Ohrid Lake and Back (for now)

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I am going to start off by saying that I think this is the tannest I have been in my entire life. We just got back from five days in Ohrid, a lake town about two and a half hours away from Skopje and the most popular vacation destination in Macedonia. Hotels are rather expensive there, so most people opt to rent rooms in a house, which is what we did; Natalie and Nina stayed with family, but David, Leo, Sean, Filip, Sashka, and I all stayed in a house with rooms for rent. The days we spent at th beach, for the most part, and at night we went out, sometimes until very late. On some days we slept past one and didn't get to the beach until after four!
It was a blast, and the lake is breathtaking. Ohrid is only one of the towns that border the lake of the same name; in fact, on the other side of the lake is Albania. The weather during the day was quite hot, but the water was at a refreshing level of chilliness so it was perfect. I swam. A lot. There was a dock where many people our age gathered to hang out, jump or be pushed into the water, etc. and I had some expert guys launch me from a cheerleader-like stance up by their shoulders into the water. So fun!
Sprinkled among the beach time were a few sightseeing excursions. On Thursday we hiked up to a church and a castle at the top of the hill in the center of the town, which allowed for an expansive view of the green mountains, bustling town center, and seemingly endless lake all at once. On Saturday we took a tour boat for about an hour across the lake to another town where there was a monastery, and stormy weather forced us to stay there for about four hours longer than we had originally planned! There was one of the times where I learned firsthand a basic tenet of the seasoned traveler: expect the original plan to not go as planned.
With this crazy week behind us, it only continues! We're all back in Skopje now but are leaving for Dojran, another lake town, on Wednesday morning. And as if that werent enough, from there Sashka is taking me with her family from there to Greece on the Monday next. It seems that my days in the sun are far from over.

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