The city of Shumen won first prize in the fifth edition of the annual awards given by the Ministry of Tourism of Bulgaria. The city was named the best tourist destination of the year, receiving over 63% of the votes in the most prestigious category of the contest.
The tourism champions of 2020
In this year’s competition, the historical and cultural landmarks in the municipalities of Shumen, Veliki Preslav and Kaspichan, united in the destination “Shumen – the land of the first” received 63.60% of the vote and convincingly topped the final ranking in this category. In second place in the “tourist destination” category was the municipality of Bansko with 20.80%, and in third place – the tourist route “Sacred womb of the Rhodopes” with 5.62%.
According to Bulgarians who cast their votes, the town of Sandanski deserved a special award as a “tourist municipality“. This category recognises sustainable development and digitalization in municipalities as a response to the COVID-19 crisis in tourism. In second and third place are the cities of Balchik and Burgas, respectively.
The Historical Park in Varna won a convincing victory in the “Innovation” category with almost 89% of the votes. The category promotes innovative approaches, services, products, technological solutions and concepts proposed by various representatives of the tourism industry. With almost 50% of the votes, the park was chosen as the tourist site/attraction of the year.
Archery tournament in the Historical Park, Varna. Photo: Varna Historical Park
The most visited and most loved sites are once again the “Historical Park”, in the village of Neofit Rilski near Varna, followed by the gorge of the river Erma and the House-Museum “Aleko Konstantinov”.
The winners of the Annual Tourism Awards were determined by online voting on the website of the Ministry of Tourism, which ended on 7 December. This year’s edition of the ranking was held in 11 categories, of which 4 professional, 5 artistic and 1 specially designed for municipalities.
Source: TheMayor.EU
