1 October
The hostel reception give me a once over decide after trying to explain maps, rules and info that although the body is there nobody is home, give me a towel and promptly deposit me into a dorm which bliss is empty and has a freshly made bed for me. A few hours sleep a shower and I'm ready for lunch!! I spend the arvo quietly wandering around the south part of town and discover a artificial lake neat park similar to Victoria Parks set up with neat walking tracks through forested areas, stumbled upon the Commonwealths cemetery from WWII.
My hostel owners and staff are also neat, each morning I have breakfast with the owner and it is custom I receive a history lesson twice a day and some rough language lessons, not doing so well the Cyrillic alphabet throws me and it is different from the Greek of last week. Bleugh. My remaining time is spent up in the mountains behind Tirana, my feet have been seen to and covered with tape. I have a brilliant day catching the local gondola in the morning up to Mt Dajti and hiking through out the oak and beach forests discovering a ruined castle and magnitude of bunkers which were installed in the 1970's to help keep the local economy afloat. Along with playing some checkers with the elderly gentlemen at the park and enjoying the local market areas from fresh food, electronics to bikes. The other thing I notice is although there are people struggling there are no beggers out on the streets waiting for money to be given to them. True a person may not have the money for a car but a donkey will be used or they will go collect chestnuts and sell them on the street corners. But there is a air of hope and people seem happy and in the most they are things are changing. Its a cool city my plan was to head north into the alps and do some further hiking but with bad weather forecasts the locals telling me the roads and areas often flood up there and the fact I don't want to be stuck that way I decide to make my way down to Berat with a neat Japanese lady from the hostel.
Nine hour bus trip my arse - they lied try more like 12! Upon leaving the bus station in Thessaloniki Greece the heavens let open with rain, its a nice change from the last couple of months besides I'm on a nice warm bus. At 11:00 pm we are woken and just eying up what everyone else does I quietly retrieve my passport and hand it over to the drivers assistant it sticks out like a sore thumb the only blue in a pie of red. We have a Greek police stop and passports are checked - at this point in time I'm questioning what we are doing parked in the middle of the wop wops with a police check, cant ask anyone but decide this is not the border so its time to stay awake and just keep an eye what is going on... apparently nothing 20 minutes later the assistant is back on the bus and we are driving. The next stop is the actual Greek border and I am surprised at the amount of traffic that is cruising through at 12:30am. We are caught in a line up of charter buses crossing the border which holds us up for a good 2 and a half hours along with a Pakistani passport holder who is questioned. No duty free but the Albanian border is a breeze after the Greek and we are through in under 20 mins. Passports find their owners and we continue on with our journey, the rain picks up again and a beautiful electrical storm rolls across the countryside I mange to get some shut eye only to be roughly awoken - not by a passenger or the storm but a pot hole! the lovely tar sealed roads seem to have been swallowed up and replaced by a single lane dirt strip with either water flooding it pot holes or both. This seriously slows the bus down at times but I'm sure the driver is making up for it when he hits good road.
Arrival into Tirana and its still raining I have also entered a different time zone with the clock going back a hour so its now 8am and I'm ready to find a hostel with a bed. I am being questioned by a taxi driver and getting a soaking from the rain so decide to grab the guide book for a address (its finally come into use) and agree with Mr Taxi man that he can take me to a hostel down the road. I also realise there is a need to visit a ATM as I have no local currency but the euro is mighty - he informs me for 5 euro he will take me to the hostel and me being checky decide as he was so eager and has carried my pack into his car before I have agreed on the fare that he can also carry my pack into the hostel for me.....
The hostel reception give me a once over decide after trying to explain maps, rules and info that although the body is there nobody is home, give me a towel and promptly deposit me into a dorm which bliss is empty and has a freshly made bed for me. A few hours sleep a shower and I'm ready for lunch!! I spend the arvo quietly wandering around the south part of town and discover a artificial lake neat park similar to Victoria Parks set up with neat walking tracks through forested areas, stumbled upon the Commonwealths cemetery from WWII.
I realise it is getting dark and popping back to the hostel and having something to eat needs to be put on the agenda. Cant quite find what I want but in the end pizza (Italian influenced) and beer wins out at 450 leke or $5.00 nz
The next day I'm up bright eyed and bushy tailed and keen to explore more of this city along with visiting the local post shop to send some postcards etc home. The people are quite cool, as in happy to help out point me in the right direction possibly having a laugh at me during the process, I manage to find the Mother Teresa square which is a let down and part of the city's bus systems storage yards.
On the bright side the local museum is quite cool with well laid out displays of the history of the land and Albanian peoples I have enjoyed spending part here and readying the two english display signs.
My hostel owners and staff are also neat, each morning I have breakfast with the owner and it is custom I receive a history lesson twice a day and some rough language lessons, not doing so well the Cyrillic alphabet throws me and it is different from the Greek of last week. Bleugh. My remaining time is spent up in the mountains behind Tirana, my feet have been seen to and covered with tape. I have a brilliant day catching the local gondola in the morning up to Mt Dajti and hiking through out the oak and beach forests discovering a ruined castle and magnitude of bunkers which were installed in the 1970's to help keep the local economy afloat. Along with playing some checkers with the elderly gentlemen at the park and enjoying the local market areas from fresh food, electronics to bikes. The other thing I notice is although there are people struggling there are no beggers out on the streets waiting for money to be given to them. True a person may not have the money for a car but a donkey will be used or they will go collect chestnuts and sell them on the street corners. But there is a air of hope and people seem happy and in the most they are things are changing. Its a cool city my plan was to head north into the alps and do some further hiking but with bad weather forecasts the locals telling me the roads and areas often flood up there and the fact I don't want to be stuck that way I decide to make my way down to Berat with a neat Japanese lady from the hostel.
One thing that is worth a mention is the bus system- it seems so disorganised to some westerners, as in they don't specifically have area with a sign that says bus stop. In fact you could almost say it is so disorganised its organised. We find the area where the buses to Berat depart from only to discover there are 20 other buses and although we ask we are pointed in 5 different directions until a local assistant takes us by the elbow and directs us to his bus. I know there is more than one company operating but just a little confusing which bus to go on when they are parked in 5 different areas but all cool we jump on hang around for another 5 mins and we are off - or so we believed, we travelled around the city for another 30 mins stopping every so often to call our destination and drive on. Eventually our bus fills up and we depart the city - I like it - any one that put their hand out the driver will hit the breaks yell the destination if you say yes your on the bus if not hopefully the next one will go where you need! even at 5am in the morning.
Berat startles us when we get off the bus as there is a crowd of children yelling things and having a go at both the Japanese lady and I. It is also the first time that I am approached in the street (because of my pack) by a local accommodation provider. I know I haven't booked my accom Mai has and we know where we are going, it is end of tourist season and any extra monies would help I'm sure but neither of us really appreciate having this much attention. After locating our beds for the night and ditching the bags we go out exploring and up to the Castle Berat which is a UNESCO world heritage site. The castle dates back 2,500 years and records of its first conquering were accomplished by the Romans in 200 B.C. the other thing which is cool is there are still people living in the castle ground in the housing and for us it was the perfect place to try out traditional Albanian Cuisine.
The day is topped off by an evening walking the main street of town - which is know as promenading . Pretty much there is a street that cars will not drive down after a certain time and all the town residents will go out for a evening stroll with their families and friends, its quite neat we even bumped into some other guests from the hostel and were able to easily join in with the tradition, although I do have to admit we were a little under dressed....
With the rivers still dirty from the earlier rains I decide to give rafting a miss and join two gentlemen form Brazil to cross over the border to Lake Ohrid, the reason I'm going - that way it will be cheaper to obtain a taxi to the border point form Pogradec and its easier having another person with you and the bus departs at 4:30am as a direct trip rather than having to under take a couple of transfers - trying to keep this simple and less complex. Although early in departure the trip is rather uneventful with a couple of stops to pick people up and a breakfast stop for our driver we were in Pogradec by 8am. Which gave us time for walk around and taxi to the border.
Hope that are well and I will start doing catch up on Macedonia for you!
Berat startles us when we get off the bus as there is a crowd of children yelling things and having a go at both the Japanese lady and I. It is also the first time that I am approached in the street (because of my pack) by a local accommodation provider. I know I haven't booked my accom Mai has and we know where we are going, it is end of tourist season and any extra monies would help I'm sure but neither of us really appreciate having this much attention. After locating our beds for the night and ditching the bags we go out exploring and up to the Castle Berat which is a UNESCO world heritage site. The castle dates back 2,500 years and records of its first conquering were accomplished by the Romans in 200 B.C. the other thing which is cool is there are still people living in the castle ground in the housing and for us it was the perfect place to try out traditional Albanian Cuisine.The day is topped off by an evening walking the main street of town - which is know as promenading . Pretty much there is a street that cars will not drive down after a certain time and all the town residents will go out for a evening stroll with their families and friends, its quite neat we even bumped into some other guests from the hostel and were able to easily join in with the tradition, although I do have to admit we were a little under dressed....
With the rivers still dirty from the earlier rains I decide to give rafting a miss and join two gentlemen form Brazil to cross over the border to Lake Ohrid, the reason I'm going - that way it will be cheaper to obtain a taxi to the border point form Pogradec and its easier having another person with you and the bus departs at 4:30am as a direct trip rather than having to under take a couple of transfers - trying to keep this simple and less complex. Although early in departure the trip is rather uneventful with a couple of stops to pick people up and a breakfast stop for our driver we were in Pogradec by 8am. Which gave us time for walk around and taxi to the border.
Hope that are well and I will start doing catch up on Macedonia for you!
 |
| (National Museum - Tirana) |
 |
| (Mt Dajti oak and Beach Forest) |
 |
| (Tirarna - Street vendor selling chestnuts) |
 |
| (Berat castle - washing day) |
 |
| (Berat Caste - Church) |
