How to travel by bus in Bulgaria. Bus schedule

We were going to Bulgaria with a very limited budget. This is exactly the situation when you want to see everything, but you cannot afford excursions and paid tours – they are very expensive here.

That is why we decided to get to the main attractions by public transport – so it turned out much cheaper and even more interesting.

How to travel by intercity regular buses in Bulgaria?

Unfortunately, there is not much information about the transport in Bulgaria on the Internet.

You can easily find deals on airport transfers, car rental or stories about terrible prices for a taxi. But how to travel cheaply, where are bus stops, how to buy a ticket and how much does it cost, which bus schedules to follow – almost no one writes about it on the Internet.

The names of bus stops in Bulgaria and their location

In Bulgarian bus stops called “avtogara”. Unfortunately, most of them are not shown on Google Maps and Yandex Maps.

To make it easier to navigate, we wrote several separate articles with bus schedules at different Bulgarian resorts.

Also there are maps in them with marked bus stops:

How to find out the bus schedule at your bus stop?

At every stop there is a list of routes that pass through it. Of course it is not very accurate, but it allows you to navigate.

Next to some routes are specified in levs (more about currency in Bulgaria). Some even have a convenient route map or a special person, who helps tourists (we saw such in Pomorie).

Where to get tickets and how much do they cost?

In every bus there is a conductor. Most often it is a woman, who will come to you on her own. Tell her the place of your destination, pay for a ticket and receive a check. Everything is simple and without cheating.

You can see the approximate prices for travel by bus on articles about specific resorts on article about transport in Bulgaria.

A ticket price does not always depend on a distance

An interesting fact is that the price of the ticket does not always depend on the distance. For example, for the same cost from Pomorie you can get to Ravda or the northern part of Sunny Beach. But between the resorts is approximately half an hour the way …

bus-seat-public-transport

Comfort of traveling by buses

Buses in Bulgaria are quite comfortable. Everything is relatively new, the air conditioners operate and there are no squeaks. Their speed is quite high and long stopovers are a rarity.

Despite the fact that even on the Bulgarian coast there are winding roads, in most cases they are not tedious or dangerous. Except from Nessebar to Varna, where riding in buses can cause you motion sickness. We traveled for about 2 hours, and even that we got tired a little.

How often do buses run?

Routes along the coast go very often, literally every 20 minutes. If you want to go deep into the country, the route may be only once a day, perhaps with changes in Varna or Burgas.

Where is convenient to reach by bus?

As you already realized by bus you can easily reach the main seaside towns and resorts of Bulgaria: Nessebar, Sunny Beach, Pomorie, Varna, Burgas, Balchik, Ravda, Sozopol and many others.

To go deep into the country is better by a rented car or with paid excursion – a bus schedule is very uncomfortable, you will have to stay overnight, and it is also not cheap.

How much can you save if you travel by bus?

If you visit the main attractions of the resort part of Bulgaria by bus, you can spend about 3 times less money than on excursions.

At the same time you get a complete freedom to decide when and where you are traveling and to decide yourself how much time to allocate to the viewing of a place. Even a trivial choice of restaurant is defined in advance in many tours.

There are disadvantages, though. You won’t have a guide, and some of the remotest corners can only be visited by a terribly expensive taxi or by renting your own car.

In general, we recommend to visit the coastal parts of Bulgaria on your own, and to visit the innermost parts of the country by excursions.

What else is useful to read on this topic?