The paths leading to tourist chalets and shelters, summits, fountains, springs, lakes, waterfalls, caves, natural phenomena, historical monuments and other sightseeing are marked. 

Most frequently the marking connects towns or villages with chalets and chalets in between.

In the presence of tourist marking special training for excursions to the appropriate object is not necessary.

The marking signs are put thus so that they can be easily visible from the both sides of the path:

Usually the tourist marking marks the shortest and the most suitable paths, passing through safe, beautiful or remarkable places.

MAIN PRINCIPLE: In case of losing the marking on unknown route one have to get back to the last noticed sign and from there to start searching the marking.

The summer routes are marked mainly with band marking. It consists of three horizontal contiguous strips, as the middle is the main orientation color and the side strips are for attracting attention. There are four orientation colors: red, green, blue and yellow and for attracting color is used the white one. Yet old marking might be seen and in it the attracting color is the yellow one.

The professional band marking may be distinguished for that it is made with stencil on static objects (trees, building walls, rocks, stones etc.). Recently very frequently ready metal three-color signs are used nailed to the trees.

The red color, as it attracts attention very well, is used for marking ridge routes and the rest colors – for marking secondary routes. The three international routes, passing through Bulgaria – E-3, E-4 and E-8 are marked entirely in red. For additional specifying the route small square yellow signs with inscription E-3, E-4 or E-8 and an arrow pointing the direction are used as well:

Another marking sign is the arrow. Most often it is a sign pointing not only the direction but also the final place where the marking leads. There are two different types of signs: yellow with black letters (the old ones) and white with black letters (the new ones):

There are indicative boards in front of the chalets, on the starting points as well as on important crossroads. They show graphically with schemes the important tourist objects, the distance between them and the color of the marking:

On the mountain ridges there are the so-called pyramids – stone heaps, put by tourists or shepherds for orientation in bad weather conditions during the summer or for choosing a route in technically complex section. In some places there are some variants for one route marked thus, so the right choice is perplexed.

It is recommended to use the winter marking during the summer in bad weather conditions although in most of the cases it is connected with bigger displacement.

On some of the new tourist maps the colors of the marked tourist routes are pointed. Because of the many mistakes (in the colors, in the right route layouts; there are non-marked routes pointed as marked etc.) we recommend the tourists not to pay serious attention to it.

 The winter marking consists mainly of metal rods (pipes of 1,5 to 2 inches) steady fixed into the earth (at least on 60 mm) and concreted. There are some exceptions as the winter marking from Musala Chalet to Musala Summit, where the abandoned metal rails serving as pillars of the former phone line to the summit are used as rods now. The rods are painted with oil in contrasting to the snow black and yellow strips with width 200-mm:

The metal rods mark routes in the open mountain parts as well as routes passing from forests through big open places (glades, cutting areas).

The winter marking is made along routes with no or small avalanche danger – for more details see the valuable “Winter Mountain Guide” by Asparuh Markovski.

Some rods have in their upper end triangular sign with a number (in Vitosha Mountain), showing the number of the rod, and on others – small azimuth sign. This sign points the distance between the previous and the following rods and the direction to them. Azimuth signs may be rarely seen on the winter rods in the Bulgarian Mountains or in case there is such marking it is bleached and cannot be used (for example such marking is along the route Skakavitsa Chalet – Rilski Ezera Chalet and in the last part of the route Lovna Chalet – Rilski Ezera Chalet through Zla Bara Area, where there is azimuth scheme). The existing winter marking is mapped but these azimuth cards are not commonly used for pity.

The winter marking in the Bulgarian Mountains is in bad condition, on many places the rods are broken or cut by “enterprising” hosts. No one maintains it – there are no marking brigades any more (who made the bigger part of the present winter marking)

The following monitory signs for avalanches and avalanche valleys are used as well: