Llogara Pass and Himara

One of the reasons I chose to take a furgon from Vlora, was that I wanted to drive through Llogara Pass. The normal bus route goes further inland, which makes more sense, but I had wanted to experience the views and thrill of driving up a mountain and then back down again with breathtaking views wherever you look.

Currently the only coastal road from Vlora to Saranda goes through the mountainous area.

Porto Palermo

Llogara Pass is the highest point of the road, and at certain times of the year, the road takes you through the clouds. To my disappointment, this wasn't that particular time. The highest point of the road is over 1,000 meters above the sea level. The route also goes through a National Park, and there are hotels within the park for the nature lovers.

I was told that there are plans to build a coastal highway closer to the ocean, which will, of course, impact the beautiful beaches that dot the coastline. We'll see when that happens.

These pictures don't really do justice to the trip, as they were taken inside a rattling and bumping furgon that didn't really care about passengers taking great pictures. I'm just very happy that the lady from our earlier trip wasn't travelling on this one *shudders*.

Arjon told me that according to one story, the road from Vlora to Saranda was designed by an Italian engineer who had a donkey travel up first, then marking the way the donkey took. He based it on a fact that donkeys are essentially rather lazy, and try to find the easiest way anywhere. It makes perfect sense! However, the road is very winding, and not for those who get easily nauseous. 

I didn't find the driving to have been particularly dangerous. The driver didn't speed through the hairpin curves, and although there were cars passing us on the serpentine road, there weren't any dangerous situations I noticed. 

Honey seller's tent along the way

 There were a lot of honey sellers on the way, and usually they were right next to the hives. You can't get it any fresher than that! 

Eventually we descended from the mountains and started passing one beach after another. 

And finally arrived at a small beach town Himara. We were left at what seemed to be the center of the town, but had no idea where the hotel I had booked the night before was. I tried to ask some taxi drivers that were gathered at the city center, but no one knew where it was. I tried to call the hotel, but there was no answer. Finally a driver who already had passengers waiting called the number again, and this time got an answer. He quickly got the coordinates and explained them to another driver. Then all of a sudden he was gone, before I even got to thank him! 

Well, this other driver started us off, it was only about 55 minutes' drive from the town center, and we were greeted by the hotel owner, who loaded us with out luggage to his car, and proceeded to drive us a small dirt road to his hotel. It really was only about a minute drive, if that, but it was very nice of him. Especially when we were way early, and they hadn't have time to get our room ready yet. 

He was very apologetic about it?! I tried explaining that we were the ones who were too early, but he then proceeded to offer us coffee and I finally got the Mountain Tea I had heard so much about! I think I read about it somewhere, and finally the lady back in Vlora had told me if I came to Himara, they would sure have it. And she was right! 

The tea is made of particular flowers that grow up in the mountains... Of course. It tasted delicious, and it's only later on that I realized that is something I should've taken with me as a souvenir! Well, not the tea from the cup, but find the packages... 

Grapes at the hotel garden

The owner was also a lifesaver; there is quite a good Wi-Fi coverage all over the hotels in Albania, which was rather surprising, but sometimes you just need a bit of data on-the-go. I had bought a tourist sim for my phone, with calls, messages and data. The calls and messages worked fine, but it was the data that didn't. The owner called T-mobile service line, even though I didn't have the number, and tried to figure out what was wrong. Eventually he had to give up, and said they had told him I hadn't paid for the service, which certainly wasn't true. But just like that, a few minutes after that call I got a few installation messages, and after installing them, the data package started to work!! 

Of all the beaches I saw on my trip, the ones in Himara were my absolute favorites. Of course a lot of the beach towns have many beaches, hidden and not so hidden, and they could've been how beautiful ever. But I'm going with what I've got. 

It was obvious that the season was over in Himara too. So many restaurants had already closed, or working with a limited menu. More often than not, you got a 'sorry we're out of that dish' even if you ordered from the menu they gave you. It's a pity, as our hotel owner said that he was fully booked still for the whole week, and was going to stay open until end of September. I do think that was a smart choice from him. There's still lots of money to be made in September.

From Berat to Vlora

The hotel manager had promised Arjon that they would call us a taxi to take us to the bus station down in Berat new town in the morning. We agreed the time we would be leaving, and for 4 euros, the taxi showed up, and took us right at the furgon that was going to Vlora, our next stop. The service at hotel Mangalemi was very good. There was an option of taking a bus, but it sounded too complicated; we wanted the easiest option, for a change. And there was no way we would've walked there with all our luggage.

At the bus station, there were lots of buses and furgons (mini-buses) waiting to take people into different directions. Like I said, we could've gone directly to Saranda, but it was going to be a long trip, plus I wanted to go through Llogara Pass, which I'm going to talk about later.

Image from xhillineshqiperi.wordpress.com

As the furgon filled up, we were finally ready to go. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of it. It was a sight to see. I think it hadn't seen any TLC for decades. The road was winding, as usual and the furgon rattled and bumped along.

Image from teachtalktravel.com

We were fine, looking out at the lively scenery outside, when an elderly lady in front of us put her head out the window and started projectile vomiting. Fortunately for us, the window was open where she sat, if not, it could've been much worse!

Somehow people found plastic bags that they gave the lady. Now, I understand how that works, having been sick on airplanes, but the lady spat in the bag, tossed the bag out the window (don't get me started on how people just happily litter away everywhere), and proceeded to vomit again.

At this point, people were starting to move away from her proximity, even those who were further than us. Not to be trapped, I ushered Mom to move to the very back, next to the window before any one of the elderly could get there. (I can be ruthless sometimes! Survival of the fittest!) However, there was some projectile on the window at the back too, and instead of fresh, vomit-free air, it stank to the high heavens. Needless to say, I closed the window, God forbid there was going to be any more projectile heading my way!

All in all, the furgon rides were entertaining, to me, at least, not so sure about Mom, I think she would've preferred Arjon's car. No complaints from me either. A lot of the drivers were happily smoking, stopping to get some groceries, there was even a grocery bag left for them on a traffic sign! Sometimes they stopped and delivered the packages to people along the way. It was actually quite convenient and made sense to deliver things that way. However, if you're in a hurry, I suggest you don't take a furgon.

You paid the driver after the trip. They don't give out tickets to locals, and I assume their rates are much lower than ours. The fare at the hotel's list for the trip was 300 lekes, but it was 450 when it was time to pay up... The worst was a furgon from Himara to Saranda, the trip was short, and it was almost double the longest trip from Berat to Vlora: 810 lekes. A friend said when he used to travel from Himara to Vlora, he paid about 200 lekes for the same trip. Well, I wasn't going to start arguing with the conductor, we needed to get along... But just so you are aware. You will have different rates than the locals. You might be able to 'negotiate', I didn't even bother trying.

So, our first stop was Vlora, another port town and maybe the site of the future airport. I didn't really feel Vlora, it left me cold. The sea didn't look that inviting for a dip, and maybe it was that our taxi driver took us to the wrong hotel, and the one we ended up in was more expensive, but that didn't show in the quality... Someone had also nicked the batteries out of the A/C remote, and so the lady at the reception had to hunt down another remote to replace the one we got.

By the time we got everything settled, we were quite hungry, but didn't want to frequent the empty beach-side restaurants. We popped in to what looked like a restaurant, but it was actually a bar that was also a betting parlor. They had a few minutes of fun when the owner told the locals two dumb tourists were trying to buy food from them...

We tried a couple more, but they had already closed, as it was September, and not many tourists were around anymore. Finally we had to go to a pizzeria by the beach, and got huge pizzas. They were nice enough and offered us to box them so we could take to the hotel! As it was off season, our hotel had stopped offering breakfasts too, so we went to a store and bought what little we needed. I was stubbornly trying to stick to my diet, for what good it did, especially with the pizza waiting.

The next morning, the owner had kindly promised 'a boy' (at least a 35-year-old guy) would stop the furgon to Himara for us. Fortunately, the furgon would be passing by the hotel, as it was situated right along the highway to the South coast. We didn't need to call taxis to haul us back to another bus stop. While we were waiting for our furgon, the lady offered us coffee and tea, while we watched a Finnish family enjoy their breakfast on the hotel... The lady explained to us that they got a breakfast because they had a busy day with excursions ahead... Ok...