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Blogs from Albania, Europe - page 8
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July 24th 2010
Balam sie troche wjazdu do Albanii. Na szczescie mielismy wszystkie odpowiednie kwity dotyczace samochodu, lacznie z notarialnie poswiadczonym w Polsce upowaznieniem do jego prowadzenia. Wtedy jeszcze nie wiedzialam, dlaczego greccy celnicy tak nas dokladnie ogladaja, ale szybko wyjasnilo sie, ze dziwnym trafem zageszczenie dobrych samochodow w Albanii nie do konca odpowiada zamoznosci jego mieszkancow. Z granicy skierowalismy sie prosto do Gjirokaster - miasta, gdzie urodzil sie w 1908 roku przyszly albanski przywodca Enver Hohxa, co spowodowalo, ze mialo ono nastepnie status miasta-muzeum, dzis na liscie UNESCO i w duzej mierze uniknelo komunistycznego zniszczenia. Tam tez planowalismy szukac jakiegos transportu dla naszej towarzyszki, ktora musiala ewakuowac sie z Albanii za 2 dni. Stare Gjiorokaster lezy na wzgorzu i sklada sie z ottomanskich domow, waskich stromych uliczek,... read more
April 21st 2010
Welcome to Albania, the quirkiest country in the world What a strange place. Brightly painted poverty, the worst roads in Europe and Mercedes-Benzes everywhere. Throughout the Balkans, I encountered squabbling people with petty disputes with their neighbors. The Slovenians didn’t trust the Croatians. The Croatians mistrusted the Bosnians. The Bosnians mistrusted the Serbs and the Montenegrins. But all of them agreed on one thing: Albania was the most dangerous, perilous and shadiest place in the world – or so they shared with me. None of them had ever been there. “There isn’t a dumpster in this town that some gypsy hasn’t laid claim to.” There are more cops than trees in Tirana and urban Albania. In fact the only quantity that compares is the number of scabby homeless dogs. The funny thing is that besides standing ... read more
February 7th 2010
Hi there everyone. After hiking across the border into Albania I put Andrew into the wheelbarrow and pushed him down the hill back to Igoumenitsa, then I continued on foot alone at night in the drizzle being followed by stray dogs. I had to get to the town of Conispol to get supplies and to find some accomodation to get away from the dogs. However, I could not get into town as I was surrounded by barking canines and I was picked up by a local who was swearing at me for being there at night! He took me to his wifes restaurant and hotel-cum-spareroom. They were real nice people, and they gave me food after i apologised for walking at night near the border. I left there early in the morning to walk northwards ... read more
February 7th 2010
Hi there. Just a quick update on my whereabouts. After hiking across the border into Albania I put Andrew into the wheelbarrow and pushed him down the hill back to Igoumenitsa, then I continued on foot alone at night in the drizzle being followed by stray dogs. I had to get to the town of Conispol to get supplies and to find some accomodation to get away from the dogs. However, I could not get into town as I was surrounded by barking canines and I was picked up by a local who was swearing at me for being there at night! He took me to his wifes restaurant and hotel-cum-spareroom. They were real nice people, and they gave me food after i apologised for walking at night near the border. I left there early in ... read more
December 3rd 2009
Hi all, Finally have found a good internet place so it is time to update the blog. Although Scott tells me I am not funny enough in them :-(. So sorry if I bore you but here goes. We picked Vicky up and had a fun afternoon seeing the main sights while poor vicky dragged her luggage around with her! (dont worry we did help her........a bit!)(Well she did forget the VEGEMITE!!!). The Acropollis is the main focal point and although it is iconic and looks great from a distance it is a little bit of a let down close up - all covered in scaffolding. Had a lovelt meal and made our plan of attack for the week. We decided to hot foot it around Peloponnese. We crossed over the Cornith Canal. A massive 6 ... read more
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December 2nd 2009
Hi guys, Just a quick note to say we are alive and well and in Albania. Its not a bad place. Very friendly but about 30 years behind (and they cant drive AT ALL!!). Will update more later. Hope you are all well - please send updates as I miss you all. xxx... read more
November 18th 2009
We both really wanted to spend time in Albania but after organising some volunteering in India for Febraury we made the decision that we would spend a bit more time in Greece so would wizz through.... Montenegro and Albania. After getting the taxi to the border we luckily managed to get a ride with an Albanian guy to the first town over the border, Shkoder. You can feel the difference between Montenegro and Albania almost instantly. Shkoder is a bustling little town and despite the craziness, it felt really comfortable! The oriental and middle eastern culture is quite prevalent with our sense teased with different music and colours from the rest of Europe! We found a bus to the capital Tirane and took what ended up to be a pretty long bus ride down half of ... read more
November 18th 2009
as you can see...we were quite lucky with the lamp posts in albania...enjoy the light ... read more
November 5th 2009
OVERALL IMPRESSIONS OF ALBANIA Ok - usually I don’t write these sorts of entries but as I was heading back to mainland Italy there were many things that ‘stuck’ in my head about Albania that I thought I would share. Some of them were perhaps scattered through as mentions in the main blog entry but this is a bit of a summary of sorts. Enjoy… 1. The sheer number of cafes. Particularly in small towns and by the roadside. It didn’t seem unusual for some towns to have a café/bar every two or three shops. While most of them would have a small number of customers, most of them would be almost deserted. There must be like one café to every two or three people in Albania - I am not sure how many of them ... read more
October 29th 2009
WEDNESDAY 21 OCTOBER - ROAD TO ROME Up bright and early this morning to get the 8am bus to Palermo. I left myself plenty of time but still only made it by about 5-10 minutes as I kept having to ask people where the SAIS bus station was. All the bus stations have their own… and their own ticket office. Somewhat confusing when they aren’t signposted very well. But I managed to get a ticket and get on the 8am ok. From there it was just under three hours to Palermo. I was quite lucky when I got to Palermo as I saw the airport shuttle bus loading passengers, so I made a bee-line for that and got on that one, saving me a half hour wait until the next one. It meant I got ... read more
