2024 Balkans Overland Adventure, Traveling from Montenegro to Albania...

Our driver and guide Gesi picked us up at the hotel in Kotor and we started our drive to Tirana. South of Budva, we made a quick stop at the beautiful, St. Stephen Monastery on an island offshore linked by a causeway…similar to Mont St. Michel. Following the Adriatic coast, we had another day of breathtaking scenery. Our stop at the border was smooth and we crossed into Albania before noon. We travelled through the Shkoder region to Lake Shkoder. There was a definite change in the demographics and still shows the signs of the former communist rule that ended in 1991.  Shkoder Lake lies on the border of Albania and Montenegro and is the largest lake in Southern Europe. We stopped in Shkoder to stretch our legs and walked along the waterfront promenade. I took a hike up to the Catholic Church for the view and a look inside the church. From here we headed to Tirana. We arrived Tirana dumped our luggage and did a quick walk about of the must-see places of Tirana. Not far from our hotel we visited the Tirana’s concrete pyramid, built in 1987 by the daughter of Albania’s dictator Enver Hoxha who ruled Albania from 1944–85, as a museum to her father. Very near the Pyramid is the Peace Bell…This bell is a reminder of the past. It is made from gun shells spent during the unrest of 1997, when hundreds of people lost their life after the collapse of the pyramid schemes. Children of the Catholic Zadrima community gathered the shells and the monument was built. We then walked through Rinia Park and saw the Independence Monument. Next, we walked to Skanderburg Square, named after the national hero who briefly ensured Albania was independent of the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth century. There is a large bronze statue of Skanderbeg in the middle of the square, and the Et'hem Bey Mosque, one of the nation's most treasured buildings that dates back to the late eighteenth century, sits in the southeast corner. The Et'hem Bey Mosque is one of the few mosques to have escaped destruction by the Communists. Also situated across the square is the National Historic Museum adorned with a huge socialist mural of victorious partisans. Behind the mosque at the entrance to Murat Toptani Road is the Tirana Clock Tower. Just back of the Clock Tower we stopped at the BunkArt, a massive bunker built by the communist dictator is now a museum. It was built on the orders of the dictator who ruled Albania for some 50 years, as a hideout in the event of war….the bunker is now a museum. This was a quick snapshot of Tirana after a long day of travel from Kotor.