Albania Nov 08

As soon as we´d crossed the border into Albania, it became immediately obvious that this was a poor country. The streets were pot holed, dirty and were lined with trash, their waterways used as rubbish tips. Only the strange sight of 'a great proportion of Mercedes Benz cars on the road' contradicted this.  We´d been warned that this was the Mercedes capital of Europe, with cars being ¨imported¨ (ie stolen) from other countries, brought here and modified for resale.

Our taxi driver seemed a bit anxious, especially after we drove past a Roma (Gypsie) squat, which was linked to the filthy river by a mountain of rubbish and discarded junk, spewing from the squat. We asked him to drop us at the fortress but he didn´t seem to know where this was.....and obviously didn´t spot it looming over the town on a nearby hill as he turned the car into the opposite direction. We decided it was probably best to get some of the local currency first anyway so let him take us into town. We soon realised that he didn´t know his way round though, when he stopped to ask for directions to the fortress....to which the kid he asked just pointed behind us, probably wondering if our driver was blind, as it really was hard to miss.

We had said we wanted a bankomat, so he drove about 200m, jumped out of the car on a roundabout, took our luggage out of the car, pointed down a street saying ¨bankomat¨ and then quick as a flash, he was back in the car and hooning off.. Hmmmm, what were we getting ourselves into??

We didn't expect to find much in the direction he´d pointed as we guessed that he just dumped us so he could get back to his own country. So we stopped and asked for directions from a travel agency, who confirmed that we were (surprisingly) heading in the right direction.

With cash in our hands, our next mission was getting back to the fortress, about 2.5km away. The taxi drivers wanted 4 euro (a lot of money for these people), so we gave up on that option. With our heavy packs, we began the walk. Seeing how far we had to walk – a good deal of the way being steep uphill – and seeing that time was getting along (it gets dark at 5pm now), we thought we should start trying to work out how to get to Tirana. The instructions we had was to catch one of the regular furgons (mini buses) from the main road at the bottom of the fortress. Ummmm, anyone else noticed how big fortresses are??? Where exactly on the main road?

We stopped and asked some petrol dude who was sitting on a chair waiting for customers. Eying us up and down and realising that we were foreigners that had no clue, he left his chair to point to the street. We looked at him blankly, not really understanding, so he motioned for us to wait with him at the curb while he scanned the passing vehicles. We had heard about Albanian hospitality, where people go out of their way to help you, and here was our first experience. He stood there waiting with us until he got us onto a furgon bound for Tirana, before returning to his shop.

The 2 ½ hour bus ride was mainly spent in the dark and we were happy to have missed the fortress afterall. Not too far into the journey an Albanian guy boarded the bus and took the seat next to us. He turned to us and asked if we spoke English and we discovered that he´d been living in London for six years. Over the next 2 hours, he gave us a running commentary on how many kilometres we had to go, or how long before we´d arrive. This was done approximately every 15 minutes. In between these updates, he also gave us some excellent insight into the Albanian way and were thankful for this little lesson before immersing ourselves in the capital. The best tip he gave us was to explain the way the Albanians refer to prices. You see, if something costs five hundred levi, they would actually say five thousand. That didn´t mean that they were trying to rip you off. It was just the way they said it. I guess it´s like us speaking in hundreds where 1 thousand 2 hundred is 12 hundred.....they'd just call it 12 thousand.... A handy tip that could stop us paying 10 times the actually price!

As we reached the outskirts of the capital city, we not only hit traffic, but also a number of potholes. The last part of the bus ride took ages as we stopped more regularly and fought with the other traffic bustling about on this Friday night. We eventually got dropped off, paid our driver (who took himself a tip) and found ourselves once again on our own in a strange city. Trying to locate our position on our Lonely Planet map – ie, looking like absolute tourists – it didn´t take one of the taxi drivers long to offer us a lift. We waved him away, but keen to help us, he asked what we were looking for. He pointed us in the right direction, explaining that it was quite a way to walk, which we knew, and off we went.

Well, it felt like a lot longer than 2km, but we eventually found where we thought the hostel should be. The streets were no longer reflecting our map though so we were a little uncertain. We noticed a taxi driver who was whistling for our attention, but knowing that we must have been close, we ignored him. Instead we stopped to ask a young fellow, who didn´t seem to know. Meanwhile, the taxi driver continued to whistle more adamantly and eventually gets the guy´s attention. Turns out the taxi driver knew what we were looking for and was trying to help us! He walked us to the door (a full 20m) and we thanked him sheepishly.

Deciding to treat ourselves to a nice meal, we left the hostel on this fairly balmy night and checked out a Turkish restaurant, Effendi. While we were drooling over the menu outside, the waiter came out and explained that it covered only 20% of all the options available. He suggested that we get a ¨Chef´s Surprise¨, a sort of banquet that the chef chooses. ¨How much would that be?¨ we asked. ¨the same prices as in the menu¨, he said. Knowing that it was risky to sit down and order without knowing the price, we agreed anyway and sat down to the best meal that we have had this trip. Definitely recommend this place if you ever make it to Tirana! And so good to have lamb!!

The next morning we woke to freezing temperatures, learning that it was snowing in the nearby mountains. It was also raining and quite miserable, the first time we´d experienced rain this trip!!! So digging out our rain jackets, we went in search of some royal palace, which we never actually found. We did find a monument in a park on the hill, which would probably make a pretty good lookout in better conditions!

By the time we got back to town however, the clouds were clearing and the sun was trying to come out.   Still cold though!  We continued our  sightseeing in the centre of town, that was nothing like the country we'd seen upon crossing the border.  This place was clean and neat with wide streets and grand buildings.  OK, so they had the occasional giant hole in the footpath, a standard feature of most of the south Eastern European countries, made even more fun at night, when with limited lighting, you are liucky to see them.  You see, they do not follow the same safety precautions as we're used to, with nothing to partition these holes off - no rope, no sign, no tape - just a large gaping hole, just asking for someone to fall into it.  At least the piled up  rubbish would soften your fall though...

Albania appears to love international brands... Only, they love copying them and selling product that exploits the international campaigns. Hilariously, we found a fast food joint called Kolonat, which was a blatant rip-off of McDonalds. The logo was almost identical and the menu was just the same, with Disney characters in the children´s playground and toys to go with the children´s meals. You have to check out the photos to see this for yourself! Not sure if they meant the joke, but it seems fitting that the name Kolonat (Colon at) appears to refer to the location of excrement.

We also discovered an Albanian fascination with energy drinks, our favourite being one called Cocaine, coming in 3 different kinds:  cut, free and pure!!! Unfortunately we only found the promotional van and not the real thing, but we threw around jokes about asking for one in a bar. ¨Do you sell cut cocaine?¨

The other thing we amused ourselves with was the Albanian word for push, written on most doors. The word was 'shtyje' which would be pronounced something like ¨Shit Yeah!¨, a joke we never tired of...

Having earlier discovered a spit lamb roast restaurant, we returned that night to finally satisfy Mark´s lamb cravings (we´d seen these places in Croatia and Montenegro, but we were out of season for them). Thankfully, a customer spoke enough English to help us order, asking us which part of the lamb we wanted. Requesting a selection of various pieces, we ended up with all ribs and neck and twice the amount we wanted. The owner then asked if we wanted ¨salate, patata?¨ to which we replied ¨yes¨, expecting to select something from the menu we´d seen earlier. As he hacked the pieces off the lamb, he motioned for us to sit down, and the next thing we knew we were served our double serving of lamb, a huge salad and fries. A couple of beers soon followed, to wash down this extravagant meal, that turned out to be a little more expensive than we´d planned. Lucky we were leaving the next day and needed to spend all our money anyhow.

The next day we unfortunately had to leave this country that we had seen so little of, as our time was coming to an end on our Eastern European adventure. That morning we left for another full day of travel, which we were a little anxious about as it included a furgon ride, a 2km walk to the border, a taxi and a bus.

We were told to catch a furgon just up the road and, now old hats at hailing this mode of transport (after our one experience), we waited on the corner with some locals, We were immediately approached by a guy offering us a lift to our destination. Assuming this was a taxi, we refused his offer as we had only enough money left to get us to the border and certainly couldn´t afford a taxi on our budget -we were down to our last few lekis, just enough to get us to the border. It´s not unusual for taxi touts to ¨guess¨ your destination and offer to take you there, no matter how far away it is, so despite his persistence, we chose to ignore him.

After some more broken English and even further offers to take us to our destination, we decided to take him more seriously and check out the vehicle. With Mandy waiting by the side of the road, Mark went to suss things out....to discover that he was the furgon! We then agreed on the price, got our bags in the car and took our seats, thinking that it was easier than expected.

The driver then returned to the corner to wait for more intending passengers. We´d read that they wait ´til they´re full before leaving and seeing as we were the 2nd passengers, we realised that we might be there for a while...

Twenty minutes later however, the car was full. The driver got in, shut his doors and windows and we were off....and so was something else in the car by the smell of things. There was a pungent smell permeating the car, terrible body odour that was so bad we were gagging for the 1st half hour, just trying to breathe!

Either we got used to it, or the outside scenery took our minds off things as we were soon climbing above the snow line, with spectacular views of the surrounding mountains and green valleys. This was our closest glimpse of snow this trip and we were pretty excited. Mark just wanted to put on a set of skis and take off as his last remaining wish was to see it snow (and to hit Mandy with a snow ball).

After we´d come through the mountain pass, the driver suddenly decided to pull into a roadhouse and, without saying a word, entered the building. We had to assume that it was a lunch stop so when a waiter came over to our table, we asked for a menu. ¨No menu¨. Ummmm, ¨Can we get soup, goulash?¨ Blank look.

Walking off, we were unsure what we were getting, if anything at all! And after about 5 minutes, we realised it was the latter. Not understanding our request, he had simply given up! So we called him over one more time, and approaching cautiously, we pointed to the person´s rice dish next to us and asked for one. Soon enough some seasoned chicken rice landed in front of us and we scoffed it down quickly. Not knowing what it would cost, and a little concerned about our limited finances, we jumped up to pay when we saw our driver departing, holding out a few coins. The waiter took a couple, meaning the meal cost about 50c.

Back on the road, up another mountain pass with more and more snow and the next things we noticed was a sign showing a fork in the road, one to Macedonia the other within Albania. By this time we´re halfway up a mountain, there is snow everywhere and there is nothing around. Then the bus pulls over. ¨Macedonia¨ points the driver, along the snow covered road, indicating our time to get out. Hmmm, 2km walk in the snow ya reckon?

Thankfully, one of the other passengers, who spoke a little English, explained that it was 2km to the border and that is was ok...as he jumped into a mercedes (taxi). ¨Can we come with you?¨ we asked. A bit of negotiating got us a lift to the border....with a little Albanian currency remaining.

Next was the border crossing, designed entirely for cars. Dodging the snow and icy puddles, we approached behind the queuing cars and were waved ahead of them by the marshall. One benefit of being on foot, I suppose! Satisfied with the two if us, we were ushered through.

The next leg of the journey could have been either a 12 kilometres of walking in the snow, or a taxi ride..... A number of taxis are on hand to shake some Euro out of the stray travellers. We had been given the tip that the fare should be 10 euros. A mercedes pulls up and we began the negotiations. Starting at 20 euros, we began trying to get him down to the recommended 10 euros. He was unwilling to budge, until a crazy guy pulled over in a dodgy old car and tried to rush us into his car. Eventually Mr Mercedes conceded to the 10 Euro fare and we were off to Lake Ohrid in the back of a Merc.

Back to Macedonia, to Lake Ohrid (scroll down to bottom of page).