Google celebrates Bulgaria's Baba Marta

Baba Marta's charming smile is enchanting the virtual world as the home page of Google, the world's biggest web search engine, was also draped in a Bulgarian Martenitsa on March 1 2011.

Google has a list of important dates and holidays for preparing special holiday logos, which it does regularly. They can be both on global scale and can be seen on the main page of Google by a worldwide audience, or they can be local with more limited exposure, as it it the case with Baba Marta.

Baba Marta is a mythical character in Bulgarian folkore, whose name is associated with the month of March.

Martenitsi, traditionally made from twisted red and white thread, are considered to symbolise a wish for good health, and are seen as the heralds of the coming spring and the renewal of life in general.

In 2010, the Bulgarian and Romanian-language versions of the search engine were draped in Martenitsa colours (known as Mărţişor in Romania and Moldova), but this year, Google put the reworked logo on its main site.

Source: sofiaecho

Spain reduces the speed limit to 110 kph on March 7th

The Spanish government has decided to reduce the speed limit on dual carriageways to 110 kph to help people save petrol. The law, which was announced by the Government Vice-president and Interior Minister, Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, will come into effect on March 7, and has been announced as a provisional measure, although no mention was made of when it might be lifted.

The government claims the sole purpose of reducing the speed limit from 120kph to 110kph is to help people survive the constant rises in petrol prices, mainly due to the situation in Libya.

Meanwhile, Renfe (Spanish Railways) will reduce the price of medium and short distance train tickets to encourage people to use trains.

Discussions underway for Euro Vegas in Spain

Casino king, Sheldon Adelson, CEO of Las Vegas Sands Corporation, has announced he wants to build a "Euro Vegas" in Spain. Discussions are underway, he says, with officials in Madrid and Barcelona, for a massive Las Vegas Strip-style casino resort with hotels offering some 20,000 rooms.

Marbella top spot in best beach ranking

MARBELLA has the best rated beaches in Spain, a new study shows.
It was followed by Ibiza and Lanzarote respectively. This was revealed by Oak Power Communication (OPC) which studied the position in international media of Spanish tourism brands amongst 600 journalists around the world.

Research shows that the region of Andalucia enjoys the best ‘brand image’ in Spain. As a general tourist brand, Andalusia was rated 7.9 out of 10 by journalists, followed by Madrid andBarcelona, with 7.3 and 7.1 respectively.

“Journalists value Spain’s purely Spanish spirit, strength and passion, as well as the enormous improvement in infrastructures and the quality of services in the past years” Maria Asenjo from OPC explains.

Madrid has the best image as a tourist city, with the Museo del Prado; and the Camino de Santiago wins in the category of natural destinations.

And with high profile visitors like Michelle Obama, it is perhaps hardly surprising Marbella was voted the third trendiest and most fashionable cities in Spain.

Meanwhile, the Prado Museum in Madrid is the best valued element of Spain’s artistic and tourist heritage, followed closely by the Alhambra in Granada.

Bulgaria Properties 13th Most Attractive to British Buyers

Bulgaria has made it to the thirteenth spot in a new ranking of property markets, which remain popular for foreign mortgages among Britons.

The Bulgarian market has attracted 1.3% of the searches for properties abroad at the site of Rightmove Overseas in January, while their number increased by 40,5% over December.

Britons continue to be attracted most by the idea of taking out a foreign mortgage for a property in Spain, the ranking shows.

Australia, New Zealand and Canada have recorded the highest increases in the searches for properties on the site, up by a whopping 114%, 91% and 80%.

"We're still seeing healthy traffic and interest for quality properties, particularly in more authentic areas; smaller towns, inland locations and less resort style apartments," Robin Wilson, head of overseas at Rightmove, said.

Owning a second home abroad was once the preserve of the super-wealthy, but in the past decade a heady combination of TV property shows and cheap mortgages has convinced an estimated half a million Britons to buy their own place in the sun.

The value of UK-owned foreign property investments peaked at GBP 58 B in 2008, up from GBP 10 B in 2000.

Recently however British owners of second homes overseas have been selling up due to falling rental income and weakness of sterling.

The number of Britons, who have put up their property in Bulgaria for sale, nearly doubled in 2009 over 2010, data of realtor Bulgarian Properties show.

Source: novinite

Bulgarian Summer Resort Albena Expects 20% More Germans in 2011 Summer Season

The Bulgarian Black Sea resort Albena is expecting a 20% increase of Germantourists this summer, in comparison to last year.

Yovka Strashilova, Deputy Director in the Sales Department in the resort, said that last year the number of German tourists in Albena were 16% more than the previous year.

She has explained the increased interest with the advertising campaign, organized for the second consecutive year by Albena Jsc in cooperation with tour operators. In her opinion, the lower prices, compared to the years before the recession, are also attractive to German tourists.

Strashilova said she expected the number of Russian tourists to remain the same as last year, when it saw an increase of 30%. However, Romanian tourists might increase by 5%, she said, adding that their number went up by 3% last year.

"This summer, the resort is introducing its new system Dine around," Strashilova said.

The concept will allow tourists that are staying for at least 7 day in All Inclusive and Ultra All Inclusive hotels to be able to experience cuisines in different restaurants.

Albena's Director of Investor Relations, Petko Gerdzhikov, said that a total of BGN 3.8 M were invested in the resort last year. The expected investments for the new season are BGN 4.2 M.

Gerdzhikov has explained that the money have been used for reconstruction of the resort and improvement of the infrastructure.

He has also stated that according to the preliminary data, Albena ended 2010 with a profit of BGN 9.2 M.

Source: novinite

More than 1,000 Italians back from Libya

More than 1,000 Italians have been airlifted and shipped back from Libya over the last two days and Italy hopes to bring back a further 200 Friday, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said after talks with German counterpart Guido Westerwelle here.

Italy and Germany agreed on the need to protect all European Union citizens in Libya, the foreign minister said. Berlin also "fully understands, while not being a Mediterranean country, that the Mediterranean is Europe's frontier, on which we will have to do the most work in the near future," he said after Italy and other Mediterranean nations' pleas for more solidarity from the rest of the EU were met with reservations from many northern EU members Thursday.

So far Italy has received 6,300 North African migrants, all but 100 of them Tunisians, but there are Italian fears that the Libyan conflict may unleash a "Biblical" exodus. OBAMA, BERLUSCONI AGREE ON COORDINATED RESPONSE.

United States President Barack Obama phoned Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi as well as Britain's David Cameron and France's Nicolas Sarkozy Thursday night to agree a joint response to the Libyan crisis.

Obama and Berlusconi agreed on the need for a coordinated multilateral response to ensure adequate humanitarian assistance and basic human rights, the White House said. Frattini said Friday Italy agreed on a proposal for "targeted sanctions" to deter Gaddafi from shedding more blood.