Albania

Overnight stops (in date order): Shkodër (x5), Tirana (x5), Gjirokastër, Ksamil, Radhimë, Udënisht

We crossed the border close to Lake Skadar and spent our first five nights in Albania camped on their side of the Lake; which Albanians call Shkodër.

The nearby town of the same name has an impressive hill-top castle (Rozafa).  Although, as with many strategically placed hills in the Balkans, the site has been occupied since pre-Roman times, most of the visible ruins date back ‘only’ to the time of the Venetians – who controlled the town until ousted by the Ottomans in the 15^th Century.

We spent a day on Lake Koman – where a ferry makes the two-hour trip through steep-sided gorges, to connect the ends of two very bumpy roads.

We took a side channel to a riverside resort that is popular with Albanians and which can only be accessed by boat.

We spent five nights at a small farm – that was growing vines and tobacco.

Although the farm is up a dirt track and surrounded by countryside,

 it is only 20Km from Tirana, the capital.

The history of the nearby port city of Durres mirrors that of the rest of Albania.  In chronological order, it has been occupied by Illyrian tribes, ancient Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Bulgarians, Normans, Venetians, Serbians, Ottomans, Italians and Austro-Hungarians (during WW1) and Germans (during WW2).   Nearby is the site of the battle of Pharsalus – where Julius Caesar defeated Pompey the Great. 

The city’s most famous landmarks are a Roman Amphitheatre,

embedded in which is a small Byzantine church,

and the city walls – sections of which date back to the Byzantine period.

The fortress at Kruja is beloved by Albanians because it was the centre of Albanian resistance to the Ottomans in the 15^th Century.  This was led by Skanderberg (that’s him on the horse in the monument in Tirana pictured above).  He is credited with having first championed the notion of an Albanian state.

To show that his resistance was ultimately futile, Kruja is one of the relatively few places in Albania where old Ottoman houses have been actively conserved (the Ottomans only relinquished control of Albania just before WW1).

Berati is another hilltop fort and settlement that has been occupied since before written history (this is the view from the top).

The Communist regime declared Albania an atheist state in the late 1960s.  The church of Dormiton of St Mary survived the subsequent wave of destruction of churches and mosques –

and houses a collection of Orthodox Christian icons.

We ate well in Albania.  A highlight was a meal at the Mrizi i Zanave; 

an agro-tourism restaurant which produces much of what is on the menu!

We spent a night at Gjirokastër;

yet another fortified hilltop town

with a long history.

In more recent times, its castle was used as a prison for political prisoners by both King Zog and the communist regime that was finally ousted in the 1990s.

Butrint in the very far south of Albania is separated from the island of Corfu by just 35Km of the Adriatic Sea.  It is set in a beautiful location,

and its ruined, walled city is a UNESCO World Heritage site. In Roman times, Julius Caesar granted land here to veterans of his victory over Pompey.

From Butrint, we took the winding coast road back north, up and over the Llogara pass.

The truck’s brakes were playing up on the steep descent.  We pulled into a garage where a mechanic, Adrian, spent four hours fixing the problem – refusing to accept payment for his labour; telling us we were guests in his country and that this was Albanian hospitality.

We spent our penultimate night in Albania on the coast near Radhime;

before driving away from the Mediterranean, east to Lake Ohrid on the border with North Macedonia.