River
Nestos
230 km from source to mouth · Greece and Bulgaria.
Greece and BulgariaFlows into Thracian Sea4th longest in Greece
In numbers
Length
230km
Average flow
40m³/s
Basin
2,767km²
Drop
774m
from 774 m to 0 m
Countries
2
The journey
From source to mouth
230 km of river and 5 stops on the way: 2 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmRilaat 774 m
- 0 kmYakoruda6,008 people
- 37 kmRetizhetributary
- 73 kmHadzhidimovo3,167 people
- 103 kmDospattributary
- 145 kmPlatanovrysi lake1.6 km²
- 230 kmThracian Seaat 0 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Bulgaria and Greece
At the mouth it carries 40 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 63 seconds. It drops from 774 m to 0 m, 3.4 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 2,767 km², about the size of LU. 166,000 people live in it. Highest water: from December to January; lowest: from August to October. It is heavily dammed: reservoirs can hold 97% of a year's flow.
Where to start
- YakorudaLargest city on its banks · 6,008 people
- Sofia Airport (SOF)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 78 km from the cityCar hire at SOF airport (Sofia)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- On the water2 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- From May to SeptemberThe best months to visit
Nestos, month by month
Highest water: from December to January
Lowest water: from August to October. Best months to visit: from May to September.
From about 9.8 m³/s in the lowest month to 95 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The basin
Nestos: the basin in numbers
5,863 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 166,000people live in the basin
- 28/km²people per km²
- 1,040maverage altitude of the basin
- 623mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 8.5°Caverage air temperature
- 45%protected areas
- 0.5%covered by lakes
- 1.2km³held in reservoirs
What covers the basin
- 65% Forest
- 9% Cropland
- 6% Pasture
- 1% Towns and cities
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
Nestos: what you find on the way
- 4Weirs
- 2Boat ramps
- 1River beachesGalani Beach of Nestos
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.7 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Nestos in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
1lake on its wayLakeyas
19mountains at the sourcePeakyas
4islands off the mouthIslandyas
Lakes and reservoirs (1)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Platanovrysi lakekm 1441.6km²
Lakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
Mountains at the source (19)
Within 15 km of the source, by Peakyas
- Musala6.6 km away · prominence 2,473 m2,925m
- Malka Musala6.7 km away2,902m
- Irechek7.3 km away2,852m
- Mancho4.4 km away2,771m
- Ovcharets2.7 km away2,769m
- Deno8.7 km away2,790m
- Rilets10 km away2,713m
- Unnamed Peak7.6 km away2,792m
11 more on PeakyasOpen Peakyas ↗
Islands off the mouth (4)
Within 30 km of the mouth, by Islandyas
- Thasos21 km away379km²
- Koinyra22 km away
- Thasopoula8.6 km away
- Gramvousa16 km away
Islandyas is coming soonOpen Islandyas ↗
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Photos
Nestos in pictures
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (6)
Also: Retizhe, Cherna Mesta, Chechka Bistritsa, Zlataritsa, Melorrema
Nearby
Rivers nearby
TurkeyWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q193904) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Lakeyas, Peakyas, Islandyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
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