Gusinje Summer (Gusinjsko ljeto)

Gusinjsko ljeto — Gusinje Summer — is the month-long festival that carries this Prokletije valley town through high summer, running roughly from mid-July to early August — and the tourist organisation bills 2026 as the richest season yet. More than a festival, it is the annual homecoming of Gusinje's large diaspora, whose return doubles the valley's population and energy.

Gusinje lies deep in a broad green valley walled by the sheer faces of the Prokletije — a town whose horizon is all rock and whose history is all departure and return. That geography sent generations abroad, and it is what makes the summer homecoming so charged: for a few weeks, the valley holds everyone at once.

The programme is famously eclectic. Big open-air concerts anchor the evenings — the 2026 programme brings Amadeus Bend on 13 July, Šejla Zonić on 31 July and Mirza Selimović on 2 August for Aliđun — while recent editions have filled the days with exhibitions, ethno-room visits, book promotions and a bicycle race through the valley. One recurring fixture captures the diaspora spirit perfectly: a basketball match pitting Gusinje's emigrants in the USA against those in Europe.

Everything peaks on 1 and 2 August. Traditional village games take over Vusanje on the 1st, and on the 2nd the whole valley converges on Ali-pašini izvori — the crystal springs of Ali Pasha — for the great Aliđun gathering, the emotional summit of the homecoming.

For outside visitors, the festival offers something rarer than entertainment: the sight of a community celebrating itself. Join the crowds at the springs, where the cold water pours straight from the foot of the mountains, and the line between guest and local dissolves quickly.

All events are free. The festival spreads across Gusinje town, the springs and the village of Vusanje, beneath some of the most dramatic peaks in the Prokletije — come for the concerts, stay for the sense of a scattered community reassembling at home.