Rides to Gjirokastër

I woke up the next morning ready to meet my next host, Allan, in Tirana and travel with him down to Southern Albania! He's a Peace Corps volunteer from NYC, had been living there for a year and a half, and spoke Albanian. We met up in the main square and had coffee before going to a "bus station" to catch a bus to Fier. It was early enough in the day, and warm, so we decided to be cheap and only buy a ticket to Fier (approx. halfway) and hitchhike from there!

We got out of the bus and walked about 50 metres to put our bags down on the side of a dusty roundabout. We had just put our bags down; Allan hadn't even put out his thumb yet before two people pulled over that were going to Gjirokaster! We weren't even waiting like 30 seconds before we were on our way in an SUV. The guys were impressed that Allan spoke Albanian, and I was happy to be getting there waaay faster and cheaper than the bus. We talked about hockey on the way hehe. The guys stopped on the side of the road to buy fish before we were dropped off on the side of the mountain!








We went up to a hotel with a view of the city and the sunset:




The house had no heating, but it wasn't as cold as the one in Perast so it was fine :)

Turkish Dinner Night

So I slept in. I wasn't surprised at myself at all.

I went out to a museum during the day. It was interesting enough. I found a little something to sew onto my bag surprisingly too! Bought the postcards, and found some food...

I was invited by the same people as last night to come out to a movie night going on at Zhujeta's house, but I had time. I went up to this sky bar/cafe that rotates on the top of a building (like the one back home kinda yeah) so I had a coffee and wrote on the postcards. I was content :)

this is the casino on the way to the cafe:


view from the cafe:







I had a hard time finding the place, plus I was 20 minutes late, so I ended up getting picked up and taken to THIS:


don't worry it's just flavoured tobacco


We watched a movie called "head on" in English, but apparently has different title translations in different languages. It's German/Turkish... and intense. I loved it :D it was harsh but in a raw way that I really liked for some reason.










After this movie night, we went out dancing! I brought the hula hoops hehehe. I ended up drunkenly hula hooping in the club place, which was fun and gathered attention. I could walk back to Olta's from this place too. I had a walking companion almost the whole way too which is always nice.:)

I once again came in late and drunk and snuck into bed....

Solitary Meanderings

I woke up at a decent time... I was walking around in the city center before noon! This is impressive for me haha.



I went and walked around some newer areas:


bridge to nowhere in particular:

I was eating ice cream while taking these... Floh was right the ice cream was really good it was my second in two days:


















I was supposed to go up a mountain, but as you can see I didn't. I at least asked about it.

In the evening I was invited to go out for drinks with a friend of Floh's, Zhujeta plus her friends. I showed up and we ended up going out to a few places... at one of the bars there was a momma kitty that had kittens!




We ended up at a bar named Radio... it was the busiest but with a really nice feel to it. It was chilled out but still lively :)

I got home kinda late so I had to be super quiet coming in... I had a feeling I wasn't going to make it out with the French people.

Tirana by Day

I woke up with more energy than I had in Montenegro: There was sunshine!!

It was warm and sunny out!! The kiwi's and I decided to have a walk, eat Burek, and walk some more:























I love the way they have brightened up the otherwise dreary communist buildings! I don't know why everyone doesn't do this! It added such a personality to the city. Between the driving and the colours, Tirana definitely had it's own atmosphere. We walked all over the city - I went from end to end.

Turns out Mother Theresa is Albanian so they have a statue of her at the University:







After this marathon of walking, we went back to the house. The Kiwi's were leaving to a new house I believe, so they had to get their stuff and move it. They were going out to a cafe later that night, invited me to come out later with Olta. After they left and Olta came home, I hung out on the computer for a little while. Her family visited and her mom gave me pasta! Two French couchsurfers arrived at the house after, so I told everyone to come out to this cafe.

They were tired from traveling, but were willing to come out for one beer... I was feeling the same way and so was Olta. We left to find this cafe. We found it but it was on the second floor - not so good for Olta's wheelchair - but there was a downstairs patio area and it was warm. The Kiwi's had left already! Then I remembered that they were there since 6pm and we were getting there around 10pm.... whoops. My sense of time was not correct at all. But we all had a drink and chatted so it was still a good night. I came back tired from all the walking so it was easy to sleep :)