We found out about a Balkan adventure traveler meet up weekend which aligned with my 30th birthday! We decided to pivot from our original plans and head to a small town in Bulgaria to check out the event. We met people from all over Bulgaria and also a few others from Western Europe and the UK. There was camping, yurts to stay in, bonfires, games, and some traditional Bulgarian events. The evening of my birthday, they announced awards from the weekend and Austin and I receive the “longest distance traveled to get to the event” award. After receiving the award, the main guy announce that it was my birthday and all 80ish people sang me happy birthday! Austin and I brought a delicious dark chocolate pistachio cake and it was insanely delicious :)

The final evening, 2 lambs were slaughtered and roasted in a traditional way. They built a contraption out of stone and wood and slow roasted lamb over fire and manually rotated it for seven or eight hours. We all got to try the lamb for dinner and it was absolutely delicious! There was also two Bulgarian bagpipe players and a woman who accompanied them singing, they were all wearing traditional Bulgarian attire. During their performance, many of the people there started a traditional Bulgarian dance where are you link arms and have a specific step and all move in a circle around the bonfire. The music was very cheery and upbeat and so Austin and I couldn’t help but join the people dancing!

It was overall a super fun birthday weekend and it will be very unforgettable! We are now on our way to explore the rest of Bulgaria for the next couple of weeks and then we will enter Turkey.