So This was my second time in Albania and I met some colorful Characters along the way . I do what most long term travelers do and attend a meet up . This one was for drinks and I do my normal thing and mingle and see old and new friends . There was this guy named George and he was on the shorter side but he had this huge personality. He spoke like five languages and was a tour guide in many different countries and one being China . We get to talking and I had just come from Sri Lanka where I had motorbiked the whole Island with a-couple of friends . I told George I was looking for an adventure that was kind of different from the normal ventures.
I left the night and with no real ideas. Then a few days latter I get a friend request on Facebook from George. He asks me if I will be at the meet up latter that week and I said yes .
I go to the meet and he was there before me and he was so excited to tell me his idea . I am embracing myself he was way to excited for it to be boring . I am like tell me already . He said let’s hitchhike to the northern part of Albania to the most remote part . I didn’t even think about it and said yes. The date was for two days latter while the weather was nice . Honestly no real plan other then we needed to take a bus to our starting part . I have my back pack and he took not even a hoodie 🤣. I am like you travel extra light . He responded by saying I have my wallet that’s all I need . This was not know how long this trip would be for .
We get on this short school looking bus . The ride would be four hours with a couple of stops along the way . He made it clear we would be getting dropped off in the middle of no where . He was not lying. I saw mountain tops, farmers, cows and turtles .
We started walking in the directions we thought we needed to go . Thank god he spoke the local
Language it was helpful . We walked and walked for hours and didn’t see a single vehicle. We come to a village and I am like I need food . So we sit under this tent make-ship restaurant. He ordered food and said there is no choice and they just brought food . It consisted of a salad , French fries and small fried fresh water fish . These fish you ate whole. Like they just took the fish from water straight to frying pan . I am like we ate and left . Started walking again and we asked what direction to head and we were off again .
This was successful we got a ride on a back of a tractor to the next village . Some how George found is a guesthouse to stay at in the next village but it was a small room and we slept on the floor . All part of the adventure and I had slept in worse places . It was only like five dollars a night .
The next day was a local breakfast and we were off to the next village . This day I actually scored us a ride with American tourist for 30 km and they were but caught off guard on our reasoning for this adventure . Sometimes there does not need to be a reason to do something .
Anyways this was actually going a lot faster then we thought . We were back to walking and it felt like forever but a random car showed up . He was like get in and so we did .
He was this random taxi driver from no idea where that was called by a local . The locals thought we were lost tourist . We were in a way but that was the point .
Here we are we jump in this car with like this dudes cousin and someone else. With limited English this was a fun conversation . He just had a lot of questions for me and I happily answered the ones I could . We did find out that we were only 20 km from our end point and I have to admit I was a bit disappointed.
By me telling you this funny story I would like each of my readers to do something out of your comfort zone . It can be little or big. These experiences has taught me new things are not bad and sometimes turns out to be wonderful experiences . And yes George and I are still friends today.
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