AboutTravelBurgas

I’m Per Åkerblom, and I’ve been coming to Burgas for more than fifteen summers. I’m not a tour operator or the city’s tourism board — I’m a Swede who fell for this salt-lake port town on the Black Sea and keeps coming back.

It started with family. My son’s grandmother lives in Burgas, so the city was never a two-week holiday for us — it became a second home. Over fifteen-odd summers I’ve watched it change season by season: the same salt smell off the lakes, the same evening walk down to the water, new cafés where old ones used to be.

I know the Sea Garden the way you know your own back garden — which benches catch the morning sun, where the shade is, how it fills up on a warm night. I’ve eaten my way through just about every restaurant worth the walk, from harbour seafood shacks to the terraces on the front. The Black Sea seafood is why I plan trips around lunch; the meshana skara — the mixed grill — is why I never leave hungry; and I’ll argue with anyone that Burgas watermelons are the best in the world. I’m not joking about that.

I’ve also made every mistake so you don’t have to. I’ve been talked into the overpriced taxi that took the scenic route and dropped me two streets from where I actually wanted to be. That is exactly why this guide gives straight, specific answers — real prices, real distances, the honest version — instead of the glossy one.

The best of Burgas, though, has always been the people. Some of my favourite meals here were never in restaurants at all — they were long tables with locals, food that kept arriving, and an evening that kept going.

I’ve travelled a good deal of Bulgaria beyond the coast — Sofia, Plovdiv, Shumen, the Devil’s Bridge deep in the Rhodopes, and every town and beach within reach of Burgas — and it’s a country I love. But Burgas is the place I keep coming back to.

That’s why this site exists. With Eurovision 2027 coming to town, a lot of people are about to discover Burgas for the first time, and I wanted them to have the guide I wish I’d had fifteen summers ago: independent, specific, updated every day, and written by someone who actually knows the place. If it saves you one overpriced taxi, it has done its job.

• 15+ summers in Burgas
• Family in the city
• Independent
• Updated daily