Albania

Before I get started on Albania, I said in my blog about Macedonia that I was going to try and take some pictures in the morning of Lake Ohrid. I did that so here they are.

We left Macedonia and got to the border and I got a good exit stamp from Macedonia, which was very nice. We didn’t even get stamps for Albania for some reason so we will see if we get them when we leave Albania. This country is a bit different than any that I have seen before, with the possible exception of Mexico. It has a lot of poverty (which you could see throughout parts of Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey as well) but a bunch of buildings are just unfinished. Brenton told me that this is because as long as you are renovating your houses then you don’t have to pay property tax.
The countryside is absolutely gorgeous, however. This made for a nice drive into the country. We stopped in Elbasan to get food but there wasn’t much there. I ended up ordering some kind of fried tortilla with cheese in it. It was actually really good and super cheap. I have spent almost nothing in Eastern Europe so that’s been really good.
After that we headed to the capital of Albania, Tirana. This city is prettier than Elbasan, but still there are a lot of unfinished things. Unfortunately, the museum for Albanian art was closed as well as going up the clock tower but I got to wander around the city for a bit. After that we still had a lot of time so Brenton and I grabbed a beer and then a couple cocktails with a couple girls from our bus while waiting for the bus. It was a good time.