Snowfall in Pamporovo and Chepelare

The snow cover in Pamporovo is currently 80 cm, and the owners of the tourist centers are overjoyed with the large number of visitors who fill the ski slopes, hotels, and restaurants. Nature was kind to the Rhodope winter resort this year. Unlike the rest of Bulgaria and Europe’s ski resorts, Pamporovo was relatively cold, even with overcast snow, during the most critical period, when almost summer temperatures drove those working in the industry and snow lovers to despair.

Pamporovo JSC announced that a portion of the resort’s slopes were snow-covered as a result of this. This is also why, this year, many skiers chose the Rhodope resort over the Alps, which has become one of Europe’s most popular. And now, after heavy snowfalls across the country, all tracks in Pamporovo are operating at full capacity, according to Kostadin Belenozov, a tourism expert in Chepelare municipality:

“The occupancy of the hotels in Pamporovo is over 80%. The guests from Turkey and Ireland predominate, there are also many Bulgarian tourists. The conditions are excellent and everyone is very satisfied. The resort complex did the best with the situation and got it under control! Even though there was no snow throughout the country and in Europe, our skiing conditions were the best in Bulgaria. And at the most critical moments, the pistes became skiable because the Pamporovo team managed to cover enough pistes with artificial snow. The prices of half-day and one-day ski passes kept the values from last year and generally vary between BGN 52 and BGN 85.”

When winter returned to Bulgaria last week, the neighboring resort town of Chepelare quickly filled up with skiers eager to catch up. 90% of the visitors are Bulgarian. At the moment, the so-called “red track” of the ski center “Mechi chal” above town. Sabi Madankov, chairman of the Chepelare Hoteliers and Restaurateurs Association, is overjoyed:

“It is snowing nicely, there are conditions for skiing. The ski center Mechi chal is open from Friday. What is new this year is that the municipality is financing the construction of a children’s ski center, in the town of Chepelare itself, with a mini ski tow one lane and many attractions for children. And the most interesting thing is that all this will be free of charge.

But for us the most important thing was to have skiing conditions. Are there skiing conditions, people are coming back! The temperatures have dropped and you can also do artificial snow. And the forecasters promised that more snow will fall during the week and then the other slopes of Mechi chal will also work. There are also cross-country ski trails, snowshoe trails, etc. in the area. Traditionally, in Chepelare, the season is very strong during February and until March 10. So we hope for good results“.

In addition to the new children’s ski center in the “Dyortevoto” area, which will open in early February, Chepelare will welcome winter visitors with two brand new marked routes.

One of them starts from the city itself and leads to a centuries-old water mill, and the other – from the lower station of the “Mechi chal” lift and crosses the “Yanchovitsa” area, where traces of an ancient cave dwelling from the Stone-Copper Age have been found. “The routes are also accessible in winter, they can be traversed both on foot and with sleds,” says Madankov.

Source : novinite