Surva Masquerade Festival

The masks come first. A group of survakari turns into the square in costumes made of animal skins, fur, horns and other natural materials, and the people inside them are performing masquerade rituals handed down through generations in western Bulgaria. In Pernik, every January, thousands of them march in the same streets.

Kukeri, survakari, babugeri and dzhamali are the masquerade figures of Bulgarian folklore, and Surva gathers them in one town. The festival was founded in 1966, gained international status in 1985 and is now held under UNESCO patronage. Pernik joined the Federation of European Carnival Cities in 1995, and the survakari tradition is on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

The 2026 edition, the 32nd and a 60-year anniversary, opened on Friday 16 January at Krakra Square with a staged show, "The Legend of the First Survakar", and more than 250 performers. For the first time the parades ran over two weekends, on 17 and 18 January and again on 24 and 25 January, with about 13,000 participants from Bulgaria and abroad, among them more than 30 groups from other countries, including the United States, France, Italy and Indonesia. The main parades were on the final weekend, and the costumed groups pose for photographs with visitors along the way.

How to go: Pernik is a town in western Bulgaria, and our Sofia guide covers the capital as a base. It is January, so dress for cold and a long stand on the pavement. The dates for 2027 are not out yet; the festival is traditionally held on the last weekend of January.