Albania

After leaving the peaceful surroundings of Lake Ohrid, I caught a bus to Tirana, the capital of Albania. Now the distance between Ohrid and Tirana is approximately 45 miles as the crow flies. So explain to me how the bus took 5 1/2 hours to get there???

Just after entering Albania. At first glance it was very scenic and hilly, but a closer look revealed the discouraging sight of the polluted rivers that seems to be the local dumping sight for the villages.

Changing leaves in the valley.

These structures were dotted all over the landscape. It seems as if there was some government program that put up the base structures all over and then pulled the plug.


I forgot to mention the celebrity endorsements over here.
Bruce Willis loves his Bulgarian Vodka and Jim Belushi can't do without his Albanian cell phone service. Personally, I think Jim could do better.....maybe chewing gum or a fizzie fruit drink.



Downtown square in Tirana.



This picture doesn't do justice to the chaos of the traffic in Tirana. Add the everlasting sound of horns and Albanian curse phrases and you might be a bit closer. I honestly don't think that there are consequences to disobeying traffic laws as I saw five cars run the same light. It felt like real world frogger getting to my hostel.



The square in the morning.

Tirana was just a night stop over on my way to Montenegro. The face I am making is my natural reaction to the smell of the bus, which I can best describe as the smell of death covered in a layer of dust with a bottle of syrup poured on top for good measure.

My first time uploading a video so forgive me if it doesn't work, but this was too good not to share. I caught a ride with my new Albanian friend Kelman and his 75 year old cabbie friend to get across the Montenegrin border. I felt like we were on our way to fulfill our Jihad suicide mission.

After clearing border patrol the scenery in Montenegro turned into beautiful Adriatic coastline with a rugged mountain range quickly climbing to heights over 6,000 ft.



On the bus to Budva as the sun dips into the Adriatic Sea.