Albania - Hello Autumn!

We expected a more comfortable trip from Italy to Albania:The ferry is full, and very luxury. That means lots of staff and almost no place to unsroll our sleeping mats and sleeping bags. Finally we find a corner... Sleep, charge all electric devices and make 200km at the same time: Perfect!


Resonablywell rested we make our way out of Albanias second largest city and spend the rest of the day on the beach. We also use the time to get inform about the new country. It was almost completely isolated until the 90s, also an absolute ban of any religion was imposed during the communist dictatorship. After Enver Hoxhas death, the fall of the communist regime and the end of the kosovo war the cuntry slowly starts to recover. It is still among the poorest countries in Europe. The contrast between very poor and very rich is obvious everywhere, lots of bunkers point to the coutries past. Numerous mosques have been build during the last 20years, which reflect the religious distribution in Albania. That might explain the way Moni was treated, adapted to the local dresscode (not showing knees and shoulders)  we like the coutry and people a lot better.


We also need to plan our route for the next days.Swimming and diving season is over, so we decide not to cycle along the coast but over the maoutains towards Macedonia. Thats prety exhausting, but the different stunning views are worth the effort: Narrow canyons, wide valleys, high mountains, ...  Quite often someone comes to accompany us for a while:


In Prrenjas autumn shows its worst face: Thunderstorms, lots of rain. So we escape into the first hotel - here the rooms are rented for Hours - we stay for two nights. We use the short moments without rain to explore the littly city and discover lots of mining remains.

After two days we destroyed the hotel wifi and start to get bored. So we decide to cycle on despite the rain. Hard to believe,we discover even more bunkers here than in the rest of the country on the pass to Macedonia.


Summing up: Albania is stunning and we only got to see a small part of the country. We will be back for sure, probably with dive gear to explore some of the caves here. But for dnianow we go on to Macedonia.

Bild
Bild
Bild
Bild
Bild
Bild
Bild
Bild

Kommentar schreiben

Kommentare: 0