CARMEN GIRÓ
Albania is one of those emerging destinations that regularly appear in the news during the pre-summer season. After the 2020 pandemic, this country experienced an unprecedented tourism boom that has turned it into a highly visited location. The country’s unique history, cultural heritage, and nature undoubtedly contribute to its appeal.
The rapid growth in tourism, however, also has its risks, as the country presents significant contrasts in terms of infrastructure, urban planning, hotel occupancy, and maintenance of tourist sites. What is true is that it is still a relatively inexpensive country to travel to, with a wide range of hotels and dining options—featuring very tasty and plentiful food—at much more affordable prices than other European destinations.
Traveling to Albania is often like being transported to a Mediterranean country with the idiosyncrasy of 40 years ago, experiencing a unique blend between the Mediterranean lifestyle and the oriental. It is no coincidence that in its history, Turkey was there for centuries, and the country’s geographical location makes it a crossroads between the East, Orthodox culture, ancient Greeks, modern Italians, and the Slavic neighbors of the Balkans.
They claim to be descendants of the ancient lilies, predating all successive invasions. It’s a complex mix that sometimes becomes explosive in conjunction with the country’s recent history, a communist dictatorship that lasted 46 years and hermetically sealed the state off from the rest of the world.
Albania has a past that swings between East and West, and this can be seen in its most emblematic and touristic places. Part of the Ottoman Empire, part of the great Greece, neighboring and historical friend of Italy, it offers a blend that is experienced at every step.
The city of Berat, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is one of the jewels of the country. Known as the city of a thousand windows, its Ottoman houses cascade down the hillsides, offering a labyrinth of narrow streets where minarets and bell towers peek out. With over 2,400 years of history, the city is crowned by the castle at the top, with a whole area still inhabited, overlooking the monumental ensemble.
Gjirokastër is another place that visitors cannot miss. Also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the city stands out for its Ottoman fortress houses, which give it a strong character, dominated by a castle and a beautiful bazaar. It is the birthplace of the dictator Hoxha, which allowed it to be respected as a whole. Additionally, the intellectual and dissident Ismail Kadare was born and began writing here.
In the city, you can visit various Ottoman houses to see what everyday life was like in these fortified mansions. The architecture of the Ottoman Empire, which extended from the Danube to the Persian Gulf, adopted indigenous nuances, including in Albania as well.
Albania was officially declared an atheist country by the Hoxha regime in 1967, which affected all places of worship, being repurposed as warehouses and often vandalized. However, people’s beliefs cannot be erased overnight.
When the dictatorship fell, many temples of all religious faiths were restored
When the dictatorship fell, many temples of all religious faiths were restored. Furthermore, some historical monuments or temples were respected, paradoxically, because some of the high-ranking party members had been born there or had a sentimental relationship, and knew the value of the place and the importance of protecting it from destruction. Therefore, visitors can admire Muslim mosques of different currents, Orthodox churches, Catholic cathedrals, small hermitages hanging in a gorge and filled with Byzantine frescoes…
In the interior, very close to the border with Greece, the city of Korçë was known as the “Paris of Albania,” as it was one of the most cosmopolitan cities with a high concentration of intellectuals in the early 20th century. It is home to one of the country’s most important museums, dedicated to medieval art, housing thousands of Byzantine icons.
Near Korçë, the village of Voskopoja, once a crossroads in the valley between East and West, is home to a multitude of churches and hermitages adorned with Byzantine frescoes. Some were able to withstand looting during the dictatorship, and most are currently being restored, undoubtedly paving the way for a tourism revival in the area. Interestingly, the ubiquitous national beer, Korça, has been brewed in Korçë since 1929.
The coast of Albania has also been widely promoted to attract tourists eager for not-so-famous selfies, turquoise blue waters, and white sands. The landscape, especially of the beaches located in the south of the country, is spectacular, with crystal-clear waters and cliffs framing them. The beaches, especially in the summer, are very crowded and almost all of them are privately managed, so you have to pay to rent a sun umbrella and two lounge chairs for the whole day.
In some areas, the prices of these umbrellas are exorbitant, in line with the musical and festive atmosphere reminiscent of the beaches of Ibiza, such as in the city of Ksamil. In others, you can find more affordable prices and a more family-friendly atmosphere, like in Himarë, with a remarkable old town and a ruined citadel on a hilltop.
The archaeological site of Butrint gathers evidence of the passage of Greeks, Byzantines, and Venetians
In all of them, urban growth has not kept pace with that of infrastructure and maintenance. Visitors may find that the road to a paradisiacal beach is a tangle of cars without sidewalks, and upon arrival, the sand is full of dirt. But, as the Albanians say, “this is also Albania.”
The archaeological site of Butrint, located in the south of the country, bordering Greece, gathers testimonies of the presence of Greeks, Byzantines, and Venetians in the area. The archaeological ruins, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, are very well preserved. They emerge, as if it were the backdrop of a theater, among lush vegetation that provides a welcomed shade. Additionally, from the archaeological complex, there are panoramic views of the Mediterranean Sea and the Butrint lagoon.
Tirana, modernity
The capital of Albania, Tirana, is a dynamic and cheerful city where the vast majority of investments are concentrated to build a new, modern country in line with any Western capital. It is a mecca for any architect, with multiple skyscrapers and urban complexes designed by top global firms competing with each other to help this city grow.
Skanderberg Square, named after the national hero, is the heart of the city, through which everything and everyone passes. On one side, the historic mosque appears small due to the immense skyscrapers that have grown in its shadow. The city offers a combination of more or less well-preserved historical monuments, tourist establishments equivalent to any café in any city, and remnants of the communist era that recall the more recent past.
The most outstanding is Bunk’Art, a museum located in a part of the shelter galleries that run through the city’s underground. Designed as a bunker for the State apparatus in anticipation of a nuclear attack, it houses a museum that chronicles the atrocities and repression experienced during the communist dictatorship. Visitors can read numerous historical documents, see the detention cells, look at the surveillance objects used on the population, and leave with a bad taste in their mouths after seeing the control rooms of the government of Hoxha’s great terror machinery.
Wild nature
Albania is a mountainous country. Everywhere you look, you find mountains, even surrounding Tirana. So, the traveler who wishes to go hiking has multiple possibilities here. There is still a lot of untouched nature, where you can walk for kilometers without encountering anything but a remote village, crossing mule tracks or Ottoman bridges.
The most spectacular routes are offered in what they call the “Albanian Alps,” such as in the Valbonë Valley National Park, located on the border with Montenegro and Kosovo. One of the most popular treks is the route between the villages of Valbonë and Theth. It covers about 15 kilometers with demanding inclines that can be completed in around 7 hours, requiring some experience but offering unforgettable landscapes and sensations. Throughout the north, you can still find the reclusive towers – known as kullas – of those persecuted under the Kanun, the ancient Albanian code of conduct that was above the laws.
In the southeast, Bredhi and Hotova National Park is even more secluded and remote. Mountain villages like Permet allow you to enjoy summer festivals with folk music while indulging in a hearty game dish accompanied by a glass of raki. The hot springs of Benje bear witness to human activity in the midst of a valley, with an Ottoman bridge under which locals bathe in natural thermal pools.
In any case, there are multiple places throughout the country where you can climb mountains, admire karst springs that form the so-called “blue eyes,” hike to discover a high mountain waterfall, go canyoning and rafting, or sail on a lake, such as the immense Lake Ohrid, the deepest in the country and bordering North Macedonia.
To converse and renew the country
In addition to being able to visit tourist attractions, travelers can especially enjoy one of the greatest pleasures of traveling: conversing with the local people. Albanians are friendly and often eager to help visitors and engage in conversation. They are willing to talk to tourists from Western countries to share their perspectives and, at the same time, inquire about those of others.
The young people, who also have a high level of English, are the most likely to speak with any visitor
Young people, who also have a high level of English, are the most likely to talk to any visitor minimally interested in the country. Almost all of them express concern about the cult of money that has led to an uncritical embrace of capitalism, contrasting with the sheltered life, but without freedoms, of the dictatorship.
They explain that their generation is beginning to understand that those who want to progress must work and make an effort on their own, in contrast to the generation of their parents, who relied on the protection of the communist system and transferred that protectionist idea to Western aid after the fall of the dictatorship. Many of them openly criticize the high crime rate among some Albanians who have emigrated throughout Europe, and disapprove with shaking heads when they see luxury cars with blaring music and young people wearing sunglasses that cost more than what they earn in a month driving around the seaside towns.
Elderly people, on the other hand, are also eager to talk, although sometimes it needs to be done with a mixture of English, Italian, French, and Russian. Some of them will show you the birthplace of the dictator Enver Hoxha in the city of Gjirokastër and they will look at you sideways to see if you show admiration or disdain before continuing talking. Others are immigrants on vacation to visit their families, and they explain the disillusionment caused by the dirt, the poor organization, and the corruption that, they say, still prevails.
Among the older generation, you can find people like the son of a minister from the dictatorship who explains the difficulties faced by the country, adding that he saw Nikita Khrushchev three times and that when he studied in Moscow, he was roommates with Stalin’s son. These conversations are a top-tier tourist attraction in this country. (Lavanguardia.com)
