Driving to the coast

We won’t see southern Albania this time. It’s too far a stretch for us. Though, we are bringing our visit to this country to a close at the beach.

Right after breakfast we start our tour to the coast. The first three kilometers is down hill, on the grabble road we came up (of course … there is no alternative). At some points, the car just fits between the mountain side and the ravine, avoiding holes and unlevelled spots is a challenge. Luckily, it didn’t rain the last days and the river bedding was still try to cross.

We followed the route, the navigation provided us… until we found us at the boarder to Kosovo. That wasn’t according to plan! In Kosovo, you need an extra car insurance, we didn’t have (because it wasn’t part of our travels now). Thus we turned around, specified our route for the navigation a bit more precise and had the amazing tour through thrilling landscape, we actually wanted to have.

Beautiful mountains, valleys, scarsly inhabited. And at the houses we saw, we wondered how it would be to live there, along way away from anybody else, any facilities, on hillsides, nothing more than a little house and garden would fit, right on the edge to the riverbed tens of meters below, a steep drop with just a few trees.

We stopped in Pukë for a quick lunch, weren’t not much impressed by the town (maybe, just didn’t see the right part) and went on.

Finally, we reached Shëngjin, our place to stay at the beach for a day. Luckily, we didn’t stay in the heart: a lot of hotels squeezed into a limited space, a bit like Spanish costas… quite a pity. We have a little cabin, a bit further in the last remaining part of a little nature reserve. Quiet. Green. Peaceful.