Golden Sands Nature Park

Worth a detour

Thirteen square kilometres of oak and hornbeam running about nine kilometres along the coast and barely more than a kilometre deep, protected since 1943 — long before the resort that now backs onto it. It is a walk rather than a wilderness. The reason to climb into it is Aladzha Monastery, cut into a cliff inside the park boundary, and the fact that the forest is twenty degrees cooler than the beach.

Story

Background

The forest was set aside in 1943, under the name Hachuka, when this coast was trees and fishing villages. The hotels arrived in the 1950s and 60s and stopped at the tree line, and the boundary has held since — which is why a resort of that size has genuine old woodland immediately behind it rather than scrub.

Inside are around four hundred plant species and a mixed deciduous canopy of oak, hornbeam, elm, maple and lime, with springs, roe deer, wild boar and something under eighty recorded birds. Marked paths climb inland from the resort towards Aladzha; it is a steady uphill through shade, which is the best argument for doing it in July rather than walking the promenade.

Expect company near the bottom in season, since the lower paths begin among the hotels, and far less of it a kilometre in. Out of season, when the resort is shuttered and slightly bleak, the forest is the main reason to be at Golden Sands at all.