Thu 8th June 2017 – Fri 14th June 2017
The border between Albania and Macedonia really was an unforgetable experience. Because of the importance of weed in Albania, the controls are very strict, and as usual, our van with two young drivers was the perfect target for some serious inspection. This time, it was not only taking a glance inside the van, it was a real search, in a garage, with a dog, and guards searching in every single corner of the van : roof, beds, bags, ex... One of them was around our age and was a real phenomenon :
When we told him we didn't smoke weed, he replied that we should because it was great, but we just had to be careful at the borders. He told us with detachment and smiling that the search of the van would be long, except if we had some euros for him, in which case we would qualify for a "quick search". He found a broken bluetooth speaker in the van and asked us if he could keep it to try to repear it, and finally saw the names we wrote on the door and before we left, he took a pen and wrote "47 (his nickname) Albania men". The check lasted for 45 minutes and if it was certainly stressful, we knew we had nothing to fear, so it was also one of the funniest moments of the trip ! Arriving in Macedonia, the first relief we had was to notice that here credit cards were taken most of the time, unlike Albania, which at the end is really enjoyable and convenient! When we crossed the border it was around 6pm, and we headed straight to Ohrid, where we were supposed to meet Lucas and Maeva, who were coming there for a few days. Ohrid is a beautiful old city, with many pedestrian streets and one-way roads. No need to say we had a lot of fun with the van there. After getting stuck because we were to high and couldn’t go further, having to go all the way backward, forcing the fews cars behind us to go back too. After dodging many cars and managing to find a side road to turn around, we parked the van and went to a bar to have the internet and contact Lucas. We leanrt that he had had a car accident (nothing serious) and will be a few hours late. When they arrived, we were waiting in front of their apartment, looking forward to take the hot shower he promised us. But this was without taking into account our legendary luck, and it occurred that hot water wasn’t working… After a night of talking, we went back to the van and decided to meet on the following day to visit the city. We walked for a few hours in Ohrid and admired the beautiful historical legacy this city has to offer and spent the rest of the day on the beach, playing cards and bathing, and decided we will go visit the national park just near on the next day. We left Ohrid around 11am and arrived in the park at 1pm. After a short lunch, we started following the path to the top of the mountain to enjoy the view. Quickly, we lost the path and started to improve, climbing moutains only made of rocks. After a painful yet beautiful walk of around 3 hours, we reached the top. The view was worth it, and we stayed there until the cold and the night falling made us leave. Our path diverged here, Lucas and Maeva going back to Ohrid for a few days, and we heading to Skopje, the national capital. After meeting and speaking for a while in german with a Macedonian guy, we headed to Skopje. This city really was impressive and we did not expected this, magnificient and huge statues everywhere (the famous one of Alexander the great in the main place), a great old city with tons of shops and a gigantic cover market where you can find absolutely anything, from Iphones to showers through shoes and souvenirs. Parking was a suppliment, but it was clearly worth it. Unfortunatly we did not meet any local there and decided to try our chance further south in our next destination: Greece.
– Written on Saturday 24 June 2017 at 4:00 PM (Day 66)