Out in the Mountains

I just got back from a short trip out to the Rhodopi mountains in south-central Bulgaria today. May 1st and 6th are holidays here, and everyone takes off all the days in between to get a nice 6 day vacation. Its kinda crazy, but I don't mind.

My trip was a ton of fun. I stayed with a couple of friends that live in small Turkish minority villages out in the mountains and I got to experience life out there first hand. A few of the towns were having festivals as well and one of the days there was even a big Muslim wedding that we got invited to. Turns out that Turkish Bulgarian weddings are very similar to regular Bulgarian weddings, although with a bit less drinking involved. It was a cool experience though and I got to meet a ton of people. Everyone out there was super friendly, and I have to admit that of all the places I have been to so far in Bulgaria, the villagers in the Rhodopis are the nicest.
I spent most of the days just hanging out, relaxing, cooking good food, and hiking all afternoon. The trails out there are fantastic and wind in and out of impressive canyons and valleys. The last day there we went on a 6-7 hour hike along a picturesque canyon with a cool natural land bridge. We made it all the way through the canyon and got to the very end, right in sight of the main road when we discovered that the bridge connecting our side of the river and the side with the road was gone. We had to finish the day with a pretty intense river crossing, struggling against the current while cars slowed down and watched.

The last day, May 6th, is a special day for the Muslims in the area. They are supposed to go out early and wash themselves in the river and get good luck and health for the rest of the year. We joined in, and discovered all too soon that there was more to it than just washing your hands real quick in the river. We had a bit of a late start and didn't get going until about 6 (way too early still if you ask me) and its was soon after that when I realized that we weren't going to the river that ran right through town, but had to climb a good ways up the mountain to this little steam. Along the way we paused to roll around in the grass (good for health I guess) before reaching our destination and performing the ritual cleansing. The water was ice cold, but fortunately the sun was coming up over the mountains so it wasn't unbearable.

After washing we hunted for green tree branches so that we could make hats and belts out of them for the walk home. It was kind strange, but my hat ended up being pretty sweet and made me look a bit like Caesar with my short hair. Then, once we were accessorized with our forest apparel, we had to crawl through three sets of old thorny bushes to complete the ritual. It wasn't as bad as it sounds, and we all made it through without too much trouble.
Overall it was a rather strange ritual but it was interesting to see and a lot of fun to participate in. I have definitely never done anything like it before and it was funny because we were doing it with all the old grandmas from the town.

(Thanks to Thomas for some of the pics) http://picasaweb.google.com/justinrobarge