Nesebar is a city in Bulgaria, on the Black Sea coast. The central ancient town is full of medieval churches, and is quite beautiful. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site. There seemed to be lots of tourists there (from the beach resort on the outskirts), tour guides and local goods for sale. The resort on the outskirts, Sunny Beach, looked pretty tacky to me.
It is a one of the most prominent tourist destinations and seaports on the Black Sea, in what has become a popular area with several large resorts—the largest, Sunny Beach, is situated immediately to the north of Nesebar.
Nesebar has on several occasions found itself on the frontier of a threatened empire, and as such it is a town with a rich history. The ancient part of the town is situated on a peninsula (previously an island) connected to the mainland by a narrow man-made isthmus, and it bears evidence of occupation by a variety of different civilisations over the course of its existence. Its abundance of historic buildings prompted UNESCO to include Nesebar in its list of World Heritage Sites in 1983.
PLACE TO VISIT
A huge part of the ancient city of Messembria (the old city of Nesebar, located on the ex-island) has sunk under water. When counting the numerous sunken ones, Nesebar becomes the city with most churches per capita in Bulgaria.
WHAT TO DO
The main things to do in Nesebar are to wander around the cobbled streets and visit the churches.
There are numerous shops and stalls selling souvenirs in Nesebar. Most of their stuff is cheap tourist tat, but you can pick up locally produced lace too.
HOW TO REACH
There are regular local buses from surrounding resorts into Nesebar. If you are on a package holiday in one of the nearby resorts, the rep may try to sell you an excursion to Nesebar on the basis that local buses are unreliable, confusing and expensive; ignore them. You can get buses to Nesebar that are clearly marked in English from numerous bus stops along the main road, and they only cost a few stotinkis.
You can also get a tourist boat from Sunny Beach to Nesebar; this is more expensive and less frequent that the buses.
