Bus Failure + Big Hot Hill Walk

Our plan today was to take an 8 am bus to an inland town called Gjirokastër. It’s just over an hour’s bus ride away and it looks historic and picturesque. Just one problem: the bus that Google and a couple of websites said went there didn’t seem to exist. We checked with two different bus drivers—one going to Vlorë and the other to Berat—and they both indicated the only bus was at 10 am. Hmm… we might need to rethink that plan then.

Plan B therefore became a walk up to the Sarandë castle, which is now a restaurant. It’s called Kalaja e Lëkurësit and sits on the hill overlooking Sarandë—the hill you can see in the photo below. 

We walked along the promenade and then started up a street that was uphill. At that point, Sarah suggested she head back to the apartment as the walk would be too far and too hot for her. That ended up being the right call. She turned back and I carried on up the hilly street. It then turned into quite a busy road with terrible exhaust fumes—yuck. It was also very hot. The forecast today was a high of only 26 degrees, but it felt like that had already been exceeded.

After about a kilometre I turned off onto a much smaller road that climbed steadily up the hill. It was fairly steep and very hot. My bottle of water wasn’t going to last long up here. Eventually, I came to a lookout beside what appeared to be a small lighthouse—no idea why it was there. It was still 300 m to the castle at the top. The view was good here though, so I paused to take some photos.

As I was leaving, a car pulled up and a guy got out. He said hello, and he was obviously speaking English. He sounded Australian, at a guess. So I replied, said hello back, and jokingly asked why he hadn’t arrived slightly earlier—he could’ve given me a ride up the hill! He laughed and said, “Are you from New Zealand?” I was wearing my dead giveaway hat!

We stopped and chatted for a good 15–20 minutes. He’s travelling around Europe by car and started in Slovenia before going to Italy, Sicily, Malta, Corfu, and now Albania. He has taken the rental car on many ferries and said it had been great, but fuel and other things were very expensive. He was heading further into Albania and then to North Macedonia today, so I pointed him towards Ohrid as a really good destination. He did have it on his list but had another alternative spot as well. He thought he’d go and check it out based on what I told him about it.

Chat over, I continued to the castle at the top. As I arrived, three small tour buses turned up and the passengers started to follow their guide to explore the castle. The restaurant took up most of the space inside the castle. It wasn’t as interesting to look at as others we’ve visited. The restaurant appeared to be closed, which suited me just fine. It was mainly outdoors to take in the view and the evening sunsets, I assume. The diners must absolutely cook in the sun though, as there wasn’t any shade—maybe there were umbrellas that weren’t yet up.

Anyway, I could wander around and take photos of the views without bothering anyone, which was great. That done, I headed back down the way I’d come. My water supply was now exhausted, but going down wasn’t so hot, and the wind had picked up, which made the walk bearable. I had turned my Strava on when we left the bus area earlier. With the bit we missed recording, I’m going to call it a 10 km walk today.

Back at the apartment, Sarah gave me lots to drink and we enjoyed some watermelon for morning tea. Feeling rehydrated, we went down for a swim. There were bigger waves again today because of the wind, but it was so nice to cool off. We probably need to go down a bit earlier to catch calmer sea conditions.

Sarah suggested we should go find some French fries for lunch today. What a great idea! We found a place that did chips and doner kebabs just by the ferry port. We shared a portion of both and washed them down with a shared 500 ml Korça beer! There might be another siesta on the cards this afternoon… 😂

The afternoon went by without anyone falling asleep. Amazing.

For dinner, we were going to get a takeaway pizza, but the pita bread doner we shared earlier was too good to ignore. We had to go back for another. This time we had one each—chicken for me and pork for Sarah. Yes, we did have another beer too… but don’t tell anyone. 😉 We also had a guest for dinner who may have received a small treat.

We have a new bus plan for tomorrow, so we’ll see if this one is more successful. 🤞