Our first full day in the Balkans (specifically Albania) didn’t disappoint! After an amazing breakfast at the hotel we set out on a walking tour of Tirana. The architecture in the city has a very eclectic variety – modern buildings, buildings that scream “I was built during communist times”, and everything in between. Tirana is very clean and comfortable, and there’s a lot of construction and renovation happening in the city.
Here are some of the views from the street in Tirana:
One of the main boulevards… decorated for their Independence Day.
The Prime Minister’s Residence/Office:
The Pyramid of Tirana (a rather unique building):
Sample building stolen from the “Communist Design Book”. (They really were… patterned off of what was going up in Moscow at the time…)
Areas of the government, the building on the right (red building), is the Ministry of Urban Planning (Essentially the Planning and Development/Public Works Department for the Country.)
The GDP in Albania has seen annual increases between 2%-4% in the last few years as opposed to larger European nations who’ve seen about 1% growth, we saw LOTS of demolition and LOTS of construction going on, so things are definitely improving in Albania!
One of the stops on our walking tour was a “museum”. Why the air quotes?? Because the museum was an underground bunker that was secretly built for the safety of the Minister of Internal Affairs during a nuclear attack. Each of the 24 small rooms has been converted into the political persecutions in Albania’s past. One of the most unique rooms was the decontamination room. Or should we say rooms? There were 6-7 chambers that were designed to deal with each stage of decontamination. Creepy, but a reality.
You could see the bunker just to the left of the Ministry of Urban Planning above, but here’s a closer look at it:
The entrance to the museum is on the other side of the bunker. You go down the stairs, into the bunker itself to get to the museum.
Here are some pics from the bunker:
And here’s the entrance to the Decontamination chambers noted above. (The exit was a blue hatch/door just around the corner/to the right.)
The weather was beautiful (low 60’s, no rain) and crews were out en-masse decorating for Christmas, as well as the Christmas markets that are open through January. The city is also heavily decorated in Albanian flags as well as banners of previous leaders and influential Albanians as their day of independence is Nov 28th.
As shown in the first picture above, the streets had multiple banner lines across the street, down the entire street. There was a Albanian flag (red background, with a black double headed eagle) in the center, with pictures of heroes and heroines of the country as seen closer below:
In addition to the streets, quite a few of the Ministry buildings were also decorated with a snazzy red and black (the country’s colors) bow, that looked like this:
Overall, it looks like it’s going to be a pretty cool Independence celebration!
To kick off the afternoon, we stopped at somewhat of an ethnographic museum. The owner of the business is keeping alive the craft of traditional, hand-made Albanian clothing.
Adding to that, she has a training program for young ladies in which they learn the craft and then once they’re of age she will employ them. There are currently 16 females in her business, all of whom create amazing clothing, some with incredibly intricate beading.
Here’s a look at some of the beautiful traditional clothing that Albanians historically wore:
And Tim and Jay both agreed… the absolutely most stunning and impressive piece was this one:
The shop owner offered small servings of rakia (small being about a half of a shot) and for whatever reason Jay decided she needed to try it. This would be considered a poor choice as Jay said it was absolutely the worst drink she’d ever had. Tim later tried it and said it “wasn’t really all that bad”, he didn’t understand what all the hulla-ballew was about.
Ironically, as a real life example of her client base… we saw an exceptionally (Tim says “fit and well proportioned) (Jay says striking) woman in sunglasses (looking quite “California”… blond hair, crop top, fit and well proportioned, etc.) getting ready to leave the store with a package in hand.
Our guide stopped her and spoke with her a second, at point he introduced her as Miss Albania. She told us (she spoke English very well) that she will be competing in the Miss World competition (representing Albania of course) in a few weeks. She was picking up a dress that is known in a certain region of Albania as she will be performing a traditional Albanian dance in it during the competition.
We of course told her good luck and that we were rooting for her, specifically that if the US didn’t win, we hoped she did. ????
This is said young lady… (san’s traditional dress, looking as described above):
Yes, she was kind enough to pose and let us take pictures. ????
The remainder of our day was spent in Kruje, a mountainside town outside of Tirana. Kruje Castle is nestled near the top of the mountain. The castle offers an amazing view of the Adriatic Sea as well as Tirana. It was a tad hazy so pictures weren’t clear so you’ll have to trust our word on how beautiful it was.
Walking up to the castle was an interesting experience as you take a small cobblestone street that is lined with shops, most of which offer traditional handcrafted goods, all of which had amazing prices!
The street and the buildings were reminiscient of a quant Alpine village. We were there at the end of the day and it’s November so it was nearly desolate, but our guide said in peak season it’s shoulder to shoulder people and one can hardly get through at times. Thank god we weren’t here for that!!
Here are some shots of the shop area, as well as other quaint street scenes in this gem of a mountain village:
Not the shop area, but the area around the hotel and restaurants:
Heading down into the shops / alley:
In the shop’s alleyway proper:
And more street views/castle area views: (We actually saw a couple of well dressed ladies walking in 3-4” heals on these cobbled streets… Tim thought it was Darwinism-on-the-verge, but obviously they were skilled and careful, as they walked smoothly and without mishap.)
Dinner was at a restaurant that again offered amazing views of the valley below and the beautiful sunset.
In addition to the set menu, two traditional Albanian dishes were served. Jay ate both of them and asked for the recipe of one! Surprising, right?!
Our guide keeps telling us how Albania is the warmest place we’ll be as it gets colder as we move north. She defined “cold” as being in the 50’s (possibly 40’s overnight). We told her that isn’t cold, that is comfortable!
Stay tuned to see what Montenegro brings!