Kotel
is a small town nestling in the folds of the Balkan Mountains. It bears a rich and troubled past and was the birthplace of Sofroniy of Vratsa, a prominent Bulgarian scholar. He wrote the first printed new Bulgarian book called Nedelnik and was later canonized. It was also the birth place of such notables as Neofit Bozveli, a teacher and a writer of the National revival Period; Dr. Petar Beron, the first Bulgarian scientist; Georgi Rakovski, the ideologue of the National Liberation Movement in the middle of the 19th Century and many other revolutionaries.

Kotel is the pantheon of the Bulgarian Renaissance. Worth visiting are the History Museum, the House of the Way of Life in Kotel, the Galatansko School and the Natural Science Museum.