Hotel Merian

14 readers found this review helpful

The Merian Hotel is a fairly small but nice hotel. The staff are very friendly and efficient and helpful. We went half board and the food (buffet breakfast and dinner) was pretty good and there was enough choice to please most people - the cook made imaginative use of leftovers! The price of drinks was reasonable compared to other bars in the village. Unfortunately the hotel doesn't have a lift so there are quite a few stairs to contend with. There are spa facilities but you pay for these separately. We had some problems with heating and hot water. We were given a fan heater to deal with the heating problem. As for the hot water issue we just had to wait or time it so that we used the shower at the less busy times - a bit of an inconvenience.
Pros: Food, price, staff, cleanliness, location, size of rooms.
Cons: Hot water, heating.
Pamporovo is a nice resort. Good for beginner and intermediate skiers. When we went it hadn't snowed for a week so it was pretty icy for the first 3 days. When it did snow it was much better skiing but the slopes could've been better managed - they were getting quite rutted after a day or 2.
One thing to bear in mind is the Bulgarian custom of having wating staff if you sit at tables in bars. We visited The White Hart and were told in a rather unpleasant way that if you sit at a table you have to use a waiter to order drinks and not go to the bar yourself. Obviously this is because you are sort of expected to tip. I certainly won't be going back to that particular bar - Stefan the waiter spoiled our night out with his bad attitude and bad BO!