Dita e Veres

Dita e Veres, summer day, is celebrated on 14 March across Albania as the end of winter and is a public holiday, and its heartland is Elbasan, where the day is treated as the city's own and where the associated food comes from: ballokume, a dense sweet biscuit of maize flour, butter, sugar and eggs, beaten in a copper pot over a wood fire and baked, made in quantity for the day and sold across the country. The festival predates Christianity in origin and is understood as a spring rite, marked with red and white thread bracelets called verore worn until the first swallow is seen, with fires, picnics and family gatherings, and in Elbasan with concerts and a very large crowd in the streets.

What you actually see

• Ballokume biscuits - maize flour beaten over a wood fire for the day.
• Verore thread bracelets - red and white cords worn until the first swallow.
• Elbasan on 14 March - the city given over to the festival.
• A pre-Christian spring rite - the origin the celebration is traced to.

When to go

14 March, and only then; the biscuits are made in the days before. A day. Elbasan is very crowded and accommodation is hard to find. Transport in and out is heavy that day.

Honest expectations

It is one day a year and outside it there is nothing to see beyond biscuits in shops. Elbasan is packed and the crowds are heavy. It is a family and public holiday rather than an event organised for visitors. Accommodation books out.

Nearby

Elbasan castle is in the city; Tirana lies north-west.