The Banderishki lakes
A chain of glacial lakes below Vihren.
kallerna — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Avi8 — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Charles J. Sharp — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Спасимир — CC BY-SA 4.0
A mountain town at the park entrance, Bulgaria's largest ski resort and by a clear margin the cheapest major resort in Europe — which is what it is known for. It has two faces: **winter** (December to April) is the ski season, with a gondola climbing straight from the town and lodging and lessons far below Alpine prices. And **summer** is the walking season in Pirin, quieter and cheaper still. The old town itself is handsome: nineteenth-century stone houses and mehana taverns serving local food. Two nights are enough for the mountain and the town.
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Pirin National Park is on the World Heritage list and covers the high **Pirin mountains** of south-western Bulgaria — a range of granite and marble entirely unlike the country's others. Three things distinguish it. The **lakes**: more than a hundred and seventy glacial lakes filling the hollows between the peaks, best known the Banderishki and Vlahini groups. The **peaks**: more than forty above 2,600 metres, the highest Vihren at 2,914, Bulgaria's second highest. And **Baikushev's pine** — a Bosnian pine estimated at about 1,300 years old, among the oldest trees in Europe. The park also holds plants and animals found nowhere else, along with bears, wolves and chamois. Its main entrance is from **Bansko**, the town that is also Bulgaria's largest ski resort. **About 160 km from Sofia, two and a half hours by car** — it needs an overnight rather than a day trip.
A chain of glacial lakes below Vihren.
2,914 metres — Bulgaria's second highest peak.
Pirin mountains, south-western Bulgaria