I know what's on your mind, there will be time for that too

This past week has felt more like two or three weeks of elapsed time. I’ve crossed a country and a half in the last week! I left the cozy village of Stob for the larger town of Ohrid in the south-west corner of Macedonia. The trip took three cycling days with two nights on the road. To sum up the trip quickly, there was a little rain, a lot of mountains, and a fair amount of kilometers. The rain on the second day was almost welcomed as I was given a brief reprieve from the heat of last week! While Bulgaria appeared to have it’s economic problems, they were a little more hidden than those found in Macedonia. While taking a bypass route around Bitola I came over the crest of a hill into a completely different world. Gone were the fields that dominated the scenery during the morning, I had cycled into a semi-planned shanty town. You know how smells can invoke certain memories? For me, freshly cut wood makes me think of my father’s basement workshop, or my time spent working at AJ Forest Products in Squamish. The smell of burning garbage transports me back to the townships of South Africa. Garbage had cascaded down the hill from the houses and onto the highway where scorched pavement and smouldering piles dotted the edge of the road. The prevalence of garbage continued as I cycled over a mountain pass and followed a tributary stream that led me down to Lake Ohrid. Ohrid was on my list of UNESCO sites to visit, they had a welcome mix of turkish culture that survived after Ottoman occupation, an old castle, and a number of Eastern Orthodox churches to admire. I was able to see everything that I cared to visit in one day. I thought about staying a second day to rest, but I decided to continue on in hopes of possibly adding on additional locations to my itinerary. Big news from my time in Ohrid! I found inexpensive peanut butter! I’ve transitioned away from tortillas since leaving Turkey because they are much more expensive here, but I can still make PB&J sandwiches! One grocery store was selling 200g containers for 46 dinar, which is around 1.50 Canadian. Much better than the 4 euro/340g I foolishly paid in Italy. I walked out with 1.2 kilograms of peanut butter. The extra weight probably didn’t help me much as I cycled 150km from Ohrid to Tirana over to days. There were two significant mountain passes to cross, one at the border, and a second between Elbasan and Tirana. Along the way I met an Irish couple on their way into Macedonia - we chatted for nearly 20 minutes, swapping information about suggestions for the rest of their trip to Istanbul, and my trip north through the Balkans. A little after lunch I met a Canadian woman from Fredericton! Laura had started her trip in Fethiye (I was there in mid-January) and came north through Turkey/Bulgaria/Greece/Macedonia/Albania and is on her way back to Belgium before repatriating back to Canada after over a decade abroad. We ended up cycling together for an hour or two towards Elbasan. I struggled a little to keep a good pace for the two of us, as she is a triathlon veteran, and was travelling with probably half the weight I was. The day before leaving Ohrid I had messaged my friend/former co-worker Masimo about what to do while in Tirana. He is from Albania originally, but is in Winnipeg working on a business degree at CMU. On top of giving me some recommendations, he was kind enough to see if his family would be able to put me up for my time in the city! Even though it was last minute, they welcomed me to Tirana with open arms! Masimo’s brother, Brendan, speaks a little english, which is a complete dream in comparison to my last homestay-ish experience in Iznik. They really have made my stay in Tirana so wonderful! Brendan took me on a tour of Tirana via bicycle the afternoon I arrived, then Luan, their father, took us on a quick drive out to Durres to see the seaside. Yesterday we took the car up to Kruje to see the Skanderbeg castle/museum, then further up the hill to a viewpoint/islamic pilgrim’s cave. From there we went to Shengjin for a massive seafood lunch! Really. The first three items came and I thought it was a lot of food for the four of us, then more and more food came to the table. We spent a little time at the beach before making our way back to Tirana. This return trip came complete with a mini tour of the schools that both Masimo and Brendan went to growing up. the day wasn’t even finished when we got back to the city around 5. Brendan and I ended up going out in the evening to play several rounds of billiards and several rounds of ping-pong at local establishments before returning home for dinner. (Fun fact, they appear to play pool differently here than in Canada. It’s essentially backwards when compared to how I’ve played at home. Rather than playing with all the balls and each person taking either stripes or solids, you go in sequential order like in nine-ball pool.) Today has been a day to explore Tirana on my own. I cycled out mid-morning across town to visit the Bunkart Museum. They’ve taken the bunker of Albania’s communist leader and turned into a large gallery chronicling the country’s history from the 1930’s onwards. The rest of the day has been mostly cycling around. Some of the time going back over ground covered the other day with Brendan to take a few photos - and take some time at cafes to catch up on my journal writing and to write this blog post! Tomorrow the plan is to cycle the ~100 kilometers to Shkoder for two nights before moving onto Kotor in Montenegro. I was thinking pretty seriously about going inland to visit Pristina, but I think I've talked myself out of that. I’ll spare you the intricate details, but in short, I think I have time to add some additional stops either in the Balkans or in Europe. I’m leaning towards entering the Schengen zone a month before the game on June 16th to make a detour out to Budapest before returning west to Bratislava and Vienna, then heading north for Poland and Kaliningrad. Route planning is always a bit of improvisation! 

Best, Gavyn.