Out of Albania, into Macedonia

Trip Start May 06, 2007
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Trip End Jul 24, 2008


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Flag of Macedonia  ,
Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Getting into Macedonia was only slightly adventurous.  First I took a furgon to a town near the border and then took a cab to the Macedonian side of the border.  After being stamped out of Albania by a border guard who didn't speak any English, I walked about 1 km in no-man's-land to the Macedonian side of the border.  As soon as I got to the Macedonian side I could feel the immense difference in the two countries.  The Macedonian border guards spoke perfect English and were very chatty.  After stamping my passport they gave me a tourist map of Ohrid and wanted to know all about my trip - where I've been and where I'm going.  I had to wait about a half-hour for the bus to Ohrid, but most of that time was filled chatting with the border guards.

When I arrived in Ohrid I was greeted at the hostel/guesthouse with a cup of tea and a baked potato.  I spent a bit of time exploring that afternoon, but it got dark and cold very early.  Set on the large Lake Ohrid, the main tourist attraction is the Old Town, which is set on a hill filled with cobblestone streets and contains over 30 churches and a fortress.  In the summer Ohrid turns into a beach town and vacation spot for Macedonians.  Both the lake and the Old Town have been deemed UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

The next morning I started on the walking route through the Old Town that was highlighted on the tourist map from the friendly border guards.  At the first church on the route, I ran into two Turkish guys with the same map, so we decided to walk it together.  At the 6th or so stop on the route, we ran into a Macedonian man who decided that he wanted to be our tour guide.  We had no interest in a tour guide, especially not this guy.  We tried to ditch him multiple times, but were unsuccessful.  He was a very strange man who claimed to be a student of religious philosophy.  He even gave us each his "card" - a 1"x1" transparency sheet cutout with a printed picture of his face and his website.  Unfortunately I lost the "card", so I can't share his website with you.

After about 10 minutes of "guiding" us he started saying some incorrect and rather insulting things about Islam, the two Turkish guys who are both Muslim were not very impressed.  We were only finally able to leave him when we reached the end of the walking route and he decided we were done with our "tour", at that point asking us for a donation.  All three of us apologized and said that we weren't able to give anything right now (though earlier we probably would have given him some money to make him go away).  After we grabbed a late lunch, I parted from the guys and went off to explore a bit more on my own before it got dark and cold again.
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