Day 41 Kotor

M rose early to beat the heat, the crowds and the entrance fee to walk to the castle of San Giovanni above the town, K declined preferring to catch up on some sleep.

M returned with the sad news that today there were two huge cruise liners is town and we could already hear the difference in the crowd noise from inside our apartment. We decided to escape the crowds again and went to the bus station to get the bus to Budva about half an hour away. We arrived at the bus station to be told the road was closed and probably would be for another hour. It was only then we noticed that there wasn't the normal bumper to bumper traffic, in fact there was no traffic, The normally busy port street had become a pedestrian mall, we did wonder why there wasn't a sign at the entrance to the bus station informing everyone rather than only finding out when it was your turn at the ticket window. We walked back around the outside of the old town and crossed the river to the other side, here we saw that there were police manning the roads and all local drivers were being stopped and told to park their cars. Then we saw motorbikes and lead cars coming down the hill past us followed by men on bikes going incredibly fast, a bit later there were more police motorbikes and the  a large group of riders followed by some stragglers. The fact that this bike race would have been organised well in advance to close roads made it even more strange there wasn't any signage here or anywhere. The drivers on the side roads had given up and left their cars parked in the middle of the road, we decided to grab some lunch at a cute beach spot and wait until the road returned to normal.

After a nice lunch we finally caught the bus to Budva where we had considered staying at one stage instead of Kotor. Budva is very different to Kotor, a larger marina for pleasure boats but no cruise ships. The buildings were more highrise and the old town not nearly  as nice as Kotor so we were happy with our choice. They did have a strip of a rock beach and then another slightly better beach strip which was more popular, but that was about it, it wasn't as charming as Kotor.

Day 40 Kotor

Apparently Kotor was largely off the tourist hub until it was featured as a place of the year a few years ago. This morning we were out and about before the passengers arrived from the new cruise ship that had arrived into port over night. We went to the bakery to try and get some coffee and breakfast but were met with a lack of interest once again. 

We went to the bus stop with the idea of catching the first bus that was leaving in either coastal direction (north or south) and the first choice was to Herceg Novi so we hopped on. It was a lovely coastal trip for an hour passing small islands in the middle of the bay, they seemed to be in pairs, The one with more height and trees would be a church and the flatter more barren island would have a mosque. How did they make the decision on which religion would have which island?

The bus dropped us off at the top of a hill in Herceg Novi and we followed the cobbled path down past the obligatory fortress and stone wall to the promenade. The beaches were narrow strips of pebbles and as we walked along we heard another tourist incredulously question a cafe waiter, no food?! We smiled as we knew how he felt, how can it be that place after place that look like they are cafes and restaurants only serve drinks, do locals not eat, or is that they don't eat out?

There was one restaurant with a menu that we would consider more for dinner than lunch and then we did find the one and only cafe on the stretch that sold food. Herceg Novi was so quiet, there was barely a tourist around, maybe the harbour isn't deep enough for the cruise ships.

By the time arrived back into Kotor at 5pm the crowds were thinning for the evening and we did some grocery shopping for a home cooked meal, our first real cooked meal, excluding noodles (I don't think they count).

Day 39 Tirana Albania to Kotor Montenegro

The bus to Kotor was leaving at 8am but luckily it was only a five minute walk from our accommodation. The bus backtracked via Shkoder where we had been yesterday, and collected an English couple we had met on the ferry a couple of days before. The border crossings were taken care of by the driver and the police coming onto the bus, it was very easy for us, they were only interested in the Albanians, questioning them on how much money they had. Our bus driver spent a lot of time on his mobile even though there was a sign on his window of a mobile with a red cross through it.

When we eventually reached Kotor it was an easy walk from the bus station through the arched gate into the walled old town, then up a few stone steps to our cute Airbnb apartment. The apartment was on two levels and very authentic with the old stone work right down to the musty smell, we are happy that we have a washing machine, which was an important filter for us.

Kotor is amazing, its all old stone, cobbled roads, walls, shops, accommodation and no motorised traffic inside the city walls. We turned a corner and found ourselves in a square with hordes of tour groups, and a cruise ship could be seen out the gate. Just as we were despairing at the crowds there was a mass exodus and by about 4pm there was only a sprinkling of people left. 

We found a bar on one of the many squares but once again experienced the total lack of interest in us or serving us that has dogged us throughout most of this trip, don't think we will ever complain about service in Melbourne again. We moved on pretty fast and purely by accident came across a tiny little hole in the wall, we were served cheap drinks by an old man on a cute street, this was more our style.

Day 38 Skhoder to Tirana

Today we had to return our small and very dirty car back to the car rental in Tirana. We have certainly had our money's worth out of our tiny, gutless car and now we understand why we were told we had to get it washed before we returned it! There is always a huge relief when you once again safely hand back a hire car. The freedom of having a car is such a plus but then taking a bus relieves you of all the stresses and responsibilities.

We dropped off our luggage at our accommodation not far from the bus station, returned the car to the rental company then wandered around the city for the afternoon, visiting one of the bunker museums as well as the revolving restaurant, at least it wasn't pouring rain like our last time in Tirana.

On our final night in Albania we were staying close to some really nice outdoor cafes and bars however the issue with these is that they don't serve any meals. They look like they are  restaurants but they are drinks only and as we couldn't find anywhere to eat we ended up eating noodles in our rooms with a tiny plastic spoon K had saved from an ice cream shop.

As we leave this part of the world we have a few thoughts, we love the huge amounts of potted colour everywhere, not sure whether this is just a spring thing but the cafes, restaurants, shops and even petrol stations are adorned with masses of colourful plants.

We have become more comfortable crossing the road at pedestrian crossings even though they don't seem to hold any significance for drivers. Kosovo was the opposite of Australia, when you want to cross at a zebra crossing at home you wait for the cars to stop and then step out, in Kosovo you step onto the crossing and then the approaching cars stop (hopefully), a much scarier proposition.

Day 37 Bajram Curri to Shkoder

From Bajram Curri we drove to Fierze and spent the morning hanging around waiting for the ferry that would take us along Lake Komani which is meant to be one of the great river boat rides of the world and the best in Europe. The ferry charges for vehicles at rate of €5 per square meter so M googled our car and made some calculations. 

Our little car was squashed on to the ferry and and we headed off for the 2 plus hour trip down what appeared to be a river but is actually a lake caused by damming. The weather was perfect and the scenery stunning, it was great to be enjoying some natural beauty after 5 weeks of visiting mostly man made sights. There aren't any pre-arranged stops on the way, if someone wants to get on they just wait at the side of the river and flag the boat down, the few small dwellings we saw appeared to be very basic.

All too soon we arrived at the dam at Komani and drove the very poor road to Skhoder for the night. As beautiful as the countryside is the area is spoilt by the amount of rubbish lying around everywhere, it appears as if the locals have got a bit of beautifying that they need to do if they want to attract more tourists.

It also seems that the local hotel and restaurant owners might have taken advice from the city of Skopje as there were a lot of not very good or appropriate statues and kitsch copied castles around the place, and of course we ended up eating at one such restaurant.

Day 36 Pristina Kosovo to Bajram Curri Albania

The free walking tour of Pristina didn't start until 11am which was a bit late for us, plus the guide we had yesterday had put us off walking tours for a while so we found a self guided tour online and spent an hour or so checking out the major sites of Pristina. This included the new Mother Teresa church, and the library which has made the list of the 30 ugliest buildings in the world. 

Next stop after Pristina was Prizen, this time the major highway was new and in wonderful shape which was a pleasant surprise after the last few days of driving.

Prizen's old town is set delightfully on the river with lots of cute restaurants and we met up with some English guys that we had met on the walking tour in Skopje. 

We then drove onto Gjakova for a quick stop, then crossed the border back into Albania before reaching our final stop for the night at the very Indian sounding Bajram Curri. This area of Albania is high in the mountains with snow on the peaks and and an aquamarine river.

Day 35 Skopje Macedonia to Pristina Kosovo

We joined a morning walking tour of Skopje which took in Mother Teresa's house and the chapel built in her honour.

We were also told by our guide that our view from the previous evening in relation to the statues and fountains was wrong. All the city adornment we had admired were not glorious at all but very recent additions in the last few years and disliked by the locals who think it makes their city look like Las Vegas, how wrong could we be!

We had been told by someone on the walking tour in Skopje that the border to Kosovo was closed but we couldn't find any info online so we were quite pleased when we sailed though the border easily into Kosovo. However just a little way past the border was a sign that said the road to Pristina was closed, and that we should use an alternative route. However as we saw vehicles on the road we thought we needed to take we followed them, and started down a very poor road that was under heavy construction but still (barely) driveable. 

We followed the other vehicles on what is possibly the worst road we have ever been on (yes we know we say that a lot). Our tiny car was not taking this bush track well and after passing some locals who seemed to be indicating by their waving and signals that we were going the wrong way we turned around and headed back to the border - now we understood, it wasn't the border that was closed but the road on the other side. We tried another road and were quickly rewarded with hand written signs to Pristina. 

It wasn't the easiest drive but we finally arrived in Pristina and went for a short walk around the area we were staying in, just off the main promenade.

Day 34 Ohrid to Skopje

We were up early for breakfast on the edge of the lake before the town got too busy, and when that was done we drove around the edge of massive Lake Ohrid to the Bay of Bones. 

This was really interesting as in this spot the remains of a stone age village had been found at the bottom of the lake. The village was now reconstructed on a similar platform over the lake. The huts were made of sticks and dry mud and reminiscent of huts we had seen in many parts of Africa. All had a small clay fire for cooking and heating and the sleeping areas had animal skins on top of straw, some were bear skins with heads and paws still attached.

Our next stop was the Monastery of Saint Naum which is beautifully kept with lovely gardens and cafes on the water, luckily we left just as a bulging boatload of people were arriving from Ohrid.

We drove on from there to our lunch stop of Bitola which was surprisingly busy, there was a wide mall with restaurants and cafes full of people facing the street and people watching. We had read that they don't have a lot of money so getting dressed up and walking the main streets is the way they spend their leisure time.

Our base for the night was Skopje, the capital of Macedonia. The streets were very quiet, as was the square and bazaar. We thought the squares, open spaces and river were wonderful with so many huge statues of so many interesting people and fountains and bridges and buildings and even a couple of pirate looking boats that were bars/restaurants.

Day 33 Berat Albania to Ohrid Macedonia

Our room in Berat was lovely, we had a pillow top bed which made such a welcome change from the hard beds of Greece and a big veranda overlooking the river. As breakfast was included with our room we went back to the terrace when we woke up and were given the largest breakfast you could imagine. At one stage we took a photo thinking that was all of it, only for more food to arrive at our table. There were omelettes, sausages, bread, toast, tomatoes, cucumber, various cheeses and more and M is always pretty happy when he is served cake for breakfast. Our lovely room and breakfast cost only 30 euros (about $48).

After taking a walk across the river after breakfast we took to the rough Albanian roads again, driving through the mountains to the Macedonian border. Albania seems to be under construction, there are buildings and roads being worked on everywhere. The majority of the cars we have seen on the roads are either Mercedes or VWs, there aren't many other makes on the road.

We passed some stalls of colourful artificial flowers and just around the corner were the brightest and most colourful cemeteries we had ever seen, it seemed as if every tombstone was decorated with the artificial flowers.

At one point we passed a convoy of black cars led by a police car and other cars with flashing lights, it looks like someone important was coming through and making sure everyone knew he was on his way.

We knew we needed to buy a Green Card on the Albanian side to allow us to take the car into the other countries and just before the border we found a roadside stand. We had been told the Green Card would be €30 but for some reason we were charged €40. We drove onto the border to find there were many places to buy the card, so perhaps we could have got it cheaper.

The border crossing was uneventful and we hoped the road would improve on the Macedonian side. It certainly seemed that there were more patches as we drove through to Ohrid.

We knew Orhid was on Lake Orhid and we expected some sleepy lakeside village, instead we found ourselves in a town with a mass of tourists and narrow cobbled streets. Finding where we were staying, where to park the car and someone who spoke English to help us through all this was quite a challenge but eventually we were sorted.

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the lake area with the other tourists but feeling like we were the only English speaking tourists in town. We couldn't really work out where the other tourists were from, were they just other Macedonians? We tried to buy a Macedonian sim but couldn't find one anywhere, so maybe we were the only foreigners.

Dinner was a little strange as every table was served a bowl of what appeared to be tomato sauce and people used a spoon to smear it over their pizza, spaghetti carbonara or whatever they were eating.

Day 32 Tirana to Berat

We had decided for the next part of our trip to rent a car to travel through some of the Balkan countries, though we had heard that the roads in Albania weren't great and Tirana especially would be difficult. We did find that in Tirana that many streets had changed names, drivers don't follow rules and there are a lot of motor bikes, bicycles and pedestrians thrown into the mix.

We had plugged the coastal city of Durres into the GPS so we headed off, it wasn't long before we were heading down a narrow dead end alley, the locals did try to warn us with gesturing and raised voices but of course we didn't understand them, we eventually could go no further and had to reverse out. We decided to ignore the GPS from here on in when it decided to send us down narrow streets.

We made it to Durres and played the same fun and games with the GPS, the maps are so out of date that many roundabouts and corners were no longer there. We passed large blocks of apartments painted in different coloured polka dots - who thought that was a good idea? We eventually found the ancient town wall and amphitheater, a quick stop to have a look, then on to Vlore on the coast for lunch.

The town roads were very rough, patched and chaotic, the only rule that seemed to apply was every man for himself, in some cases they didn't even bother painting lane markings on the roads.

Vlore has a new, modern, wide promenade with lots of restaurants and is alongside a nice looking beach. All the restaurants seemed to have the same menu, seafood and pizza, so we chose a pizza restaurant for lunch, only to be told there wasn't any pizza. So instead we shared a rubbery chicken fillet then drove inland to Berat.

The road was probably the worst sealed road we have ever been on with massive holes, disappearing sections or no road at all. Fortunately Berat, known as the town of 1000 windows, made up for the difficult drive.

Berat is a lovely town divided by the river, our hotel was built into the cliff face and was so authentic that huge pieces of the rock cliff face protrude through the walls in reception.

We went for a walk across the river and along the promenade but there was a bit of evening rain so we took shelter at a cafe on the promenade. M then found a very efficient and meticulous barber and received a very good hair cut for the princely sum of about $2.50. When the rain stopped we went back to our hotel with its terrace restaurant overlooking the town and had a nice meal of roast lamb.