site.bta Hotel Owners in Troyan Report 25% Increase in Overnights This Year

Hotel Owners in Troyan Report 25% Increase in Overnights This Year

Troyan, Northern Bulgaria, December 22 (BTA) - Hotel owners in the historical town of Troyan have reported a 25 per cent increase in visitors' overnights in 2015 compared with 2014. Expectations for the winter season are rather optimistic, Tsvetelina Kalcheva, Chief Trade and Tourism Expert at Troyan Town Hall, said. By the middle of October, almost all hotels and guesthouses in the area had been booked for Christmas and New Year's Eve, Kalcheva said.

The Troyan section of the Balkan Range is a preferred tourist destination throughout the year with its combination of beautiful mountain views, clean nature, mineral springs and balneotherapy services, cultural and religious landmarks, and opportunities for practising winter sports.

This winter, visitors to Troyan can use 199 categorized accommodation facilities with a total of 2,850 beds in them. Between January and October, guests spent 110,284 overnights in the area, up from 87,569 in the like period of last year.

The Chiflik resort in Troyan Municipality attracts tourists not only in the warmer part of the year, but also during the colder months, because the outdoor pools in most local hotels operate all the year round thanks to the hot mineral water available there.

The ski season in the Beklemeto resort near Troyan will be opened on Christmas, ski instructor Tsvetomir Taslakov told BTA.

In addition to winter sports, people can also enjoy cultural tourism in the Troyan area. During the holidays, places of interest will be open to visitors as usual, with normal working hours, except on Christmas Day, said Preslava Ivanova of the local Information and Culture Centre. She said foreign guests have increased recently, mainly those from the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

Hotel owners offer their guests special programmes during the holidays. For example, they organize visits to workshops where people can make things with their own hands.

The fact that the Troyan area is a preferred travel destination during the winter is proven most clearly not only by the increase in hotel overnights, but also by the practice of hotel rooms being booked a year in advance by people who were satisfied with their stay.