Macedonia (FYROM) - Part 1 - Gevgelija, Smokvica, Przhdevo, Negotino, Prilep

Saturday, 20th September 2008 - Alexandria

I cycled in the afternood and it felt nice to be on the road again. Short before Alexandria my view fell on a shop where several strange things where offered: broken music instruments, old mashines, tools, and even beds! I liked it :) I stopped and talked to the shop owener Ioannes (Johannis, an about 55 year old man) with a smile. He invited me to a coffee, and in fact I could sleep at his house later. When he closed the shop, I left the bike there and he took me with his car to a big market and fair, where I was invited for food and bought some shoes that I hoped would suit my better for cycling. I made sure that I had his phone number, so that we could not lose each other. There were hunderts of market stalls with all kinds of goods, the scariest of which was a child boy (perhaps 7 years) presented a running motor saw. Musicians joined each other to fire a restaurant with balkan gipsy sounds, and near by there also was something like a night club. But I got tired of following this man everywhere. I still feared that I could lose him. Later I found out how he treated his dogs (not nice) when we reached his house. I had joined the life of a stranger for 12 hours, an interesting thing, and you cannot expect that you like everything you see. The next morning we went to his shop again by car, and after a coffee I continued cycling with a 'Thank you!'. And the freedom felt good again after I was dependent on him for the last 12 hours.


Then I cycled the whole day, which was now possible due to the colder weather. The afternoons have been so hot before, now I could cycle till dawn if I wanted, and I did. I found a nice spot to put up my tent by asking non speaking men at a gas station. They recommended to camp near the church as before in Velvendos, and I did. Unfortunatly the rest of the evening was boring without company.

Monday, 22th September 2008 - Gevgelia - Smokvica

The next day I had my first flat tire near Policastro and fixed it with the help of some guys (it happened at a gas station). Then I met a guy from Polen who was hitchhiting home. I walked with him for a while and caught him a truck to Skopje :) Two hours later I reached the border myself on the bike. I again realized that conflict between Greece and the FYROM Macedonia: the Greek police men corrected me as I expected when I named the country I wanted to go to "Macedonia". They joked 'this is possibly Makeronia but not Macedonia'. Even due a Greek Policeman told me the "other" side of the border was on strike, they let me and my bike pass. On the other side I talked to some truck drivers that usually can be met on borders - waiting for their luggard to be checked by the custums. I put down some macedonian words, drew some macedonian money from my bank account, bought a few packs of cigarettes, bought a map, and continued in a cheery mood on the only road: the motorway. I had go cycle on the motorway, there is no other road! I realized that this motorway was sponsored by the european union. It's a main transit road connecting Belgrad and Thessaloniki, and even Germany. A few kilometers later I branched off over a small bridge to Smokvica, a small village where I asked for a café. The people were very friendly and they do not see tourists very often, that is clear due to the big attraction that I and the bike were to the children. I was allowed to camp on the main square of the village right next to the building. I was very happy that evening, and Fanni's soup was great. George and Ivo and his family were very nice! Finally I got tired and went into my tent early.

Tuesday, 23th September 2008 - Prchdevo

I wrote a Thank-You-Letter since I fell asleep so early the day before that I could not say good bye to Ivo and George. I nearly forgot my mobile phone which was loading inside. I felt very safe in small villages like this. On the bicycle again I was cheered up by some guys who were working on a bridge. They just made a lunch break and I had some food with them. Later I could cycle on a smaller road parallel to the main one via Negotino. Near sunset then I met a nice couple on a hoarse carriage. They could not speak any language I can speak, but we managed to communicate a little bit. I asked them if I could camp in their village close to Negotino. I did not want to get into the town, in towns it is not possible to camp, and I don't want to spend my time in hotels. This couple again was very very nice, I just felt overwhelmed with food and care. I also played a game of chess with their son (my age, he could only speak russian, which I cannot). I slept in the same room with him. I felt uncomfortable because the parents told him what to do, all this was not his decision. None of them wanted to accept money for the food, but I should give their son something like 1 Euro, I gave him 2 and felt guilty. In the hour when we had breakfast I saw about 10 horse carriages passing, but not 1 tractor and only 3-4 cars. I did not expect to see a village in europe where horse carriages are still the main transport. The toilet was a wooden outhouse behind the house. They had pigs and chicken, and behind the lane of houses there lies garbage on the grass. Something a tourist does not want to see normally but I wanted to see the country as it is... with its problems. Garbage bins, garbage disposal service and (I guess) garbage incineration plants are not common in Macedonia, so garbage is a problem. The goverment tries to solve this problem by a 50 Euro penality. Anyway the time in Prchdevo was great and I was very happy to be their guest. I liked them very much and also their ranch. We exchange addresses, took a good bye picture and I left with the bike as they left towards the fields on the horse carriage.

Wednesday, 24th September 2008 - Negotino

Just an hour after waving good bye the next day I reached Negotino. There I found an internet cafe and stayed too long. I read a lot about Alexander The Great, the problem with Greece about the name, I knew not enough about Macedonia. Then I talked with a family who run a pizzeria next door. After a few beers they recommended me a hotel, it was raining badly, and the hotel charged me 22 Euro, much after the family told me that 10 Euro were a normal hotel fee for this period of the year. Ending with a little TV the day was quite uneventful after all the impression of the last days. I did not like this day.

Thursday, 25th September 2008 - Mountains between Kavadarci and Prilep

After i checked out of the hotel I again checked the internet, sayed good bye to the family who works there, and ate something after the bad breakfast omlette I had at the hotel. It was raining heavily, but I decided to move on. After 15 km up and down I have passed Kavadarci and stopped near a gas station for a coffee. I talked to two guyes in my age there, the route I was cycling always was a goog entry into a chat. I had a "Schnaps" / "Rakia", that I had to try on the bill of one of them. Negotino and Kavadarci are wine and rakia regions, while furtheron in prilep tabak is the main business which brings lower income than wine. These two guys and later a stopping van whose driver offered to take me to Prilep in this heavy rain cheered me up from the down I have had due to internet, hotel and bad weather before. :) On the way to Prilep the road climbs to about 1100 meter into the mountains and short before the pass I branched to a small village of even only a few huts next to apple tree fields. I said hello ("Zdravo!") to a couple there and managed to ask them for a site to camp. They showed me a place. I had to pass a little river that flooded the sand road on a bridge of 3 or 4 tree trunks. A few minutes later when I was cutting an apple, another farmer passed and invited me to his place. I was happy due to the rain. He could not speak any language I spoke so we communicated with a mixture of macedonian, hands and feet and single words in english or german. He offered me a bed later and I was also happy that he did not offer me much more, so that I could at least eat, what was given to me before. His name is Nicolas and I felt really happy again and slept perfect that night :)

Friday 26th - Sunday 28th September 2008 - Prilep

I climbed the rest of the mountain the next morning and met a bearded experienced looking man on a bike! The first biker I met on this trip except Jon. He cycled to the opposite direction and had camped not far in the bushes. I liked his bag on the front wheel, I will try to get some of these, too. I did not take pictures of people normally, neigther of the farmer, the guys at the gas station nor of the biker. I would just have felt too touristic. The weather was better, I reached the top of the pass and slid down to Prilep on the other side. I checked in to a motel, unluckily i forgot the name. The farmer recommended that motel, and it was 13€ a night. I can recommomend it. (When you enter the town coming from Negotino, you pass two traffic lights both of which say that the center is right. If you go straight instead of right on both these traffic lights, the motel is on the left of the road.) The rest of the day I spend in the hotel, watched tv, had my cloth washed. The next day I wanted to drink the beer, that the town is famous for, but I was a little disappointed (perhaps normal as a German). The beer is nice, but it is distributed nearly totally in bottles and there is not really a beer culture like in Germany. I knew that i unfortunately missed the beer fest two of three weeks before, but the party like places I went into on that evening in the center were not really worth the visit. Bum-bum-music as everywhere, and the beer is distributed over all of Macedonia, so I already tasted it in other places. But that night I had a nice idea so I was still in a good mood after a few beer :) Prilep also was the first place where I saw a muslim mosque in Macedonia. I talked to a good english speaking guy (Hulio) who works at an exchange office, and he invited me to his village (Lazhani), so I made this my next destination. I set up my blog and a hospitallityclub account, and I also cycled arround town to see the monastery St. Archangel Gabriel on the little hill on the north side of town. I continued my journey
late (10 PM!) on Sunday when my head was feeling better after all the beer. I put up my tent somewhere next to the road after about 10 kilometers and slept bad that day.

Monday 29th - Tuesday 30th September 2008 - Lazhani

I got up at 6 AM in the morning after only a few hours sleep and realiyed later, that I should contunie sleeping. So I put up the tent again somewhere a bit more off the road and the day felt just wrong started, even after I slept another 3 hours. I reached Lazani, met the brother of Hulio at the supermarket and some others. I knew that Hulio would work in Prilep untill afternoon, so I waited for him and updated the blog. Internet was cheap here. When Hulio arrived I had already talked to his sons and brother. He invited me to eat with his family, and I could put up the tent in the garden. The family is quite rish, we had nice conversation. Lazhani is a village where people from Bosnia live, a muslim village with a mosque next to the town center. The next day the Bayram fest began, which is important as christmas in muslim world. So I decided to stay the next day till 3 PM to see Bayram. After the meal it was already late and I accepted the offer that I could sleep in the unfinished flat above them. The whole house reached german standards, high above the houses of the villages I had seen untill now. The next day Hulios wife prepared delicious food for breakfast and everybody dressed in their best cloths. I spent good time with my age boys of the family and was driven around with a sportiv BMW model. Later the family members visit each other for Bayram visits, as it is tradition. I washed my bike after all the rainy days and also took a look at the local little fair. A carrousel for children driven by a motor and a wheel construction that was hold in the hands of a concentrated working man in the middle. Box competitions against this typical combination of leather stump and indicator, how strong you are. Also table kicker, and I liked that. It is good about sports and games that you do not need words for it. After that I made my bike ready for take off and said good bye to all. I really liked the boys, they are funny. I hope to see them again in Skopje, we exchanged phone numbers.

Tuesday 30th September 2008 - Kruševo

Tuesday evening I reached Kruševo with sunset. It is the town where the beloved singer Toše Proeski grew up, a real star in Macedonia. I had heard of him everywhere in this country, this is his town, a memorial site is set up for him here, pictures everywhere, in the bar, in the hotel, on the streets. He died in 2007 of a car accident. The town is beautiful but nothing for a bicycle, so I had problems with stairs and my bicycle. I had a coffee and decided again to stay in a hotel here since Kruševo is on a high altitude (1250 m), the area is hilly and the houses lie close to eath other, so there is not much space for a tent. The guy at the bar where I drank the hotel called somebody and the place was again expensive, but nice. I stored the bike and walked around. Beaufitul but I did not make nice contacts, football was in public interest in a bar I went to. So i went to bed early.

Wednesday 1th October 2008 - Kruševo - Bitola - Rotino

I did not see a lot of Kruševo because I decided to move on early the next morning. I decided to be in Germany on the 10th of October and so I had to make kilometers :) I glided down the mountains in the morning, made only short breaks, nearly reached Bitola in the afternoon. The main attraction for me on that day was the view on a mountain (Pelister) top covered with snow. I found out by a look on my map that it lies south near the road between Bitola and Ohrid, so I would pass it even nearer. I decided to skip Bitola since I had not heared anything special about this city. So I took the direct road to my next destination Ohrid. At the branch I talked to a couple and their son who were working on the wine fields but I continued further on after a short conversation. The road passes a very poor part of Bitola where I felt unsafe because of humans for the first time. A group of youth boys called me and I turned around to talk to them. After they crowded around my bike I felt that they could just take something away but it did not happen, they asked a few questions, I tried to answer, where I am from, where I go, and so on. After Bitola the road rises on the northern side of Pelister. Short before sunset I branshed to the village Rotino to find a site to camp, near the mountain. The village is very calm, there is nothing like a center with where active peolpe, I had problems to find any shop. After I talked to a few people a family with an english speaking daughter showed me a good spot for my tent: the garden of an old school building below trees. They told me that it could get cold at night, but the night was fine. I wore both pullovers and closed the sleeping bag arround me :) The people in this village are prospering at least more than in Smokvica or Prchdevo, and they did not seam to be that dependent on agriculture. I slept good here, the weather was quite over night. The next morning I left around 8 AM, after I said good bye to and had a coffee with the family who helped me with the camp site.

Thursday 2th October 2008 - Rotino - Resen - Galichitsa - Trpejca (Lake Ohrid)

When I reached the top of the continuos rise of the road to Ohrid/Resen I made a break to eat an apple and smoke a cigarette. A group of cyclers from France on their way back from Istanbul came along the road and we chattet and after that descended to Resen together. It rained and they wanted to cycle to Ohrid on the shortest way. I was attracted by a mountain path further south not that direct and a little higher but I wanted to join them. Unluckily on my back wheel a spike broke, which was easily identified by the more experienced cyclists from france :) We stopped in Resen for a coffee and a pizza and I decided to get that fixed before I go on. I do not have a spare tire, only the tube. And the back wheel whobbled a lot, I wanted that fixed in Resen if possible. So the frensh group continued to Ohrid and I found a bike shop in Resen, then had to look for the owner Jacko in his place, since he was not in the shop. When I found him, he just woke up by the barks of his neighbor, I was sorry for that! But he did not complain but was just helpfull. It was still raining and my bike had a new spike 20 minutes later up-side-down under his marquee. I asked for two more spare spikes for my luggage, and he gave them to me :) They could be helpfull if that happens again somewhere where the next bike shop is far. After that I made a challenging desicion that should pay out. I still wanted to try the indirect way to Ohrid over that mountain. So I cycled south, passed the coast of Prespa Lake and found a sign that told me that this whole mountain Galičica was a national parc. I also found out that the road on my map that I wanted to cycle rose from 853 m (Prespa Lake) to 1600 m (pass, Galičica is 2254 m) altitude and back down to 693 m (Ohrid Lake). It was already 2 PM and the clouds were low but I cycled upwards despite a heavy shower on the first kilometer. I feared both weather and animals, was very awake but when I reached the top of the pass it all paid out a thousand times. On the other side i looked 900 meters down on the Ohrid Lake coverd by a layer of clouds that reached the horizon. Mountains rose out of these clouds here and there, in Albania and left and right of me. It was fantastic, I felt like in an airplane but I was only on a bicycle. 5 minutes after this impression the wind speed raised (it was calm till now) and shreds of a cload rushed from behind me over the pass, as fast as I could cycle. I did not trust the weather, I did not rest long, but I enjoyed that view and feeling so much, it has been the best of my whole trip! The way down was fast and is slopes, I entered the clouds, and the world below them reappeared 20 minutes later... I drank two coffee with rakia in a small tavern after that, stinking of all the sweat. And I laughed and laughed and felt happy :) The family running the tavern invited me for food and the coffee and raki after all! Then I had a nice conversation with some guys at the central market/square where they drank a beer. I told them that I wanted to cycle to the next camp site (7 km from there) in the dark and they told me: no need, camp in that house over there :) So I stayed with them.

Friday 3th October 2008 - Arround Lake Ohrid (Trpejca - St. Naum - Albania - Border)

In the night I had some problem removing the broken glass inside that broken house from the ground for the tent (Ireally did not want to damage it!) and also later when I left the whole village because I must go to toilet. The next day one of the guys of the last night - Lambeski - woke me, we had appointed that. He works in St. Naum that I also wanted to see since somebody at the shop in Gevgelija where I bought my map of Macedonia told me that I had to see it. So I packed, cycled out of the village and had a small breakfast before I left. A young dog wanted something to eat and I gave him a small part of bread. From then on he followed me kilometers and kilometers. And I did not like that because I know that sometimes male dogs are not at all nice to other small male dogs that arrive in their village. I tried to get rip of him, but I only did it by leaving the road at a ramdom branch after 10 minutes maximum speed downhill. Anyway I arrived at St. Naum soon, a really touristic spot with hot springs, some restaurants and many souvinier salesmen one of which was Lambeski :) I had a nice meal at one of the restaurants, the sun came out. I spent time with Lambeski, and this time really cleaned my bike good - especially the chain and the chainrings in the sun. I solved the problem that Jacko of the bike shop in Resen had fixed my backwheel screws that hard that I could not open it with my weaker tools. Some friend of Lambeski could organise a good hexagon spanner of size 15 and the problem was solved. I left at 3 PM which a friendly hug to Lambeski and a new wodden necklace as a gift of his sortiment. I took a photo this time, but I lost all photos I have taken since Lazhani. I told him I would send it to him, but now a text will have to do. When I left from St. Naum I decided to surround the lake on the other side through Albania. I would not make it to Ohrid today then, but okay, I would have another stamp in my passport. You should not smoke on Macedonian borders! There is this 50 € penality, and I nearly ran into it. Besides of that I did not have any problems. I had a great view on Mount Galičica from the other side of the lake. The main Albanian city on the lake (Pogradec) appeared to my also weathier that the Macedonian side, but there were also very poor impressions including young boys who sell fish from Ohrid see (in Macedonia it is forbidden to fish now) who begged my for money. Mainly because of the new language I did not want to sleep in Albania but make it at least to somewhere on the other side of the border on that day. Unluckily before the border the road climbed and climbed in slopes again and I reached the border in full night. My front light was weak, and it was cald, I ate somthing, and finally slept in a truck with a macedonian truck driver who as truck drivers generally do, has seen a lot of european streets. We talked about Germany, he could speak German, told me that he owes Germany a lot, that he had buyed his house with German money not with Macedonian... Something that many people say, when they say Germany is good, they mean the money. The night a slept good and it was also warm due to the electric heater of the truck :)

Saturday 4th - Tuesday 7th October 2008 - Ohrid

The next morning I continued to Struga where I had a coffee, and Ohrid where I had something to eat after I gave my mobile phone to the woman behind the bar to have the battery loaded. Unluckily I then was tricked by a thief who pretended to be interested in my bike and wanted to show me around. I did not like him, I once even shouted loudly at him, he should stop to tell me what to do, he should be quiet. I watched my bike, but unluckily I forgot the phone in the restaurant and when I realized that I said it, and he now knew, went away and asked the woman behind the bar for the phone of his friend - in English language he asked. It was my fault, and it was a downer, sure. Police, etc. So this day and the next day I did not have fun. I just checked into the cheapest accommodation I was offered (10 Euro) and that was find for me. I went to bed early, spent time in the internet the next day. But the family was very nice and on Sunday evening I watched television with them: the memorial concert for Toše Proeski in Skopje. And I could see the drops of tears and the love in the eyes of all those people. That was a nice evening on which I could experience Macedonian culture today. I can fully recommend that family I stayed with: Skenderova Lenče, Ulista Ohridska Arhiepiskopija 28, Ohrid. Telefone: +389-46-268608. I payed 10€ per night, and left Macedonia for a few weeks. I bought a Bus return ticket to Germany, had a 26 hour bus tour, and I will return soon to continue my travels.

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