Today we are extra smart and start at 8, before everyone else, to avoid the big groups. And it works out. Until 1 pm we see no other humans. The first part takes us through the rest of Valbonë along the road. This village is a pretty good preview of what Albania has planned for the next years. There are many completely new houses in the style of swiss alpine architecture, huts like in center parks and it is very clear that they are preparing for the big touristic boom, which is undoubtedly coming. The only thing missing for the big plan is their capability of dealing with waste. There are some waste bins standing around the road and always surrounded by mountains of litter and maybe a cow or a horse eating some of it. In general, there is a lot of waste in nature, especially around the villages and consciousness for environmental issues is practically inexistent.
After passing the village and arriving to the trailhead, the first three hours take us straight up the mountain and to the pass that forms the border between Albania and Kosovo. As we are the first ones to walk this trail today, we also get a nice show of Albanian fauna. Apart from the usual small lizards and the grasshoppers with the orange wings, we see 5 big green beautiful smaragd lizards on our way, which are also happy to get photographed.
Thinking we almost did the hardest part, we take a noon break there. It is windy and sunny and the temperature feels nice. My feet had been sore and hurting since 2 km into the hike and I have some blisters so the snow patches are very welcome for some cooling.
We head off around 2 again but instead of going downhill like we would have expected, we hike up and down for what feels like an eternity. We encounter some cows, a few more snow patches and few other hikers. On a patch where we are hiking steeply uphill again, I suddenly get the feeling of walking by a strong air conditioning and stop. The freezing cold air emerges from a cave in the rocks. You can walk in for a couple of meters and then the path ends in a dark hole with no bottom. The foggy air coming out of that hole is about 8 degrees cold and feels like pure madness when coming from the hot outside. We enjoy the cold for a few minutes talking to another German girl and walk on.
Finally, the down hill part starts. This is the first part of the trail that is technically more challenging. Until now, I would have taken anyone with enough physical condition on this trip, but for this part you need a certain experience and security. I personally enjoy it because the concentration I need for finding my path and climbing down take my mind away from exhaustion and pain in my feet, but my mom feels mentally a little exhausted by this stretch and struggles at times. The steep rock ends on a wide grassy pass which is also the border back to Albania after this short first visit to Kosovo.
Our expectation had been to easily walk down hill after this and then reach the Guesthouse around 5 but even the last and supposedly easiest part of the day is much more difficult and tiring than expected. We are hurting and tired and not very motivated anymore and again and again find ourselves in front of new up hill parts, loose our trail and have to check GPS a lot. We pass a few women collecting blueberries from the mountains and a little later a shepherd’s village and a group with two donkeys fully packed with buckets full of blueberries who are on their way to the valley. Some stuff is still very original and basic out here.
As we descent further and further we start having serious doubts about the trail in general. Today we have to walk 17 km with 1300 m of ascent and 1000 m of descent, which is very hard. But there are even harder days to come and neither of us feels like we want to or can do any more than this. In general, the organization is getting a little on our nerves. None of the descriptions meet the GPS tracks or reality, the estimated times don’t add up and the classification as “moderate” with very romantic descriptions is also a little misleading. In the end one should always plan stuff for themselves, we just didn’t have the time or will to do it and it might have been a mistake.
Unsure of the way and tired, we finally arrive at the Guesthouse around 6, after 10 hours of hiking with 8 hours pure walking time.
The Guesthouse is rather small today and a little more rudimentary than the previous ones. There is a small kitchen building where the family cooks on a wooden stove and a main building with several bedrooms for the guests and two bathrooms for everyone. The bathrooms are my personal highlight. There are no normal toilets but the standing up type you still get on french Autogrills sometimes. The shower gets it’s water from a water tank that is connected to the sink and then reconnected to the shower and is placed right over the toilet-hole, so that you literally shower IN the toilet. And the sink is not connected to a tube, so any time you use it, the water will just fall out on the bottom, flow through the bathroom and end up in the toilet as well. Very practical.
Another highlight is the fridge. To avoid electricity use, the fridges are completely refunctioned in a very creative way. A tube of cold mountain water is connected to the fridge and feeds a sprinkler inside. This way there is cold water flowing over the content inside the fridge the whole time. Everything gets wet but apart from that it’s a perfect and very ecological solution. I secretly also think they are having their private fun with tourists who open the fridge for a cold beer and are not told to switch off the water first.
Sprinkler – door = wet tourist.
The whole day we had been wondering about the big group that was supposed to do the same tour as us today but had started later and never passed us. Now we find out that the group is really supposed to arrive and has still not reached the Guesthouse. Their luggage is already waiting for them in the garden (they get Donkey-Transport), but the group is still on the way and it’s getting late. We are half worried but mostly relieved that in the end we weren’t as shitty as we thought with our 10 hour day. It seems like the organization is not working so well for the groups either.
Waiting for the group, we have a relaxed shower with lots of space and calm and meet Manuela, a German woman who is walking the trail alone with a tent and without organization. That seems to work perfectly fine and she is really cool and funny. When the group finally arrives at half past 7(!), we can have dinner and get fed another delicious meal all made from home-grown food from the garden. Green bean soup with fresh milk, fresh salad from tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and onions, baked vegetables, rice and meat. I wouldn’t have needed that much emergency food and I should probably eat some of it to get rid of some weight. But I couldn’t have known.
We sit talking for a while after dinner and Manuela is fun and interesting enough to stay out here for many hours but in the end it’s getting late and cold and we manage to be in our room by 9:30.
