to cook food very lightly, we found this in the hotel on one occasion and in the resort, so would advise you check your meat is properly cooked. All the staff in the hotel were friendly and polite and most spoke some English.

We would say the resort would be popular with younger people as there were lots of clubs and music bars. There is a land train which stops by the Victoria Palace Hotel that takes you to the resort centre. The seafront promenade is lined with small shops/stalls that seem to sell mostly the same things In the resort we saw some not so good things such as shops selling stun guns ,knives, axes etc; In the evening we saw snakes, crocodiles and a dancing bear to have photographs with, upsetting to see if you are an animal lover. We saw a few prostitutes but they were only approaching men on their own. The pavements in the resort were quite poor so you had to watch your step. The beach was nice with lots of sun beds to hire We found there was not much to do in Sunny Beach once you had seen the shops and been on the beach. One day we went to the other end of the resort (the Nessebar end), which seemed older and not quite as nice as the end we were staying at. We felt safe in Sunny Beach but I don't think we would have ventured out on our own away from the resort as the
surrounding areas were very poor looking.
There were lots of taxis around the resort which all seemed to be yellow and on
meters. We would say to still ask for a price before getting in though.
We ate out a few times just for a change and we found it to be very cheap although prices did vary from place to place.

The weather was about the same as England but slightly warmer. It rained on three days but was nice and sunny the rest of the time but a bit breezy.
The trips we went on:
Discovery tour with Thomson which took us to Nessebar with a boat trip around the harbour which we didn't enjoy as there were too many people crammed in the boat, no life jackets and the sea was very rough. A bit scary! Then, a guided tour around the village with some free time to look around. We decided to stay on in Nessebar as we felt we needed more time to look around properly. We thought Nessebar was a lovely place but felt the 'olde worlde' atmosphere was spoiled a bit by it being so busy and touristy.
Tastes and traditions with Thomson. Drove a short way into the mountains and stopped at an elderly couple's house to see them doing traditional crafts such as weaving. A short visit to an ostrich farm and then a horse and cart ride to a picnic area. The food was ok with a soft drink or beer included in the price of the trip. A pleasant day out and nice to see a bit of rural Bulgaria.

Sozopol and riverboat with Thomson. First a boat trip up a river, then onto Sozopol with two hours free time. It was much quieter than Nessebar and easier to look around. Included was a visit to a nature reserve for bird watching. Personally we would have preferred to have stayed in Sozopol for an extra hour to have time to visit the little museums and look around more, but it was still a nice day out.
The other trip we did was with a company called Ok Tours who we saw in the resort it was a trip to the Blue Mountains. We visited two towns/villages called Zheravna and Sliven.In one of the villages we saw around two old houses, looked around the village itself which was peaceful and took some nice photographs. A nice trip but it was a long 2 hours there and 2 hours back for what we saw.
On the whole we enjoyed our holiday to Bulgaria and found it interesting to see an old eastern bloc country. Having spoken to other people we met we think we did the right thing by going 4 star and to the quieter end of the resort.

We would go to Bulgaria again but to Golden Sands to see the things we didn't see this time. We would advise going while it's still cheap.

Had read lots of reviews about this hotel/resort on here and on other sites, so was fairly well prepared.

What can I say about the Helena Resort, except WOW!!!

We arrived in early hours of morning, to be met by bell-boy who took our cases from coach, and straight up to our rooms, once we had checked in, which took a matter of minutes.

Room lovely and clean, no need to take towels as they will be changed every day if you wish, also no need to take shampoo or shower gel really, as this is provided and topped up whenever needed.

Safety deposit boxes available in room for 35 leva a week/ 50 leva for 2 weeks.

Had lovely food every day, masses of it, and lots of choice. You could, if you so wished, have 5 or 6 courses for each meal!! Menus were repeated,but as there was so much choice, it didn't bother us.
Restaurant staff are very friendly and helpful, nothing is too much trouble.

As well as the buffet restaurant, there are three others in the Helena Resort that you can also use, though we never felt the need to.

Lobby Bar is a very relaxing setting, special mention to barmaid Elena, who is very funny, she has a wink for everyone, and is always cheerful. Staff at Pool Bar also very helpful and freindly.

Never had a problem getting a sun lounger around the pool, again towels are provided. It can get a bit chilly hee if a wind blows up, as it did, from time to time, but certainly didn't deter anyone staying around pool. Pool itself is lovely, although VERY cold, which is probably why there was never many people in it!

The grounds are lovely. You can use all the facilities of the Helena Sands if you are staying at the Park (except the pool). Drinks etc in bar at both hotels are same price, (and not a lot more expensive than local bars)

Ladies- go for a massage in the Wellnesss Centre at the Sands. Had a chocalate massage as a treat WOW!!

The Resort:-

Very commercialised with bars, stalls selling fake designer gear and 'tack' everywhere.

Lovely beach, lots there for children of all ages.

Saw the bear a few times, just look the other way, same goes for the bloke with the aligator. Hopefully, once Bulgaria's in the EU, and if people start complaining enough this sort of thing will stop.

Also saw the children begging with puppies, and palying instuments (all seem to belong to same family) - they move along quickly once police appear.

Trips:-

Do Nessebar on your own, you can get a taxi from hotel (they have their own) for 25 leva or get the water taxi ( a bit choppy this time of year) or the bus (smelly and crowded). We went with the half day organised trip from Rep and found it very rushed, and didn't have a lot of spare time to explore this lovely town, so went back on our own a few days later to wander around at our own pace. Nessebars a lovley place, it's a shame that all the tacky shops have sprung up.

Khan's Tent.

This is a must go to place. The view over Sunny Beach is spectacular, and the show itself is amazing.

All in all this was a great holiday. We couldn't praise the staff in the hotel enough, they are wonderful.

Would we go back? Yes, probably once more, and definately to this hotel. You don't get any better facilities in the Sands so why pay more for 5* hotel when conditons in 4* are as good.

The Helena Park hotel is 4* with its sister Helena Sands being a 5*, we stayed at the park. The grounds themselves are lovely with gorgeous gardens. The food was average, basically it was the same every night except for the change of meat, the cavery was tiny i.e one choice every night, the salad and cold dishes - lots to choose from then you have fries, rice, a fish dish, little veg and a few others - it got a bit boring after 3 nights.

There is no adult entertainment of an evening and the day time entertainment is in the Sands hotel which is not highlighted on the entertainment board. The Saloon and the Lobby bar shut between 11 and 12pm which was a huge let down as the closest late open bars were between 20-30mins walk away. The casino in the Sands is also not recommended, we went in with another couple just after midnight and apart from 1 other couple we were the only ones there and we got swamped by staff on the black jack table there were 6 of them and it was extremely intimidating, so we left after 10 mins, went to change our chips and they refused to change them back to leva, so instead we got euros!! We did complain at the time to the manager about the staff surrounding us and the euros but just got fobbed off saying we got a good rate and they were just trying to cater to our needs.

We booked Khans Tent - this can be done so much cheaper if you go yourselves as its a restaurant up the hill 5 mins from the hotel. We payed 84 leva but could have done it for half of that with a taxi ride and a normal meal. The entertainment was fab especially the bendy woman, the food was average and you get one bottle of wine each and then after that its 15 leva. The food being served to the other customers looked superb and much much larger portions. The bus was also 30mins late in picking us up.

Sunny Beach itself is excellent for families and a chilling holiday, as the night life is not for groups or young couples, its still cheap, and restaurants such as Eagle next to Globus hotel and La Banana sell lovely food. Nessebar is a definite but get the local bus as its dirt cheap and the the fish meals are only from £4 each.

What an amazing holiday we had in Bulgaria and what a lovely hotel the Helena Park is. The staff at reception couldn't do enough to make sure we were happy and having a good stay. The food was fine (even for a vegetarian), especially the Italian themed night where I ate much more than I should :) Make sure you get some of the lovely fresh fruit alongside your daily helping of cream cakes and home made ice cream or else you'll come away feeling exceedingly fat!

A few tips for people going - firstly, try and get a room on the pool side, we didn't and, being a light sleeper, I wasn't sleeping too well as our room was facing out onto a generator. However, one mention to reception and we were moved to a lovely new clean room with no hassle (they even moved our bags for us!). Secondly, when we were there, we weren't allowed to use the loungers in Helena Sands (but you are allowed to use the pool - not a good combination when one of you loves swimming and one loves sunbathing!). However, if you use your own towels (which as an aside, are much cheaper to buy out there than to take!), they have no way of telling which hotel you are from (we made the mistake of using our green Helena Park towels on the first day and being asked to move and then being recognisable for the rest of the holiday!). Lastly, drinks in the hotel and the hotel beach bar are much more expensive than in the bars a few metres down the beach, we had lovely pre and post dinner cocktails most days on buy one get one free ! There isn't an awful lot of nightlife near the hotel but apparently, if you wander down to the beach front late at night it all starts happening.

If you feeling brave and end up renting a car, be warned about the drivers on the roads! We drove up to Varna (as it was much cheaper than taking the Thomson organised visit) and my eyes were closed for half of the journey for fear! We saw coaches overtaking coaches on blind bends of single carrigeways and witnessed several near misses. The car company organised through the hotel (Sixt) were great and provided us with everything we needed, including a map. Parking in Varna seems to consist of parking your front half of your car up on the pavement and leaving the other half on the road! Its worth wandering around away from the shopping area to get an idea of how poor parts of Bulgaria are, especially when compared to the lovely 4* hotel you return to.

We rented some bikes and cycled up to Nessebar which is a beautiful retreat from the promanade of Sunny beach, its worth a trip over there (even if you just get the boat) as the restaurants were much nicer and varied than in Sunny beach.

Have a great time there, make the most of it as its a lovely place, but still somewhat under developed for more than a weeks stay. We will go back, but not for a few years!

Be warned - the airport in Bourgas, Bulgaria is terrible. No organisation but a free for all to get through passport control so be patient! Arrived at the hotel to be greeted by pleasant staff who spoke good english and couldn't do enough for us. We had asked for pool view rooms with sunny afternoon balcony and adjoining rooms, and as we didn't get that, they moved us to a superior room without hesitation and apologised for the inconvenience.

The hotel is fabulous.Spotlessly clean, friendly, efficient staff. Restaurant staff are good. You have an allocated table and waiter.We had the wonderful Melina who spoke excellent English and was chatty. Food was not quite what we expected from a 4 star plus hotel-everything was highly seasoned and geared towards the Germans. However, it was all fresh and displayed invitingly.

This hotel is not geared towards families particularly. It's much more for mature couples so don't go expecting to take part in games throughout the day.

There is little entertainment in the hotel other than musicians who finished by 9.30pm most evenings. We ventured out and can highly recommend the Caribe bar with the entertaining Nicky and Lorenzo making cocktails which were much more potent than they looked!! We also visited the Arizona steak house which was excellent value for money. For ladies, don't miss the Maximus show. Very interesting!!

While at the hotel, we took advantage of the wellness centre which we can thoroughly recommend. Especially the hot stone massage - bliss!!

The weather was fantastic and we had little problems getting sunbeds. The beach is lovely white sand with plenty of beds and a cooling sea breeze.

There are many bargains to be picked up if you're into fake designer jeans, t-shirts or sunglasses. Remember to haggle as you will knock the prices down. If you get a taxi anywhere, remember to agree the price BEFORE getting in the car.

The only irritation of the holiday was the airport chaos. If we thought the arrival had been bad, it was nothing compared to the departure. Standing for 2 hours outside the airport terminal to get checked in and then straight onto the plane. Not good.

All in all, a great holiday. Would we go back to Bulgaria?

YES!!

This was our first trip to Bulgaria so it was with some trepidation that we boarded the plane from Glasgow for our trip to Sunny Beach.

It was quite late in the evening when we arrived at Bourgas airport (more about that place later!) and the bus journey takes around 50 minutes (unless you were unfortunate enough to be on the Leeds-flight bus which got lost and took 4 hours to get there!) to the resort so it was straight up to the rooms (once we found them, the hotel is a bit of a maze) for a shower and a good night's sleep.

The rooms were very nice, clean, comfortable and spacious, although we had ";Superior"; ones, the regulars are quite a bit smaller so try and get an upgrade if you can.

Our holiday was via Thomsons so the next morning there was the usual meet 'n' greet will their rep - this to be honest was a complete waste of time, the girl (nice as she was) new absolutely nothing about the resort, the hotel or anything else of much use and was only interested in trying to flog some very expensive excursions.

After this we ventured out into the sunshine for a first look at the resort and were pleasantly surprised.

The Helena Park is one half of the Helena Resort (the other being the Helena Sands) which is situated about 2.5 from the centre of Sunny Beach. The Helena Park is directly behind the Helena Sands so none of the rooms really have what could be called a sea view although it is only about 150 metres from the hotel to the lovely (sunny!) beach across a section of private promenade (you'll see why I've mentioned this later).

Thomsons have the hotel listed as a Platinum resort so we were expecting high standard throughout and in the most we were not disappointed. The rooms were spotlessly clean and the staff were all pleasant and courteous. There was a lack of evening entertainment in the hotel but guests can use the facilities over at the Sands and they did have some, although to be honest it looked pretty dire.

During the day the cheery staff laid on numerous activities which were particularly good for the large number of special needs and handicapped who were staying at the hotel and everyone seemed to have a great time. The hotel and indeed the whole resort is laid out in such a fashion as to be wheelchair friendly so if this is a deciding factor in your choice of holiday destination then you may find that this hotel suits your needs perfectly.

The swimming pool at the Park benefits from the resort having it's own filtration plant so the water is not full of chlorine, although it is unfortunately shaded by trees so can be a bit chilly, although the Sands pool and the sea are only a few metres away so it's not really a problem.

One area where the Park fell down badly was the food. We were there on a half board basis and if there had been any decent restaurants within walking distance I doubt we would have eaten at the hotel at all. The breakfast menu was varied but the food was fairly low quality but far better than the dinner one. Personally I am not a great fan of pizza or pasta and chips but I found myself almost forced into eating this for most of the week as the rest of the food had what can only describe as the ";Rolf Harris Factor";, i.e ";can you tell what it is yet?"; My impression was that the had a load of meat and a load of signs saying Beef, Pork etc and they simply stuck these randomly together. Grey-looking pork was presented as ";Sirloin Steak"; and Chicken Thighs (at least I HOPE it was chicken) in a watery gravy was labelled as ";Chicken Nuggets";. The rest of the main courses throughout the week were no better and dinner wasn't really something that any of us looked forward too with any great relish. To be fair the starters were quite nice if you like salad and the sweets were passable, however two members of our party came home with mild food poisoning so all in this aspect of the hotel gets a resounding thumbs DOWN - well below the standard expected of even a two star never mind a four. Interestingly on the literature in the rooms the Helena Park is listed as a FIVE star so it looks as if it has had one taken from it and certainly the food could account for that.

The resort of Sunny Beach consists of one long promenade with a few small streets running off it and is, as someone else commented here, just one big car boot sale. Once you leave the private Helena section of the resort the walkway is flanked by row upon row of small shop units all selling counterfeit goods - watches, clothes, perfumes, cds and dvds. None of this looks to be especially cheap, certainly no cheaper than I've seen it at our local markets and carboot sales. There are no ";proper"; shops in the resort at all with exception of some small supermarkets. The only shops that weren't selling fake gear were those selling knives, police-type batons and stun guns - not exactly something that made me feel safe.

The season was only just beginning whilst we were there and by midweek it was beginning to be quite busy. There are vendors on the seafront renting out golf carts and small mopeds (both banned from the private,guarded, Helena section of the promenade) with the result that you have to share the walkway with these. We witnessed many drunk-looking teenagers careering about on these carts weaving in and out of the crowds at high speed so you really need to be have your wits about you at all time. Another thing to watch out for are the money changers who approach you in the street offering you an exchange rate that seems to good to be true - it is. All you'll get is a handful of worthless counterfeit money wrapped up in one genuine small denomination note, which is exactly what happened to one holidaymaker I spoke to. There are also quite few persistent begging gypsies to contend with.

There appear to be quite few things to keep the kids amused such as pitch n putt,rides and an archery stand - although I'm not sure how sensible firing arrows towards a target set 10 feet from sunbathing tourists is! There is also one of those bungee sling things but you're braver than me if you go up one of those, especially out there!

The beach itself was lovely with a gentle run-off into the sea making it ideal for kids although more adventurous swimmers should be aware that there is no division between the swimming are and that used by the jetskis with the result that they can come quite close at high speed.

The Helena Resort is located within walking distance (a long walk mind you) of St. Vlas, but I wouldn't recommend you try it. There is only pavement/sidewalk for a short part of the way and it is a busy and dangerous road (they drive like lunatics). I made the walk one early evening on my own whilst the rest of my party were getting ready for dinner and as I approached St Vlas a boy of about 18 crossed the road in front of me and out the corner of my eye I caught sight of another suddenly running across behind me so I stepped to the side just in time to see the stanley(craft/boxcutter) knife in his fist. At this point I decided to return to the hotel - quickly!

We had one slightly cloudy day whilst were there so we made the journey to the neighbouring town of Nessebar.This cost 20 leva (about £7/$13) in a taxi. Before I talk about Nessebar I should warn you about the taxis or the one that we got at any rate. Ours was an old yellow (all the taxis are yellow) Ford Focus which at one point had been purple - at least the back half had......the front had been silver and the airbags had been removed and passenger side one replaced with what looked like a cutting from an old leather jacket. This car is stationed at the Helena Park so avoid it at all costs and try and pick one of the few newish taxis.

Anyway back to Nessebar. This is quaint looking little seaside town with some very interesting archaeological digs and a nice historic feel to it. This translates over to the shops as well for instead of selling counterfeit dvds here they sell counterfeit antiques! They are full of supposed WWII nazi relics - mainly pocket watches, but if this is the case then most of the third reich must have lost their watch somewhere in Nessebar judging by the quantities on sale! Once again there are few ";proper"; shops but it's well worth a trip. Not in a taxi though - the bus back (admittedly only to the bus station at Sunny Beach - 5km from the hotel) cost only 0.60 leva (about £0.22/$0.40) each!

Despite sounding negative about the resort I personally enjoyed my holiday and was actually considering a return until (come one, you knew this was coming lol) we had to try and get home. First off the Thomson rep told us the hotel did not have a courtesy room available for changing in (they did) and then tried to extract £15/$30 EACH from our party for the bus journey to the airport, despite this being part of our package and us having proof of this.

It was once we got to the airport that my mind was made up never to return to Bulgaria. On arriving at 19.30 hrs for our flight home at 22.15 we were confronted with the sight of several hundred people being forced to stand around in the buspark as the Bulgarians would only let a small number into the terminal at one time. The airport is tiny and staffed by only a handful of dour looking easter europeans who insist on inspecting every minute detail of every traveller's passport before stamping it in triplicate. The Thomson rep ensured us this was perfectly normal and our flight would be leaving on time, which was slightly disconcerting as at 22.00 hrs we were all still standing outside the terminal building (which is about the size of a minor UK mainline train station) in the pitch dark waiting to check in! It took nearly another hour before we were finally through customs/passport control and on the plane.

The whole thing was so badly organised you couldn't even get annoyed it was verging on comical, although I'd hate to see the place when it's the height of the season and really busy. The tour operators should really warn their clients to expect this delay at the airport, although given how clueless our rep was about everything else on the holiday it's not really surprising.

Apparently there are plans to build a large new airport to handle the increasing flow of tourists into the country but this will be situated some 200 miles away from the resort of Sunny Beach.

All in all I have mixed feelings about the place. I enjoyed the holiday (apart from the food, the incident on the road to St Vlas and the fiasco at the airport) but the country is lacking many basic amenities (such as decent roads/shops etc) which we in the west take for granted. It reminded me a lot of the way the Spanish costas were 30 or 40 years ago. I'm sure given the amount of money that is being pumped into the area that in five or ten years time Sunny Beach and similar resorts will have captured most if not all of the traditional Spanish holidaymaker market but for the moment if you are looking for more than just cheap drink, fake designer gear and sunshine I would advise looking elsewhere.

First trip to Bulgaria, very disappointed. Listened to friends etc who said fantastic place really cheap, what a let down. Was nervous as this is still an up and coming country for tourism. Used to certain standards you understand! Booked a top class hotel, 5 star or so I believed not so. This country and resort has a helluva lot to learn namely the germans are not the be all and end all of tourism.

Although may I interprate things as I personally saw them the Germans and Bulgarians are in perfect harmony with each other. They are both so arrogant in nature that they complement each other perfectly. The only difference is the Germans want to take your sun loungers and the bulgarians your money!

The hotel was very nice, exactly what you would expect for a 4*. The food was good plenty of choice but soon got sick of it after 2 weeks. The pool area was nice and kept clean and tidy, free clean towels given every day by the pool. If staying in this hotel you could use some of the facilities of the 5* sister hotel eg gym, health spa, internet etc. The hotel is very well maintained and very clean. Rooms were cleaned every day.

The hotel offers an exhange service however the rate was lower than other places and they charged 4% Commission the Bellevue hotel which is just down the road offered a higher rate and no commission.

The resort itself is very busy with a lot of battery operated mopeds, scooters and golf caddies going up and down the promenade.

Happy hour in most bars every night, drinks really chaep and food.

Overall a very good holiday and would definetly return to Sunny Beach

We stayed at the Helena Sands hotel from 7th June till 15th June.
I had never fancied Bulgaria but my husband wanted to try it.So for his 50th birthday I took him for a surprise holiday.
I didn't know what to expect but was pleasantly surprised.
The hotel was brilliant, lovely and clean and the staff were helpful even if you weren't sure they understood you.
We were greeted with champagne on arrival when we booked in - the porter whisked us and our luggage away to our rooms .

The room was lovely - loads of space and everything you could wish for.
The weather could have been better but from day 4 it changed and was nice and hot.
It was so cheap - pint of lager 50p - bottle of wine £1 from the supermarket. If you went out to eat it only cost you a couple of pounds, although the food in the hotel was so good you didn't need to go out.
It was a real eye opener and we would not hesitate to go back again, although I think we would go later in the season as we were told the weather was better in July/August.
The locals were really friendly and we met some really nice people.
Hopefully they will never change to the Euro as this will surely change the situation.

If you have never been I would say try it but don't go for the cheaper hotels as it is worth paying a little bit more and getting a good one. I think our hotel would take some beating!

We have just come back from a very pleasant holiday in the excellent Helena Resort. We don't normally book half board but decided to be pampered this time. Although we have read various reviews stating that the food in the hotels was not up too much we found that the Helena Resort food was good. We did eat out on ocassion but only because we wanted to try traditional Bulgarian food and hospitality. Try Carriby restaurant on the beach - excellent suckling pig, fresh chicken, fish and good soups. The resort itself was luxurious, towels changed daily and bedding every second day of our week's stay.

This was our first time in Bulgaria and will definately be going back next year to the Helena Resort. The entertainment in the Helena Park and Sands was not up to much but there is plenty in the Resort itself if you wish to venture out. We had a bit of bother obtaining sun loungers around the pools as you had the typical German (and some British) people placing towels on the beds and then going shopping etc. Very selfish and the management need to take control of this. Clean towels were provided by the pool attendant as and when required. The outdoor pools were still quite cold when we were there, however, we made use of the nice indoor wellness centre, pool and jacuzzi. Staff were excellent, courteous and very friendly.

We visted Khan's tent through booking with the Thomson rep as we were told that you could not book direct. The show was short and food below average with a bottle of wine per person put on the table. Definately not value for money. If we go again I would book direct and you can then watch the show, order what food and drink you require - which many people seemed to do. All of the trips you can do yourself, there is a free bus to the aqua park which is a good day out and value for money. However, you also had a problem here trying to prise the rubber rings required for use with the flumes from people who were determined to hold on to them for the day. Saying that, after many complaints the management were very quick to put staff at each area to take the rings from people as they came off the various slides and ensure everyone could get access to the flumes they wanted to go on. A day trip to Nessebar was nice and relaxing with lots of fish restaurants serving excellent fresh fish - try the fish skewers with four different types fo fish - very tasty. The lazy day cruise is enjoyable and you can book at the harbour at Nessebar for a fraction of the cost that the tour operators charge.

The resort itself is developing very fast but most items are still very cheap and people really friendly. Always agree a price for taxis before using them as they can vary immensly. To anyone going to Bulgaria we would advise going to a Rui hotel as the standards are excellent.

On arrival first impressions of the hotel are good. We had booked a superior room and found it to be of a very good standard, however the room was situated at the front of the hotel, which faces a busy road so traffic noise at times did prove to be a nuisance, we later changed rooms because of this but only after some difficulties with the staff and the rooms manager who was not to co-operative. we eventually got a room change to the rear of the hotel which is much quieter.
The restaurant in this hotel is very well ran and the staff here are excellent as is the food.
The hotel is very clean and well maintained, it has plenty of amenities, however be aware most of them are at extra charge including the pool table which works out at £6 / hour. the entertainment was poor and we did not bother with it in the end.

The Helena Parks backs up to and shares its grounds with a sister hotel The Helena Sands, which is a 5 star hotel; you can share the amenities in this hotel but again be aware of extra costs.

The resort itself is a purpose built resort and lacks in character, it is mainly made up of hotels, bars and market type stalls selling copy gear, and once you have seen one stall you have seen them all!, all 5 miles of them.
The beach at the resort is very good and clean; the sea is good also but watch out for jet ski which come in quite close, there where one or two near misses with swimmers and jet skis.
Most things in the resort are really cheap to purchase including food and drink, and even if you staying in a hotel on HB or AI it is worth having a meal in a restraunt at night.

on the whole we found the resort a little to commercial and not quite what we expected, if you are a couple looking for a relaxing holiday i would suggest this is not the place for you, but however if you area family with plenty of children or a a group of people looking for a cheap boozing holiday them maybe it is.

Let me give you some inside info on the best hotel in Bulgaria. This hotel and staff get 10/10 for everything, there is the odd grumble like the minimal entertainment but these can be overlooked because of the excellent standard of this accommodation.

To clear up one point I read in another review. The superior rooms are rooms with space for a 3rd adult, this is the only difference! Superior DOES NOT mean better views, nicer carpets or free peanuts. Just a little bit more room. That small rant out of the way I'd always advise you to request a pool view room as the road at the front of the hotel can be a little loud in the mornings.

Spotlessly clean rooms and grounds. Yummy food especially the homemade cookies and cream ice-cream. Julian the matre'd was fab, kind and courteous. But the special mention needs to go to the Host manager Maya Stankova (hope thats how you spell it maya) without her this hotel would not be half as good. She runs a tight ship, will sort out any problems straight away and always smiles ( which is rare in Bulgaria as most of them look like they're chewing wasps ). What a remarkable women. Thankyou we'll be back.

Oooo Just like to point out to anyone thinking of going next door to the Riu Helena Sands DON'T. Go to the Park instead. The staff are 50 times better. The room quality is the same, the food is also better and best of all the bar here is cheaper. There is no need to pay for the 5 star part of this resort the 4 star side is more fun and includes all the same facilities (excluding the beach front pool, but you get your own very adequate pool in the Helena Park grounds)

And just to mention a couple of the better excursions from Thomson. The Istanbul trip is a must! a fantastic city not to be missed. Please don't be put off by the journey this unforgetable, lively and vibrant city is well worth it. And my favorite was Tastes and Traditions. Visit a mountain top village with stunning views and a fantastic homemade pic-nic lunch. Not only is this the best food you'll have in your entire stay it's the only chance you'll get to see the real Bilgaria this trip is a must (and excellent value for around £16 pp)