I’ve been in Albania for just 5 hours and I feel compelled to write about it. I managed to get a few km’s ahead of schedule today, figuring that if I could crossed the border a day earlier than planned, then it would make my life easier over the next few days when I’ve unwittingly planned a few lengthy legs on the bike. And to be honest, Montenegro was turning out to be just a cheap extension of Croatia. Besides the beautiful Kotor fjord, there weren’t any other major tourist attractions I planned on stopping by, and I’d certainly had enough of the up/down coastal roads. I thought that I’d finally left most of the hills behind me when I emerged from Bosnia, but Montenegro seemed determined to carry on the theme and it was starting to get a bit monotonous. Time for something new, and that’s exactly what I got. Fair dinkum, Albania already has me enthralled; the goats and cows, the amazingly friendly and curious people, the chaotic traffic, not to mention the potholed roads and of course the famous bunkers. And it’s incredibly cheap. Ridiculously cheap! And considering Albania is the poorest country in Europe, there’s strangely an awful lot of very good internet cafe’s everywhere. Yep, welcome to Albania. You’re a long way from home now, Shire boy…
I was struggling through the final southern leg of Montenegro, literally 10km from the Albanian border, when I pulled over to a mini-market to grab an energy drink and an ice cream. I was pretty knackered, the roads had led me a little astray, since you can’t cross over into Albania along the coast like I initially thought. I knew this of course, having had a chat with a French cyclist the previous evening at the campsite. But I missed a turn off and decided to keep going as the coast was so lovely. But the right roads when I eventually took them, wound their way through the countryside, through shallow valleys and past steep cliffs, and then broke out into lovely plains and rural areas. It was extremely pretty but for about two hours I never seemed to actually be getting any closer to Albania, even though it was only about 10km away as the crow flies. Annoyingly, I realised that if I’d just taken the right turnoff as planned, I would have been in Albania about 1 ½ hours earlier. But eventually I would get there.
Sitting on the footpath at an intersection, it was a great opportunity to do some people watching. It seemed that everybody knew each other, all the car drivers waved and honked their horns as they passed the fruit sellers at their makeshift stalls by the side of the road. Kids especially were headed in every direction on bicycles and walking home from what looked like a swim, even though the beach was a good hour away. I hopped back on the bike and couldn’t believe my eyes when out of nowhere, a donkey came into view, carelessly ambled across the main road at a round-a-bout and crossed over to the footpath on the other side of the main road towards Albania. Cars stopped and gave the donkey right of way as if it were nothing out of the usual. It was such a bizarre sight that of course I snapped a photo, but then I would come to find dozens more goats scattered along the road towards the border checkpoint. Nobody seemed to own them or be looking after them, nor did anybody seem to care that they were loose along the highway and going where they pleased, generally to the nearest patch of grass for dinner.
Just before the border, I came across a small bustling village. It’s hard to describe the scene, but the town consisted of simply the main road and a string of shops along each side. Once again, chaos was the order of the day with pedestrians, the animals (donkeys, cows, chickens, cats and dogs) and the cars, trucks and bicycles all mingling together on the road in spectacular fashion. Nobody was driving too fast so there was never any real danger on the road, but still, people seemed to have a certain tolerance before their patience wore thin. Interestingly enough, a man trying to park his car (or double parked, I can’t remember) quickly raised the irk of the other motorists, trying to pass, however moments later, the farmer moving 25 sheep down the road was no problem at all and the cars patiently weaved past the herd with care and understanding.
Flying along I did a double take and a sharp u-turn back to the first internet cafe I’d spotted in 5 days. Thank God for that, I could finally transfer some cash and catch up on a couple of emails. It was getting on for time however so I didn’t muck around. I was barely ½ hour from sunset and I still needed to find a place to stay or camp for the night.
I crossed the border with ease. No problems, the Albanians even appear to have gotten rid of the annoying 10€ arrival and departure fee, which was handy. It did however take a little longer to get out of the border checkpoint than it would have, had I not attracted the attention of a group of Albanian locals. Apart from the main language, they reckon that 85% of the population speaks Italian also, and 75% can speak English. Not this mob, but that didn’t worry them as four guys surrounded me to find out what my story was. One of the border/customs officers came over and actually translated the conversation between us. The locals wanted to know where I was from, and then once they found out I was Australian, then the questions flew thick and fast. Where are you cycling too? Why Albania? Where are you staying tonight? How long does it take you to cycle 100km? Amazing. In the end I had to make out like I was in a hurry in order to escape.
Dusk came and I kept on cycling with my lights on through the twilight, searching for an ATM to withdraw some local currency (Leke) and then find a room or something. The Albanian countryside was even more crowded than before the border, with hundreds of farmers guiding their huge cows along the side of the road, women milking cows in the yards, kids playing on the road chasing cars (and my bike when they saw me) and more dogs and cats everywhere. The famous Albanian roads were noticeable immediately and I had to be careful not to run off the side as there was often no gutter, or a big drop off the edge that would have been a flat tyre for sure (or worse). But for the most part, the roads were better than I expected, since everything I’d read had talked up how shite they supposedly were. Some parts were extremely good, appearing to have undergone some recent roadworks. Despite whatever road conditions were thrown up at me, the cycling was blissful. There was no wind, the un had finally set and the heat abated, and finally I had hit some flat ground. The entire coastal area of Albania is a large, flat, fertile plain. No bloody hills for once! For the final hour of cycling that day, I really did make some excellent progress.
There were no ATM’s immediately across the border, so I figured I’d have to head directly to the first major city, Shkodra. I’d never heard of the joint before, but it was as good as any place around to bunk down in for the night, and it was only 100km or so from Tirana which should be an easy cycle the next day. Shkodra was across a river, and the only bridge into town was the most old, rickety, forlorn looking thing I’ve ever laid eyes upon! In any western country, the bloody thing would have been condemned and closed down immediately. Two policemen directed the traffic which could flow in only one direction at a time as it was so narrow and fragile. To be honest, I wasn’t half convinced it would even stand up to my bicycle crossing it alone. The planks of wood moved and rattled underneath me, nails threatened to pop my tyres and on more than one occasion I thought that I’d narrowly avoided plummeting into the water below.
Yes, Albania really was living up to its reputation as the poorest country in all of Europe. It was evident everywhere, from the quality of the roads, to the crumbling footpaths and worn buildings and public amenities. But the people looked like some of the happiest I’d met so far on the whole trip! Coming into Shkodra, it took some time to find the nearest ATM, right in the center of town. As I pulled up, a security guard came over and started chatting to me. It took me a little time to figure out what he wanted – to borrow my bicycle pump so that he could put air into his own tyres – his bike was parked outside the hotel he was guarding! No worries, he then suggested if I needed a room, to stay in the hotel. I looked up above and noticed the enormous, roughly 10 story tower block. IT was dark but from what I could make out it resembled a typical Holiday Inn style hotel that you might find in any country. Of course this one had a very concrete soviet feel to it, and I have no idea when it was constructed but by the look of things, sometime around 50 years ago at least. I quickly realised that this was probably one of the more ‘premier’ hotels in town, even though it appeared to be a bit run down, like everything else in the country. My first gut feeling was that I would never stay in a hotel like this, due to my budget, but then I was in Albania after all. I asked how much for the night.
Two English guys walked past to see if I was in trouble, but I explained no, quite the contrary, then they helped translate the deal with the hotel. There were ‘three prices’ or presumably three types of rooms. The 1000 leke, the 2000 leke and the 3000 leke room. The English guys basically said that’s like £10, £20 or £30 per room. It sounded good to me, so I grabbed some cash and headed to the lobby. The lobby was enormous, but there was no furniture. I figured that once upon a time there might have been, but couldn’t be sure. Every aspect of the hotel gave of two vibes – the first that it was a run down, cash strapped establishment and undergoing slow renovation where it could be afforded. The second vibe was that it might never have been finished at all and they were still working on it after all these decades, so that the construction work and renovation work was all now sort of tied loosely together.
I had checked the exchange rate at the Internet cafe just before the border, and discovered that my average daily budget of £30 would give me something in order of 5000 leke. Taking the money from the ATM machine I couldn’t help but be in awe at the currency. It’s not often that I have 5000 of anything in my wallet, so once again I had the novelty of being in a country where it was like playing with Monopoly money, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit rich. And so I should have; I was staying in only my third hotel for the whole trip and my own room with a shower was costing less than it normally does for a dorm bed in most hostels. I paid exactly the equivalent of £12 for the night. Bargain
The lift didn’t work so I had to take the massive staircase up to the third floor. The higher I went, looking at the hallways and the rooms about me, I started to get a feeling that I’d seen something like this before. Then it hit me – the building, even though it was an occupied, functioning hotel in the centre of a fairly large city in Albania, reminded me of the bombed out bank building back in Mostar. All it was missing was a few personal banking documents strewn about the floor, all the windows shattered and general rubbish and junk lying about the place! I started to amuse myself with thoughts about what my room would actually look like, but I was pleasantly surprised; my first hot water shower for 3 days, two beds, a fan, good lighting, a cool breeze coming through the window and an interesting view across the town. All you could ask for really!
Dinner was next on the agenda and I was starvin’ marvin. Time to see just how far the ‘leke’ currency goes when it comes to food. It was gonna be hard to beat Montenegro and the enormous, delicious 1€ hamburger that I had for lunch in Bar. But sure enough, Albania started looking pretty good value. I discovered that for about 300 leke, you could get a whole pizza. That works out at about £1.50, or $3 AUD. Bottled beer is around 100 leke, or 70p, and you can also get hamburgers here for just 80 leke – 60p! Not as good as the one I had for lunch, but for the price, who’s complaining? These were central city prices in Shkodra – no doubt tomorrow when I hit the road and find a mini-market and a bakery, things will be even cheaper!
I gorged myself on food. With brekkie and lunch in Montenegro, plus the two dinners and beers in Albania, I did my calculations on the exchange rates and figured that I had spent the grand sum of no more than about 15€. That included a whole pizza, two hamburgers, several energy drinks, two cans of coke, ice creams, a loaf of bread, two bananas and a couple of beers. That’s fantastic value. Compare it to Switzerland, where 12€ would be the cost of your average Big Mac meal, and I was laughing. I’m just about to go to bed stuffed, and it takes a lot to fill me up these days, since when you’re cycling as much as I am, you can pretty much eat whatever the hell you want. And I do.
Wandering around town before bed, I found that the city was very cosmopolitan. Loads of bars and cafes with outdoor seating, plenty of late night venues and shops open until all hours. Once again, I spotted no less than five internet cafes in the several blocks that I walked. Speaking of walking, it’s a bit difficult when the pavement you are walking on suddenly ends. The local council clearly has no money to maintain even the footpaths in the centre of town. What used to be a lovely paved pedestrian area suddenly turns into piles of cracked tiles and stacks of rubble which you need to dodge carefully. God knows how the footpaths even got into that state, despite the lack of money to maintain them.
They have traffic lights in this country and people do seem to take notice, but in general, the traffic and pedestrians go where they please. It’s not unusual to see a couple of motorbikes or pedestrians walking in the middle of a huge round-a-bout, in the middle of the road, into the direction of oncoming traffic. The cars don’t care and will just swerve around them. As in Italy, there are no lane divide lines or markers, so lanes of traffic just form as necessary. It’s comically absurd, but it seems to work, and when it doesn’t, the locals are only too happy to jump on their horns until the traffic holdup is resolved.
Well, four more days of Albania is sure to bring a lot more surprises. I am going to put it out there right now, even though I’ve not even spent one night in town. Albania is possibly going to be the most interesting country of the whole trip. Even if I’m wrong, I’ll tell you one thing; I’ve finally found a country that feels like I’m no longer in Europe. It sits on the frontier of Europe and the East, and it’s a magnificent cultural change. I can now finally expect the unexpected. And then the prices, well let’s just say that everybody knows that Eastern Europe is cheaper than Western Europe, but things aren’t generally as cheap as they used to be. Until you get to Albania. This place is REALLY cheap and I’m now putting it up there with only a handful of other countries that also remain cheap – Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Montenegro. If you want that authentic, rough around the edges travel experience, and to visit countries that are genuinely still cheap, then these are your destinations.
It’s like somebody put out a big welcome mat at the doorstep to Albania, and I’m loving it! I should arrive in Tirana tomorrow, so it will be interesting to see if the capital city is better and as cheap as the rest of the country.
ADDITIONAL: I woke up this morning at exactly 4am to some howling, wailing recording being played from loud speakers from the top of the bloody mosque next door. I can’t believe how bloody loud it is! Seriously, I would expect an air raid siren to be no louder, and it must have woken up the entire city. What kind of bloody culture do these Muslims have going? Don’t they like to sleep? Who the bloody hell wants to pray at 4am in the bloody morning? Note to self – don’t stay in a hotel next to a mosque…
