Smokey, Smokey Korca

Day #8 Tuesday January 3, 2012

            My daughter and I wanted to hit a couple of stores this morning as it did look like there were some interesting shops here and of course they were closed yesterday but maybe  today.  We had breakfast in the hotel, nothing fancy, and walked up the cobblestones to the first turn we had made yesterday towards the castle.  There was a wood carver shop we wanted to visit.  He had some really nice pieces.  He had a cut out of the double eagle of Albania.  We both got one and I got a small key chain as well.  He and his wife very carefully wrapped them up separately in paper and gave them to us.  They didn’t have a lot of English but asked where we came from.  We said the States and sometimes that doesn’t register as well so we said America and the man goes “Obama! – good”.  Huzzah.  People overseas like our president again.  Nobody ever liked Bush.

            We start back but have a few minutes so we look at some postcards and get some cards and I get a magnet.  My daughter has been looking at the purses women are carrying but we have not found a good purse store.  She has also been looking at the shoes and they look lovely but she thinks there will not be any in her size especially after she had to go with Large in the clothing store. 

            We get back to the hotel and  the men are waiting for us.  We take off about 10:15.  Our guide is very nervous about the road today.   He has asked the locals and other drivers how is the road as he says this will be the worst road to drive over in terms of snow and if any driver had said it was bad, we would have gone the other way which probably meant back to the coast. 

            So today we are going to Korca (pronounced Korchah) and supposedly we will see a nice mosque and a museum of medieval arts BUT Klodi has already warned us that this place will probably be closed.  It is, after all, only the 3rd and people don’t like to go back to work yet.  This has become his theme song with each singing of it becoming a day longer that things are closed and another day of our vacation that we could have spent somewhere warm!

            There are some truly magnificent views as we are driving.  The mountains are snow covered, the trees are green or brown, nothing in between, and towns are nestled in valleys and quite lovely.  Driving  in the shadows there are some slippery spots which Klodi drives over at about 5 mph.  In places where the sun is shining, he goes about 10 mph if there is snow on the side of the road.  We stop one place to look at a valley where there is a waterfall.  Kind of hard for me to see it but the valley is beautiful.  I finally make out the waterfall.    There was a herd of goats there too and they kept coming up the steep hill to the road.  At first, it didn’t seem like there was a shepherd but he finally showed up and he is walking up the cliff about the same as the goats do.  Just looking at how steep it was made me fall off balance!

We finally get to a spot in the road that is in shadow and there is ice on it and the car can’t get a grip to get up enough momentum to get up the road without sliding.  Our guide backs down and  tries again to no avail.  He backs further down and no luck.  It is not a wide road and there are cars behind us and cars coming towards us and we are pretty much in the middle of the road and stuck.  Klodi gets out of put on chains. 

            I don’t think he has ever put them on before and they were not a design we knew.  Usually, you lay down the chains and rive over them and then lock them.  He was putting them on and trying to reach behind the wheel to lock them.  Men were coming up and offering advice and helping with the chains and all.  One man talks to us and offers my husband his card (he was actually talking to me too) and he is a doctor at one of the hospitals.  He was quite friendly and didn’t seem to mind at all that he was stuck on the road behind a stuck van.

            Our guide is getting frustrated and  rips off the chains and acts like he is going to try to drive up the hill again with the men pushing the car but then several of the men take the chains and manage to put them around one wheel on the left hand rear.  So how many Albanians does it take to put on one tire chain???  In our case, it took three!  We get back in the van.  Men walk up the road and direct the cars coming towards us to the side so we have a full road.  Then several men push and we slide a bit but the chain holds and we get up and over the hill.  We keep driving with the one chain and it is flapping as it goes around but we can’t be going over 10mph.  We come to a small restaurant and coffee shop by the side and our guide pulls in there and says we will have a break.

            The men get busy and  take off the chain and attempt to put it back in its case, then  Klodi has to put the van back together because he had gotten out the jack as well in case he had to jack up the wheel to get on the chain.  All the men who had helped us come driving by us now in their cars and they all wave.

            There are bird cages in this small restaurant too.  There is a fire in one room and we stand by the fire.  There are men working on a car outside and then they are out there holding a rifle and I thought they were going to shoot something but Klodi said they were just posing for photos with the rifle as if they had shot something.  It is quite cold in this small restaurant because all the men going in and out working on the car and taking photos of each other holding the rifle always leave the door open.  It’s about 2C outside and we are very cold so we are as close to the fire as possible without climbing into it!  The door usually gets shut about ½ ways but each time a new person comes in or goes out, there is a chilly breeze into the room. 

            So my daughter and I are waiting for my husband and our guide and somehow we got into talking about  honey.  This place was known for its good honey for sale so we each got a kilogram of honey for something like 10,000 Lek which is a bit under $10.  We finally continue our journey to Korca.  As we pass over some hills and see these little towns and small cities tucked into the hills in nooks and crannies, there is a haze hanging over a lot of them.  At first, it wasn’t a great haze so wasn’t sure if it was haze or clouds.  When we got further into the mountains and there would be valleys surrounded on all sides by mountains, it because quite apparent that these were smoke hazes hanging over the towns.  When we arrived in Korca, it was quite hazy and this town smelled very much like damp wood smoke and peat fires.  We had to spray all our coats when we got home because of the smoke smell from this place.

            We got into Korca late as  it was getting dark already.  But then it was getting dark by 3:30 or 4 p.m.  We went to the Hotel Regency because this was the only place I had asked for a different hotel as the reviews of our originally assigned hotel was the Kocibelli and it didn’t have good ratings on trip advisor.  I was supposed to pay extra for this hotel as it was more expensive.  I gave that money to Klodi the next day and he pocketed it so not sure if he got an extra tip or not.  Hotel Kocibelli was just around the corner from us and actually looked nicer.  The hotel is a nice little place with a fish tank in the middle of the lobby that has a large carp in it that has to jerk itself around about 3 times in order to turn and swim the other way.  Also a couple of huge plecostimas  We did manage to ask where restaurants were and our guide told us how to find the ones around the main square where the cathedral was and said we couldn’t’ miss it.  The restaurant in the hotel was closed.  Then he was gone and we were on our own for the rest of the day.  No touring today, no sightseeing today, no anything but riding in the car and crossing the mountain.  Ah, but there was shopping this morning.  I guess that’s something.

            We go out to find the restaurants.  We find the main cathedral but it’s very, very cold.  The cathedral is lovely and lit up at night with some holiday greeting.  We see a couple of restaurants on the side of the cathedral so feel confident that we know how to get something to eat.  We head back to the hotel and stop at some small shops on the way and find some snacks and drinks.  We are accosted by a couple of boys who think we should give them money.  This is the only place where we have bit hit by kids wanting money other than some of the obvious gypsies.  After our guide had discussed with us about how he told the lady at the mosque in Tirana that she shouldn’t be begging but should get a job and get help from friends, we were surprised that these boys approached us.  They weren’t gypsies and in Albania, it seems that gypsies begging is ok but everyone else, it is not.

            We head out again about 6 I think.  We’re hungry and ready for food.  We make our way gingerly back to the square and cathedral because the walkway is icy and slippery in spots.  We make our way across the square and pick the restaurant on the left and head into it.  It is pretty full of people on the ground floor and someone directs us upstairs.  It wasn’t until later when our daughter said something that I realized we had been directed to the women’s bar upstairs.  Yep, this was not a restaurant but a bar.  We ask for a restaurant and they direct us around the corner.  We go around the corner and find a place that says bar and restaurant.  We walk in and ask if it is a restaurant and he says yes and directs us into a room with tables and then leaves.  We sit there for maybe 5 minutes or longer and then he comes back and says they will not be cooking yet for another hour!  I guess he was happy to have us sit there for an hour or so but we didn’t feel like doing that.  Sooooo.

            OK, we are out of there.  We walk back across the street and back down the slippery sidewalk and stop at the small stores again to make sure everyone has something to eat for dinner because we’re not coming out again in a hour in this cold and this smelly, smoky town and that ends our night in Korca, total waste of time to go there really and the tour agency should have known things would be closed.  Could have shortened our trip by several days!

            Other things we have noticed.  Most Albanians look rather surly and will stare at you.  When I smile and give a nod, they totally transform their face and smile back at me.  They seem to love it when I try to say thank you.  The first few times after I had it written down, I still wasn’t doing very well but got pretty good at the end.  They laughed a lot too at the beginning.  Faleminderit (pronounce all letters including the t at the end and the e’s are accented and sound like short a’s).  There is no zoning and no anti-litter laws.  Trash is everywhere and the worst of it is thrown into their waterways.  Several streams and rivers had high water marks in the trees lining their banks and the markers were odd bits of plastic bags and trash that would be stuck in the branches all at the same level and all ‘flowing” in one direction. 

            Not only are they heat challenged but they are door challenged too.  Even on the coldest days, a lot of people walk in and out of stores, restaurants, bars, hotels and just leave the doors open.  It’s no wonder that all the shop keepers, bar keeps, etc. are wearing heavy coats inside their stores. 

            Usually we saw shepherds with just sticks and dogs but in the mountains, sometimes there were shepherds with rifles and other long guns.  Twice shepherd dogs came over to our daughter to be friendly.  The one in Antigone got in trouble for it, I think.   We have had Klodi stop for fruits and vegetables many more times than he has wanted to, I think.  Now he rolls his eyes each time we say we need to stop for fruit.  But in spite of all the heat problems and food problems, it is a lovely country.