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Showing 1-25 of 31 results
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Vagabond Hiker Scholar – Francis Tapon
Blog: Vagobond.com - 21 January 2012
If there is a modern day heir to the great traveler/scholar Ibn Batutta - I would say that Francis Tapon is the guy. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more!
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Three Odd Interactions With The Men of Gjirokastra
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 4 November 2011
1. Stone/dirt path scramble, muddy Converse and I’m chasing rubble: mad crumbled buildings in this town, falling like trash down the mountainside, and the urban explorer/trespasser in me can’t get enough. Guy sitting on his stoop—track suit and cheap sunglasses, smoking what smells like weed. Give him a nod, which I can’t tell if he [...]
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No Prayers in Shkoder
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 27 October 2011
Exercise: 20 minutes of contemporaneous note-taking, cafe in Shkoder. Click of heels on stones and bass of techno, bicycle chains and conversations. The lamps click on their orange glow, against the minarets and mountains. Two men in business suits behind me, speaking accented English and I have to turn and look, have to stop and [...]
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Notes on Flying Into Albania
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 25 October 2011
At the Bergamo airport outside Milan, and I’m in Albania before I’m in Albania. Waiting at the gate, last flight of the night and it’s delayed—”ritardo,” which sounds like “retarded” and I laugh and take a picture, and get those sideways glances—”Girl, you’re not from here.” And I’m not—one of the only people at the [...]
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Lady in the Balkans
Blog: A Lady in London - 3 October 2011
Most people thought I was crazy to travel to the Balkans by myself. I was lectured on safety, on health, on everything imaginable. But I had been curious about the region for years, not least because the only thing I really knew about it related to the conflicts in the 1990’s. There was surely more [...]
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Lady in Tirana
Blog: A Lady in London - 23 September 2011
I was warned about Tirana. The two English-speakers I met while traveling from Montenegro to Albania told me that it was dangerous. They said that other Europeans considered Tirana a no-go zone, and that the only people stupid enough to visit were Americans and Australians that hadn’t gotten word about Albania’s bad reputation. I knew [...]
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The Most Pathetic Country, Explained
Blog: A Traveler's Library - 3 August 2011
Destination: Albania Book: Chronicle in Stone (org. 1971, NEW paperback edition) by Ismail Kadare This amazing novel by a former Man Booker Prize winner brings to life Gjirokastër, a city on the southern edge of Albania, near the Greek border. The events during World War II in this city provide a microcosm of the shifting bands of conquerors [...]This content is a post from: A Traveler's Library To comment on this post or search for related information, click on the link to A Traveler's Library.
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The Other Europe
Blog: A Traveler's Library - 1 August 2011
Destination: Eastern Europe Book: (2004, newly out in paperback) by Andrzej Stasiuk So few of the place names in On the Road to Babadag were familiar, that I began to wonder if I had ever left the farm. Actually, Andrzej Stasiuk, a Pole, wrote this for a Polish audience, who might have more of a clue than [...]This content is a post from: A Traveler's Library To comment on this post or search for related information, click on the link to A Traveler's Library. We'll leave a light on for you.
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Off Track on the Northern Albanian Komani Lake
Blog: Todd's Wanderings - 24 June 2011
It’s hard to know what is on and off the beaten path these days. Most travelers get their information from the Internet (yes, including you right now) in a way that was never possible before with regular guidebooks. But with the proliferation of information is there still a beaten path? Or are we all beating down the grass as we wander freely here and there depending on the whims of a Google search? Whatever the answer is, for most people Albania as a country is off the beaten path and is just starting to open up to tourism.
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Tirana Took Some Piece of Me, Under Seige And Too Far Away
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 22 January 2011
Sometimes when you travel, a place will steal a piece of you. And sometimes you’ll leave a little piece of yourself in a place—which might be the same thing—some piece of you you hadn’t really known was there, that took the foreign air (smoking chestnuts and car exhaust) to be awakened or realized. And you’re [...]
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Tirana, Albania Wishes You Were Here
Blog: Suzy Guese - 10 December 2010
This week’s Wish You Were Here post comes from Cynthia of CynthiaOrd.com, Thoughts on Tourism, People and the Earth. Cynthia is fascinated with travel and tourism as an industry and its impacts. She likes to visit unlikely places and see how many people she can convince to go there. Be sure to [...]
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We dance on the ruins of this stupid stage.
Blog: Murmurs from a foriegn land. - 26 November 2010
Berat, Albania Its time to leave the pot hole riddled Tirana for somewhere a bit more slow, a bit more laid back. And we aren’t talking about the buses. We’re headed for the small town of Berat – a few hours south of TIrana. We set off on the journey. Its a bit of a [...]
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Colourful and Drab.
Blog: Murmurs from a foriegn land. - 16 November 2010
Tirana, Albania. I’ve decided to leave Macedonia and head for a new country – Albania. After some breakfast, I head off to get some money out to pay the hostel and get myself to Albania. Though at the cash machine things don’t go that way – I was expecting some money to be in there [...]
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Experiencing Expat Albania
Blog: GoBackpacking - 8 November 2010
One side effect of staying with ex-pats though is a certain distance from the locals.---------Join Travel Blog Success today and learn to build a better travel blog.Membership includes 12 lessons, community forum, audio interviews, and a blog.
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Transit Fragments: Views from the Window
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 28 October 2010
I. Bar to Ulcinj Gypsy children at the intersection bang on the windows of stopped cars, pleading / until the windows roll up and they see their reflections, / dirt-faced and pleading back. II. Ulcinj to Shkoder Carry that girl through the rubbish and field of dead, the rusted carcasses of cars, engineless and humming [...]
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Boys, Boys, Boys: A Solo Female Traveler’s Experience With the Men of Southern Italy, Montenegro and Albania
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 26 October 2010
“Southern Italy, eh?” He gave me the raised eyebrow of caution. “Watch out for the men.” This was Alex, his voice lifting above the roar of hair dryers and hip music at the salon, two days before I left on my trip. A lady friend of his, he continued, had recently spent several weeks in [...]
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Lonely Planet BlogSherpa Carnival #12 - Scary Stories
Blog: Hello, Pineapple? - 19 October 2010
As the host of this month's Lonely Planet Blogsherpa Carnival, and in the spirit of the North American holiday of Hallowe'en, I have asked some of the best travel writers on the web to share their own indigestions, and recount to you, the reader, some scary tales of woe whilst travelling the face of the globe.I'll go first.
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Tirana, Tirana, The One I’ve Been Waiting For
Blog: Lonely Girl Travels - 8 October 2010
If Tirana were a boy, it’d be the boy I’ve been waiting to meet. You rumble across the border, furious windshield wiper and donkeys in the dirt road, hills dripping lush green. You dash from the taxi to the minibus, puddle-footed and soaking-hooded, grab the last seat as a man climbs into the trunk compartment. [...]
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Albania and its indestructible bunkers
Blog: 501 Places - 6 October 2010
One of the first topics we will read or hear about Albania is usually the bunkers. Of course there is so much more to this fascinating country than the concrete mushrooms that litter the landscape and I felt it right to write about some of these highlights first. At the same time however a description [...]Albania and its indestructible bunkers is a post from: 501 Places
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In search of Albanian fortresses
Blog: 501 Places - 25 September 2010
The first thing that most visitors to Albania will notice is that little has been done to make the place look nice. While further up the Adriatic coast the Ottoman treasures in former Yugoslavia have been carefully and expensively restored, this has not happened in Albania. Apart from the dramatic rainbow coloured transformation of some [...]In search of Albanian fortresses is a post from: 501 Places
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Snapshots: 巴爾幹半島 Balkans
Blog: Diaries of a Vagabonding Couple - 15 September 2010
Rovinj, a picturesque town on the Istrian coast. Pink & violet are signature colours of the Croatian sunset. Boats docked at Rovinj's harbour, Croatia White graves of those who gave their lives in the Bosnian conflict. Different years of birth, same year of death. Golden statue of Bill Clinton rising before the proud phrase: "No Negotiation. Self Determination!", a strong reminder
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Behind the crowds: people watching in the Balkans
Blog: 501 Places - 11 September 2010
One of the greatest pleasures of travelling through the western Balkan region was the fact that as tourists we were always given our own space to observe, experience and interact if and when we were happy to do so. I mean this as a contrast to those many places where as a visitor from western [...]Behind the crowds: people watching in the Balkans is a post from: 501 Places
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Tirana: sightseeing in a place with no sights
Blog: 501 Places - 10 September 2010
London, Paris, Rome, Prague: mention these European capitals to most people and they will instantly conjure up an image of a famous building or scene from a favourite movie. Mention Tirana however and you’re likely to be met with a blank stare. And it’s hardly surprising; as the capital of one of Europe’s least developed [...]Tirana: sightseeing in a place with no sights is a post from: 501 Places
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A few reflections from a trip in the Balkans
Blog: 501 Places - 9 September 2010
After a little over two weeks away it’s nice to get back to posting on 501 Places again. Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Hercegovina and Croatia provided much for me to ponder and share in the next dozen or so posts; beauty, sadness, the kindness of strangers and the scars of a bitter war are [...]A few reflections from a trip in the Balkans is a post from: 501 Places
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Day 190: Albania, land of the warmest smiles
Blog: Diaries of a Vagabonding Couple - 19 August 2010
Morning Coffee in Gjirokastra Didn't sleep well last night. Not sure what kept us up more: the coffee and raki (aniseed flavoured liquor sipped straight up, this is the albanian vodka) that Mario invited us to, or the thought of leaving this country which unexpectedly became our home away from home, our family away from family. Like a soulful bowl of chicken soup, Albania is one of the most
