Eastern Europe - Days 59 & 60 - Tirana, Albania

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We left Ulcinj yesterday morning and commenced our quest to enter Albania. We were very priviledged in that we had a private transport to take us from Ulcinj to Tirana. It was only a short jaunt from Ulcinj to the border, however it took sometime to actually get through the border. When we arrived at the border crossing there was a massive queue of cars waiting to enter Albania from Montenegro. However our bus driver was a crafty little bugger and slipped a wee bribe to the appropriate person and we managed to skip all of the queue. Even doing this it took us about an hour to get through the border. And we had to send our tour leader, Barbara, back to the border guard to actually get Albanian entry stamps in our passport.

Once we had passed through the border we stopped at a little cafe just by the river to have a coffee and icecream. We then continued onwards to Tirana.

Tirana is a very interesting city. I felt right at home straight away. It basically feels like a slightly neater version of many cities in the middle east. When we arrived our bus driver didn't really know where our hotel was and apparently there are two Hotel Europas in town. One being a very big flash and posh hotel and the other being our slightly smaller and rather more sedate hotel. So of course every person the bus driver tried to ask for directions thought that we were looking for the big hotel. And the bus driver wouldn't listen to Barbara when she said that she knew how to get to the hotel (probably because she is a women). So we spent about 20 minutes driving around town trying to find out hotel. Which turned out to be down about 3 tiny little allleys. Which provided a large amount of amusement to all us passengers when we kept coming up against cars trying to come the other way in these alleys as we were trying to get to the hotel.

What was increidbly lucky for us was that just as soon as we had checked into the hotel a MASSIVE thunderstorm broke out just above us. And I do mean a massive thunderstorm. I was actually using my laptop and at one point the lighting strike and the thunder roll were soooooo loud (and directly above us) that it gave me such a fright that I actually threw my laptop up in the air. Luckily I managed to catch it again.

After the thunderstorm had passed us by Barbara took us out on an orientation walk of Tirana. This walk consisted of the major sights of Tirana (and there really aren't all that many). We looked at the outside of the National History Museum, The Et'hem Bey Mosque, Skanderbeg's Statue and Skanderbeg' Square (which the statue sits in), the Palace of Culture where all the operas and ballets were held in the communist times, and the pyramind which was built as a museum to the former ruler Enver Hoxha by his daughter. According to the Lonely Planet this museum now houses a disco called the mummy, however when we visited it it looked totally derelict and like it wasn't being used for anything. Another case of the Lonely Planet being totally out of date. We also wandered down towards Mother Teresa Square and while we were there we heard an opera singer practising her art.

Dinner last night was had at the most delicious and inexpensive restaurant ever. We ate at a little place called Era Pizzeria. This place served traditional Albanian food as well as Italian food and what we had was amazing. I managed to have a massive traditional Gardener's Salad and Stuffed Paprika for the princely sum of 5.55 euros. It was amazing. We also tried the traditional desert, Treleche, which I can heartily recommend to anyone who visits Albania.

Today we had a wonderful breakfast at the hotel ( the best fried eggs that I have ever had) and then headed off on a wee excursion to the village of Kruja. Kruja is the place where Skanderbeg rallied the Albanian people and made a stand against the Ottoman Empire. Apparently Skanderbeg started life as a young man called George Kastrioti. Kastrioti was the son of an Albanian prince and was handed over to the Turks as a hostage. The Turks converted him to Islam and then gave him a military education. In Turkey he became known as Iskander (after Alexander the Great) and the sultan promoted him to the rank of Bey (which when put together with Iskander gives Skanderbeg). After the Turks were defeated in 1443 by the Hungarians Skanderbeg took advantage and abandoned the Turkish (Ottoman) army and rallied his fellow Albanians against the Turks. He managed to repulse 13 Turkish invasions in his life time and was never defeated. However Kruja did fall to the Turks after his death.

So we headed off today to visit Kruja and see where all of this happened. It was really lovely to get out of Tirana for the morning and see what life is like out in the villages. Apparently a few years ago George Bush (not sure if it was junior of senior) also visited Kruja, and there are streets and cafes named after him because of this visit. Kruja is located on the top of a bit of a rocky mountain which provides for beautiful views out across the valleys below. The fortress is perched at the top of a hill and there are still remains of the old fortress there. However a couple of new museums have also been built in the fortress and we went to take a look at the Skanderbeg musuem to see if we could find out a little bit more about his life. This was relatively tough to do as most of the information was in Albanian. This is probably one place where it would have been a good idea to get a local guide.

After checking out the museum we headed off to take a look at the local bazaar. This was housed in quite a cute little street, but did have ankle wrenching cobblestones that stuck up at all angles, just like the teeth of the fiends of hell waiting for unsuspecting, clumsy kiwis. Luckily I managed to survive a few walks up and down the bazaar with no injuries. Following a wee spot of shopping (where I didn't buy anything) we headed off for a gorgeous lunch up in a restaurant that overlooked the valley and that charged a pittance for fantastic food. I think that I am going to like Albania very much!

We met up with the rest of the group again at 1:00pm and headed back into Tirana where we were dropped off at the History Museum to take a brief tour of the country. I have to say that I wasn't the greatest fan of this museum. Everything was in Albanian (fair enough since it is their country) but I just couldn't get excited about looking at another musuem today. What I really wanted to do is to go for a walk through the park. However the very second that I stepped out of the musuem to do this a massive thunderstorm broke out across the city.... AGAIN. So instead I scuttled back to the hotel to type up this blog of the last few days.

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