Blogs from Skopje, Macedonia, Europe - page 6

OK, so long story short. Me & two of my Peace Corps buddies went to the TAKSIRAT Festival in Skopje two nights ago. The Roots, Marky Ramone, Neville Staples from The Specials, and Bernays Propaganda (awesome local band) all played. When we arrived, we walked in the wrong way. One of the security guards saw us and assuming one of us was in a band, ushered us backstage to The Roots' green room. (P.S. One of my friends is black as are The Roots.) We kind of just played along and got free beer and got to hang with some of the groups. It was pretty cool meeting Black Thought. He said I looked and talked like Jack Black (maybe not the first nor last time someone has said that to me). HA! I just stood ... read more

Took the 7:30 am bus to Skopje from Ohrid, the bus went through great sceneries, autumn colours abound in the hills and velleys we passed through,according to LP this is the scenic route via Tetovo. @ hours into the trip we got pulled over by a cop, the driver cursing under his breath. We finally made it to Skopje 3 1/2 hours later factoring in the morning traffic in the city. A kind taxi driver showed me where the left luggage is, at the train station! He offered to give me a ride to town but declined him politely. Started walking around, disoriented at first as I cant remember where i saw the stone bridge, found it and wlaked to it, eventually found quite a few mosques and the fortress and the Turkish market, lots of ... read more

Well we actually had breakfast in this hostel but it was slightly uninspiring. Rob as usual made the most of it by having as much toast as a person can consume. It was too smokey to sit around in the kitchen for long so despite the snow outside we went to explore the city. The road into the centre was very flooded so we had to be careful whilst we walked. We took it in turns to avoid the rubbish and holes in the pavement and being soaked by cars driving past us. We easily found the centre of the new part of the city, less easy was believing it was the centre. Maybe it was the first properly cold week of the winter and so nobody fancied going outdoors but there was nobody around. We ... read more

Hello bloggers! Since we last blogged we have travelled down the Turkish west coast through the Greek Islands and now up to Macendonia. From Troy where the last chapter ended we continued south along the Turkish Mediterranean coast to Bodrim via Bergama and Selchuk. Bergama was inland somewhat and the site of a huge Roman archeological site complete with amphitheatres, arches, aquaducts and temples (all ruined) on top of a rather dramatic hill overlooking the town and surrounding valley. The countryside has been devistated by millenia of overgrazing, deforestation, and olive growing and more recently major drought. So all in all very bare and dry. Certainly not the landscape the Romans would have enjoyed with forests, elephants, bear, lion and the like! At Selchuk are the ruins of one of the greates Roman cities (Ephesus for ... read more

Hi Everybody! I am using a strange keyboard that has y and z switched. Try to overlook that if I have spelling errors with those letters. I also cant use an apostrophe or quotation marks. Walt and I walked over the Old Stone Bridge and explored the Ottoman section of Skopje. A young couple was exiting the Orthodox Church after getting married. Two musicians serenaded them as they left the church. The Kale Fortress overlooks this section of town. Only3 of its original 70 towers remain. This city is 2000 years old and has suffered many floods and earthquakes. When buildings have been rebuilt, modern architectural designs have been chosen that really dont fit in with the old European style buildings. The train station is one of the worst designs. It is a big, gray, ugly ... read more