Palm Beach - Golden Sands, Bulgaria     

We have been to Golden Sands 3 times before so we know the resort. We decided to change from the Lilia Hotel to the Palm Beach as it was advertised in the brochure as being exclusively for use by Balkan Holidays UK customers. This was not true as the hotel was full of Russians. We have nothing against Russians but we hoped to find some company to talk to. The hotel is okay, but the Lilia, next door, is better quality and the Ibrostar up the road looked good. Prices have gone up and a beer is about ?2. We found a great bar with live rock music and a brilliant Bulgaria restaurant up in the hills. There is plenty to do in the resort and the jeep safari is a must! If anyone would like more imformation please contact me.

this is the second time we have stayed in bulgaria and the first time in the hotel palm beach. we picked this hotel with balkan holidays as they had child prices and my son was 13. the hotel itsself was nice and clean. the room we stayed in was a bit dated the shower door was off, but the maid made sure we had clean towels and bed linen and we needed extra pillows. the pool was small compared to some hotels and people still reserve sun loungers then bugger off all day. i think they need to charge like other hotels do. we found a place near the beach that you pay for the beds and umbrellas and they have a swimming pool and bar, also an inflatable for the kids and slides. the food in the hotel was ok very repititious and on many occassions it was cold but it was cheap to eat out. if you eat in the resort it is expensive but if you go out further it is cheaper. we hired a car for a few days which we did through the hotel and we were able to go to nessessabar and sunny beach we picked a day when it was raining though. the hotel has a sky bar which was great especially at night and also in the thunder storm but it did get a bit flooded. we did three trips the first was the jeep safari and yacht trip. this is great fun my husband was ill that day so couldnt go you are in jeeps and it is really a giant water fight with the other jeeps the down sid is DONT BUY THE VIDEO we made the mistake of doing this and it was rubbish we took our laptop with us so we tried it out it was 55levs which is about £25 we showed it to the rep and she got on to the company they wernt happy but replaced it but the new one wasnt even of us and was just as bad so in the end the holiday company refunded our money. the yacht trip back to meet our coach was just a boat with wooded seats no where to sunbathe like it was meant to be,atleast the weather was good. the second was the pirate ship this was ok for the kids but a waste of money really. you put bits of paper in water and throw them at another boat. lunch was a cabbage salad and fish and that was it. the best trip was the balkan nite good food good entertainment except that my husband left our camera on the coach and we didnt get it back. we found two resturants that were worth a mention one is a russian resturant near the sofia hotel the food is excellent and the waitress and competent and service is excellent the second we found was next door to the muppet bar again the service was good and the food was excellent cooked right and hot. the resort itself is still clean and there is plenty of entertainment but it is getting expensive we noticed that the chicken kebab went from 4-5levs in a matter of days. alot of the bulagarian were staying that there is a 40% decress in the amounts of british that are going there now and we found that our hotel was ful of russians. still it was hot and a nice relaxing time and that was what we wanted. the balkan holiday rep was very good (sorry cant rememer her name)and the people in the office at the resort were plesant.