Albania

Articles from this Category

Up high and around

We had a day for some sort of day-trip from Tirana.  None of the options appealed so we settled for a roam around town followed by cablecar ride up Mount Dajti. While we didn’t really want to do that, the next option was to just do nothing in the room.  

Read more

Back to the Big Smoke

Travelling back We woke early for the 0745 direct bus to Tirana.  When a bus pulled up at 0720, the driver said “Tirana” and “directo” … so we boarded.  Strangely, none of the markings on the bus said “Tirana”. Sure enough, when we reached Vlore, he instructed us to change to another bus.  It was […]

Read more

Day at the beach

From our dorm at summer school, Jale beach is about 45 minutes away but we didn’t go there. Supposedly it has restaurants and is quite well patronised. We’ve been told that if you walk right or left from Jale, you’ll get isolated spots to yourself. Instead, our host Ben drove us (about 10 minutes by […]

Read more

Summer school in Albania

We travelled from Berat to Vlore (2.5h) to connect on to Vuno (1.5h), where we stayed in its local school.  The school (Shkolla Vuno) is closed for summer (or in the last couple of years for the whole year due to lack of kids), when it is converted into airbed dorms. It is run by the […]

Read more

Visiting the citadel

Today we climbed up to the Kala or citadel above Berat. It was a hot but nice little outing. We had a traditional Berati meal up in the village in the citadel. As with the rest of Albania, there isn’t too much of “Wow” sites which allows one to relax, people-watch and appreciate the subtleties […]

Read more

Old Ottoman town

It wasn’t a long (2.5h) or windy road from Tirana to Berat but strangely people were vomiting. I thought Albanians might have the motion-sickness gene but later bus travels didn’t show that up … so maybe there had been some serious partying prior to the bus ride. Berat is an old Ottoman town scattered on […]

Read more

Nod means “No”

Wandering around Tirana I soon realised that the sights listed in the guidebook existed because they had to fill that heading with something.  The couldn’t just leave the section blank! Tirana isn’t exactly beautiful either as many of the buildings are plain and functional.  It’s probably a reflection of the communist era. Despite all that, […]

Read more
Go top