Macedonia, a lake and a fake (city)

Crossing the border on foot !

From Tirana, we went in minibus to Pogradec, and dealt with the driver to be dropped at the border, outside the city. From there, we walked our way through the no man land's (very quick, 10 min max, see below the macedonian monastery on the left in the sun and the building a little on the right of the center of the central hill). 

After crossing the macedonian border, we hitchhiked to be dropped at the monastery. It's very near but as there is a military zone between border and monastery, you have to walk 5km or so to get there...

the monastery, located in a very quite place and full of peacocks and other animals

With our science of perfect AND improvized timing, we had time to visit the monastery, sip a beer in a bar and take a boat going to Struga and Ohrid. (a bit long, more than 2 hours !)

We really deserved the famous trout (not from the lake as it's now forbidden)

it's a very nice little town full of traditional houses...

...churches...

Our host suggested a guide for 35 euros to get to 2 villages in taxi for the morning.

springs, nature and an old car... what else to ask ???

We headed to Skopje for our final step of our Balkan trip !

 Macedonia in a pic : the flag, the statue of Alexander the Great that didn't lived there, the Catholic cross and brand new statues and bridge...

Skopje is largely uninteresting, with lots of "brand new soon to look old" buildings, covered with statues, fake columns... the most absurd being those 3 fake pirate boats in front of the main city buidlings...

 and quite a big fail for this one, if you look at what the guy holds in its hands..

Welcome to Tirana, raki, burek and Enver Hoxha...

Again, a very nice surprise.

When earring from Albania, you may associate it with mafia, poverty and communist buildings.
Well, not so much for 1 day tourists in Tirana (I guess it takes more time to notice mafia businesses, but locals can talk you about it...)

We arrive by minibus from Prizren in 3 hours directly in the Skanderberg Square.  Sun, heavy traffic with expensive cars, mixed gender population at the numerous cafes... A pretty dynamic and cool atmosphere !

A summary of influences in Albania :
- old mosque
- the terrible Skanderberg, local hero and true fighter
- colored italian fascists buildings
- recently colored 70's communist buildings
- glass-covered modern buildings

The big buildings colored in strong shades downtown are not like this anymore : the paint quality was bad apparently. Now it makes buildings with pastel coloration, best viewed from the Skytower (free ascension, kitsch rotating bar on top).

you can also see in the upper foto the former dictator (Enver Hoxha) villa and its garden, and at street level below :

Not so great uh? That part was the Blloko neighborhood where the oligarchy lived apart from the rest of the population.

Most striking building with a communist feeling, the quite destroyed pyramid that is still open nonetheless

and also the museum

 Our host also talked about the south of Albania, apparently very promising.
We had to skip Berat, one of the 3 UNESCO Heritage cities in Albania. The 2 others are way south, with virgin playas, a little Riviera with Polish and the neighbooring Corfu... tempting, but for another time !

 the kitsch bar with some views, nice place to get raki or cocktails.. :

After a breakfast made of bureks, we left Josselin (going back to France) and we  headed to Ohrid lake (pronounce Okrid), the frontier with Macedonia.

 green environment and small mountains

 BIG haystacks all over the country, made the old way

 no, it's not a caban for kids turned to a solar panel. Enver Hoxha made hundreds of thousand of these built all over the country to protect it against an invasion... pretty paranoiac !

a bunker with a view... on Macedonian mountains