The Mardi Gras carnival weekend is upon us. On Saturday the city centre will be taken over by the Dragon Carnival, in which around 1,200 are expected to take part.

This time the carnival will be marked out by everything round, as Ljubljana has already begun its preparations to host this year’s European Basketball Championships.

Ljubljana City Museum are hard at work preparing Carnival Saturday with the Chess Queen, which is set to revive memories of the ‘Black and White Reduto’, an elite carnival dance that the bourgeoisie of Ljubljana enjoyed between the two world wars.

Dragon Carnival

A central part of the Dragon Carnival is to be the Mardi Gras parade, which gets underway at 11am on Saturday 9 February 2013 from Breg (at Novi trg), across Čevljarski most (the Cobblers’ Bridge), along Prečna ulica to Mestni trg, down Stritarjeva ulica and across Tromostovje to Prešeren Square and from there to Congress Square.

The children’s part of the parade starts at noon. The parade will include, among others, characteristic costumes from the pagan folk tradition such as ‘kurents’, ‘laufars’, ‘morostars’ and others.

The central carnival event is to be held in Congress Square, where the programme runs from 11am to 3pm. In addition to a showcase of costumes, the fun will be provided by the Ljubljana Majorettes, Bežigrad Wind Orchestra, Ljubljana Morostars, many ethno music and children’s groups plus music from the Blue Angel Gang with vocalist Katja Koren, while of course we mustn’t forget the carnival mascot – the Dragon.
You are warmly welcome to attend the Dragon Carnival.

Dragon Carnival accompanying programme:

Saturday 9. 2. at 10.30, Ljubljana Castle: Introduction to the Dragon Carnival – Kurentovanje
Saturday 9. 2. at 11.00, Ljubljana Castle: Fairytale-creative meeting
Sunday 10. 2. at 11.00, Ljubljana Puppet Theatre: Carnival merrymaking with costume-wearing
Tuesday 12. 2. at 17.00, Ljubljana Puppet Theatre: Grand ‘kosovir’ concert and carnival merrymaking