Hotel Smerald Korce

... Yeah!" Immediately afterwards, an eighteen-year-old with his muscles showing gave me a ride and wanted to be my boyfriend. "No a paura," he told me (Don't be afraid), though he was more comical than threatening. Later, in the touristy town of Kruja, young men in cafes seemed to have nothing better to do than stare at me darkly or make lewd gestures. Finally, a fat bus-driver spit on me while trying to spit on a friend; and, I suspected he made rude comments to a ...

... which were blooming while we were there. Furthermore they have an old section to the town, cobblestone streets, old villas and smaller houses, some well hidden churches and fresh water springs where the locals get their personal water supplies! Sadly their sewage goes right into the lake and therefore when you walk along the lakeshore, there's a strong smell, which stops you from ever wanting to stick your big toe in the lake! People do swim there in the summer however ...

... our conversation. This woman was very excited to learn that I was American, but couldn't understand why I would want to leave a country as great as America, especially for somewhere as terrible as Albania. She even offered to trade places with me - she would return to America instead of me and I would remain in Albania and raise her children. I obviously wasn't too keen on that plan. Then the questions began to get ...

... lights do work and there is lots of hot water. Berati appears as I would imagine a Greek town. The steep streets are white cobblestone, the houses made of white stone or whitewashed, and of course, there are ubiquitous grapevines. I start my visit with a hike up to the oldest part of town, where the Illyrians built a fortress in the 3rd century BC. It has since been added to by the Byzantines, Serbs, and Turks, and was a pleasure to wander through ...

... Mary, autobus, Elbasan. They fed me some breakfast and Lelya, Anjela's little brother and Malvina walked me to the center and put me on a furghon (mini-bus) headed towards Tirana. I had been nervous to travel in Albania, after reading that there aren't any bus or furghon schedules, and that it can be a bit crazy and confusing, but this trip was very easy. At Elbasan my driver passed me along to another driver, who drove to just a turnabout in the middle of ...

... careers. They were also really curious about America and about me travelling alone, whether it was dangerous to travel by myself. And they kept treating me, for coffee and for ice cream, I didn't protest too much since I know in their culture it verges on an insult if you refuse. It was 1 pm when I got back to the house and Lelya was still nowhere to be seen. She came back at 2 with Anjela's little brother and said, how about we stay in Pogradec tonight, and then ...

... the border. A bit later I was dropped off at the Macedonian border. It proved to be the easiest border crossing of my life. I was the 5th in line, 2 others were also crossing on foot. I struck up a conversation with this couple in Macedonian by asking them the time. They turned out to be a really lovely couple, the man (Bairam) Macedonian from Ohrid, and his wife (Sanije) was Albanian from Pogradec the Albanian town just on the other side of the border. After getting my ...

I walked to Albania yesterday. The bus from Ohrid drives around the lake as far as Sveti Naum. After that it's all walking. Ohrid is a crater lake between Macedonia and Albania, and Sveti Naum is on the Macedonian side of the border to the South of the lake. Albania is only a kilometer to the West. There are other ways to get to Albania, but Sveti Naum came well recommended: it's an Orthodox monastery of sorts. Something like Treskavec near Prilep, but more accessable ...

... have spent a lot longer, and had I not been locked into the schedule, I owuld certainly have stayed overnight. Berat is a beautiful little town, and certainly my favourite place in Albania. Upon arrival, I had another cup of coffee and once again dumped my bag in the cafe, then set out to explore. Totally missing the town, I went straight up to the castle. Situated a good 15 minutes uphill and commanding some great views, it's not a castle as I (and probably most of you ...

As mentioned previously, I caught a 5 o'clock bus out of Saranda and got into Gjirokastra at about 6.30. A quick cup of coffee to wake me up - they just don't do tea here - and I was able to leave my bag at the cafe and explore town. I wasn't all that taken with Gjirokastra. It was worth stopping here and looking around for a few hours, but ...