Gjirokaster, Albania

We wisely hired the owners of our apartment in Borsh to drive us to Sarande. Otherwise we would have had to get a ride up to the road and wait in the rain for a bus to eventually come. No thanks!

Sarande is probably the equivalent of Cancun to Albania. Several Albanians warned us not to stay there because it's crowded and ugly. We're glad we didn't. But it's popular because it's a beach town and it's a short ferry ride to Corfu, a Greek island with a large airport. Many Europeans fly into Corfu on low budget airlines and then ferry it to Sarande, Albania.

We grabbed a bus to Gjirokaster from there. The city doesn't look like much from the lower part of town, but the touristy stuff is the beautiful mansions up in the hills in the Old Town. And there is a huge ancient castle here. Another one? They're pretty impressive and far different from castles in Northern Europe. They would hold whole villages within their walls and are perched on rocky acropolises.

Several of these old houses in town are museums now and we went to three different ones. One looked as it did 150 years ago, another one was slightly remodeled and the third one was totally remodeled. We really got our steps in the last 2 days as this is a very hilly city and its nicknamed the City of a Thousand Steps. Trust me, there are more than that.

At one of the museums we saw a guy wearing a Wisconsin shirt. He was from Milan and bought it at a second hand store. Milan, the heart of the fashion world.

We booked two nights in a very comfy apartment about halfway up to the old town, and that's plenty of time. While I like it here, it pales in comparison to Berat.

I spent most of this morning touring the castle and the military museum inside of it. Albania has a sad but interesting history. It was the home area of the Albanian Ottoman tyrant, Ali Pasha. His other headquarters were in Ionnina, Greece, where we just were 4 weeks ago. See https://findpenguins.com/0x7ax2pvwii8d/footprin…

Ionnina is only about 90 kilometers away, but it's across the Greek border now. Gjirokaster is also the hometown of the Communist dictator Enver Hoxha.

We're going to rent a car for the next 2 days so we can see some hot springs and go to a waterfall. Wish us luck! Renting a car here is weird. Basically a bunch of guys bought cars and just rent them out pretty casually.

More photos and videos are here.

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