Albania

Day 9 202 km ( 3232 km total)
I'm currently sitting in the garden of a very nice little oasis of a guesthouse near Durres, Albania having just finished a georgeos meal & a couple of local beers, thinking I'm in Albania!

The route here was, varied here's a recap.....

I woke quite early to a strange sound outside the window, peered out and saw this!

I didnt think the water looked deep enough for that, and there was me thinking I'd found an undiscovered gem!

Anyway I got up, as I had a couple of jobs that needed my attention on the bike. I had noticed a small oil leak which would periodically drop a drip into the catalytic converter, resulting in a whifs of oily smoke at traffic lights. Turns out it was an 'oil gallery plug' that wasnt sealing properly, a little smear of silicon soon sorted that out.

The other issue presumable resulted from yesterday's little catnap, one edge of the right pannier was just touching the exhaust heat shield and would vibrate annoyingly at a certain speed. Nothing was bent & so I just loosened all the mountings, re-positioned a little & re-tightened, sorted!

So by 0830 I was feeling pretty pleased with myself & went for a walk to explore the village in the morning light. Some lovely views, & nice and quiet.

A quick cappucino and then it was time to pack the bike & get off.

The next hour or so was similar to yesterday, excellent views all along the coastal roads

 

All of a sudden we hit a queue., seemed to early to be the border but thats exactly what it was. The Montenegro-Albania border is a combined affair, so one set of guards process you out of one and into the other.

It was friendly enough but quite formal, had to produce the bike registration documents, driving licence & buy local insurance. All of this time being pestered by groups of kids & their mothers for donations of Euro.

It's always find it a bit tricky dealing with this, the kids look so hard done to its easy to give them some money, but is encouraging this behaviour in their long term interests? Of course once you have given somethimg to one, then you will have 20 more clammering for the same handout, some becoming quite insistant.

Once down the road into Albania proper it is very evident you are in a different country.

The landscape is similar but the roads, villages, cars @ locals are distinctly more 'run down'. The one remarkable thing was the sheer number of petrol statiosn en-route. No real towns, villages, industry or agriculture was visible, just petrol stations - weird!

There were also lots and lots of police checkpoints, but none of them gave us any attention.

It was only 90 minutes or so to Durres, and not a lot to see, hence the absense of photos. There was the occasional fort (?) on a hilltop, which if I had had more time would have been interesting to explore & find out more about.

Apparently the city has been occupied for some 2700 years and more recently has had quite a tumultic history through the first & second world wars and the post war years.

Based on the experience I have had in the hotel this evening, what I can say From personal experience that the Albaninas are amongst the most friendly, hospitable people I have found anywhere - not much here on this street, but really friendly people & a very welcoming atmosphere.

Food & deink was pretty good too :-)

Gëzuar! ..... Off to Greece tomorrow....

 

Schoolboy error, so the Tiger takes its first nap

Day 8 - 325 km (total 3030 km)

Today was a long hot day travelling down the Adriatic coast and taking in Croatia, a little bit of Bosnia, back to Croatia & ending in Montenegro. Border crossings getiing a little more formal now with long queues, luckily on a bike people dont seem to mind you riding past most of them.

Back to the start though & that Tiger nap .... I met Alan last night, who is travelling a similar route and was staying inTrogir. We agreed to meet at my roomstay in the morning & ride together, as it was on the road out. Unfortunately he didnt find it, though I could see him at the side of the road a few hundred metres away. Unable to attract his attention I decided to do a U-turn in the tight driveway I was waiting in and ride down to him. I paddled backwards uphill slightly, trying to navigate the small gap between the gutter and a parked car, just about did it but then put my foot down & the floor at that point was about 6 inches below where I expected it to be. Well phyiscis takes over, once you have 250kg pointing towards the ground and you have lost your footing, there is only one outcome!

I manfully adopted the position to try and lift her back up (which I knew I was unlikely to be able to do without removing the panniers). It was then I realised that I was directly outside a small beauty salon and the 5 occupants were all staring straight at me with looks of concern/amusement, not sure which, on their faces.

To be fair they all came outside and tried to help, one gave me a manicure, another wanted to paint my toenails and a third was waving a pair of straighteners around as if that might help! Before I got too engrossed in what would surely have been a memorable encounter, a suitably big beefy croatian man pulled up on his sportsbike and flipped mine upright with his little finger, well not quite, but you get the idea.

Bikers the world over you gotta love em. After a few minutes chat he headed off & I checked for any damage, which was none, the panniers were the only things to touch the ground really.

Nicely warmed up, with straightened hair & nicely painted nails, I made my excuses to the salon girls & headed for the hills with as much dignity as I could muster!

The guy who stopped to help had warned against using the coast road due to numerous traffic jams, so we headed for the expessway for a bit of free movement. The toll road around here is actually quite nice, a combination of big sweeping bends cutting through rugged hills, with the odd tunnel or bridge thrown in.

Once we took the turning towards Dubrovnik, however, the road became a standard one and moved over to the coast. Stunning views but slower progress, much more traffic and hence extremely hot.

There were 3 borders to cross today - Croatia into Bosnia &H, then 30 minutes later Bosnia & H back into Croatia both before reaching Dubrovnik. The third was from Croatia into Montenegro. These were all fairly smooth, but had very long queues, maining a sweltering wait in the hot sun, even though we manged to drive past the longest part of each queue.

The road towards Dubrovnik itself is pretty special ...

So no rich tourists there then !

Dubrovnik is a lovely place, if a little popular with the cruise ship crowd. My wife & I spent part of our honeymoon there 32 years ago, when it was all still Yogoslavia of course.

We did try to venture down into the old city in the bikes , but turned around once we got embroiled in a multitude of cars, tour busses & tourists - not to be reccomended on heavy bikes on a hot day!

So it was along the neautiful coast road towards Kotor for the night.

My final resting place for the night was a lovely little village called Dobrota, near Kotor. Have to come back here one day - very nice.

Where i got stuck into a scrumptious (does anyone still say that?) meal of greek salad & a local pork & paprika stew...yum!

Finally ... The view from my room tonight

Good night ... Country number 8, Albania tomorrow.