It could be titled, "Dead Kittens and Evil Marshes."
It could be titled, "The Closest to Nowhere We've Ever Been."
It could be titled, "Hobo Picnics and Haunting Podcasts."
Tessa and I are in Tirana.
At a hostel.
Tessa's sleeping.
I'm still far too tired to sleep.
We packed up our things in Durmitor and ate a breakfast of plastic sausage and plastic cheese provided "special for you" by No One Special.
He hovered the entire time.
"Where you go next?"
"Shkoder," Tessa didn't even look at him. Her bullshit-ometer was bobbing violently in the red.
"You need ride?"
"No."
"I can give you ride. Special price. Only for you."
"What price?"
"For you? 100 euro."
Even I laughed at that one. The taxi ride from Herceg Novi to Zabjlek was twice as long and only 45 euros. Which Tessa immediately told him.
"It is impossible," No One Special looked especially sheepish and defensive.
"But we did it," I contradicted the cheeky Montenegrin.
"No. It is impossible."
Tessa stuffed a roll of bread into her face (which is equivalent to face-palming) and Giuseppe grinned.
We didn't take the taxi. We took the bus to Niksic and stood at the bus station for 20 minutes, contemplating our next move. Giuseppe would take the bus on to Podgorica, but Tessa and my final destination was Shkoder.
I hadn't hitchhiked in a while. I was feeling tired. The day looked muggy. The bus only cost three euros.
I said all this to Tessa.
"Do you want to get somewhere or do you want to see something new? If we take the bus, we know we'll get to Shkoder. If we hitchhike, who knows what will happen -- and isn't that the point?"
Of course it was the point.
We hitchhiked.
And I was so, so glad we did.
Our first ride took us all the way to Podgorica. The tow-truck driver was unbelievably inebriated and could hardly say his own name through his explosive hiccups, but we managed to arrive in one piece.
We changed our sign to "Shkoder" and waited at a petrol station.
Bikers made jokes about taking us, blowing kisses and motioning towards their back wheels.
People waved.
People smiled.
No one stopped.
"I think we need to change the sign. We're not going to get across the border. I'll go ask the people in the petrol station the name of the Montenegrin town closest to the border."
Tuzi.
If you're hitchhiking from Montenegro to Shkoder, put "Tuzi" on your sign first.
Our next ride picked us up and dropped as at the exit for Tuzi.
And the ride after that?
Marko took us to see Montenegro's version of Niagara Falls.
"You see?" Tessa laughed. "This is why we don't take the bus."
It started to rain.
If I see an ark and a bearded hippie man with doves and ravens yelling "coulda, shoulda" floating by, I won't be surprised.
Marko drove us to the outskirts of Tuzi, but begged us to stay in the car until it stopped raining or until we could flag down another ride.
"Albania," he moved his hands to demonstrate a license plate.
So we stayed in the car and squinted at the license plates, looking for the small AL in the lower left corner. Whenever one approached, we stepped out of the car and stuck out our thumbs.
But none of the few Albanians wanted to take us across the border.
"It's okay, we can walk," we tried to reassure the extraordinarily friendly Montenegrin who did not want us to get wet. "We don't mind the rain."
"No, no -- please," Marko insisted.
He finally ended up driving us all the way to the border and wished us good luck on the rest of our journey.
"I think that was our best ride thus far. My goodness, what a perfect end to Montenegro."
We walked through the first border and then popped into a cafe to inquire as to whether or not there was any burek to be had. Tessa has developed a raging addiction to this flaky pastry.
There wasn't. Tessa looked crestfallen.
But there were a lot of Albanian men who suddenly stopped doing whatever it was they had been doing and gawked at us like we were space aliens or cartoon characters come to life.
"As you were," Tessa allowed as we left.
I chuckled and gave her a high-five.
"We're in ALBANIA!"
"No, we're not. We're nowhere. We haven't crossed the border into Albania yet. What would happen if war broke out while we were here? Would we be stuck? What if we died? What would they do to our bodies?"
I scratched my head. These are things I generally don't question. But Tessa questions the things I don't generally question. When she was nine years old, she asked her mother who made god. Now she wonders how something as insignificant and flimsy as a cloud can steal so much heat from the sun when those rays have come such an incredibly long way already.
We crossed the Albanian border (for realsies). I gave Tessa another high-five.
"Now we're in Albania!"
We paused.
"It still feels like nowhere. Where are we?"
"Where the f*ck is Albania?"
"At least it's pretty."
"Yeah, nowhere's okay."
 |
| Lake Skadar |
A terrifying looking man with a gratuitously pointed umbrella looked down and up at us.
"Shkoder?"
"Yes."
We shuddered and kept walking.
Men sitting and drinking jumped up when we trudged past.
"Taxi? Taxi? Shkoder?"
"No. Thank-you."
Tessa looked more flustered than I have ever seen her. Which made me unusually calm. Perhaps the fact that I could think of nothing else other than my urgent need to pee helped distract me from the creepy people driving on the wrong side of the road just to talk with us.
"I'm just so bewildered. I feel vulnerable. I want to get away from the border and I want to sit down. Does that make sense?"
"Tessa, I'm learning that your instincts are usually really good. Let's find a far away nest and have a picnic."
 |
| Our nest. |
 |
| Picnic of sausage, zucchini, leftovers from Giuseppe's last cooking extravaganza, breakfast food swiped from No One Special and two shots of rum |
Feeling refreshed and at ease, we continued our walk on the side of the road towards Shkoder. Traffic was slow, so we kept ambling along, holding out our sign only when cars approached.
After about twenty minutes of walking and intermittently holding up our cardboard sign, a truck pulled over.
I still get jittery when it comes to accepting rides from truck drivers. Hollywood, how greatly I loathe you for influencing me so.
Our ride turned out to be a friendly, talkative fellow named Hasan.
His seat wasn't as bouncy as Niko's, but I magnanimously forgave him this shortcoming because he took us all the way to Shkoder.
 |
| Albanian traffic jam |
The overly curious men in the cafe between the passport control stations were not an isolated phenomenon. As soon as Tessa and I tumbled out of the semi, locals stopped mid-sip to stare.
We laughed. And smiled. And celebrated.
We'd just hitchhiked 130 km and were pleased to pieces.
But it was getting late and we still needed to check the internet to see if we might have found a couchsurfing host for that night.
We walked to the city center.
"Taxi? Montenegro? Taxi?"
"No."
"Montenegro? Tirana? Taxi?"
"No."
"Taxi? Montenegro?"
"NO."
It was relentless. I wanted to wear a shirt that said, "I JUST CAME FROM THERE," to deter the opportunistic, pouncing drivers.
"Let's just sleep by the lake," Tessa said as she sipped her tea after I announced that we were still without a couchsurfing host.
Balkans. Worst place for CSing in my travels thus far.
"Great, lake sounds good."
"Do you have Larry handy?"
I took the headlamp out of my bag, "yup, he's ready to go."
We spent forty-five minutes walking out of town.
It got dark. Quite dark. Quite a bit earlier than in Split.
It started to rain. Quite hard. Quite a bit harder than we would have liked.
"I'm imagining a soft patch of grass with four trees where we can hang Judy," Tessa told me as we schlepped and stumbled through muddy puddles and loose gravel.
Loose gravel gave way to marsh.
Marsh gave way (immediately) to lake.
The rain did not give way.
Small rowboats were moored on the marsh's one rocky place. Softly, quietly filling with raindrops.
There was no soft patch of grass. There was mud and more mud and a little more mud.
"What do we do?"
"We could put Judy over one of the boats and make our nest inside."
"But they're already so full of water," I countered.
"Let's walk back and see if we can find a field."
"I think our best bet will be to sleep on the patio of that abandoned looking restaurant. We'll just have to pack up and leave before the fishermen see us when they drive by in the morning."
The rain petered out a little by the time we made it back to the dilapidated restaurant, so we hung Judy between the branches of two trees and made our nest underneath. Then we unpacked lunch's leftovers and had the most hobo picnic in the history of hobos.
Leftover leftovers from Giuseppe's final extravaganza. Served in an old tomato sauce jar.
Leftover leftovers of sausage and zucchini.
Crackers (for Tessa).
Two spoonfuls of some version of Nutella.
Yup.
"What would Giuseppe think of us now?"
I don't think Italians believe in hobo picnics.
We brushed our teeth and crawled into our bivvy bags. The rain had stopped and we could even see a few stars if we looked past Judy and into the night sky.
And the sounds.
Frogs croaked, swampy birds squawked, mosquitoes hummed, and dogs howled and snarled the whole night long.
Nature. Nature is supposed to be relaxing, right? Soothing, no?
No (that is an emphatic, inflexible Balkan "NO").
Last night, nature was a spooky, cacophonous bastard. Like a snoring serial killer.
"Do you want to listen to a podcast to help us sleep?" I asked Tessa through the nature.
"That sounds nice."
I placed my iPhone between us and cued up an episode of "Mysterious Universe." This is a show that normally has interesting/hilarious stories about aliens, Bigfoot, psychedelic experiences and many other manner of far-fetched beliefs.
My eyes drifted shut and I slept for an hour and a half (Tessa stayed awake for the rest of the podcast. Which talked about two girls tricking another girl into the woods and stabbing her to death. We had words in the morning).
I was awake for the rest of the night.
Drenched in sweat (bivvy bags might keep the rain OUT, but they keep all your moisture IN).
Terrified of being attacked by packs of stray dogs.
Actively being attacked my hordes of mosquitoes.
At four o'clock, the fishermen started biking past, casting us slightly quizzical glances and then continuing on to their boats.
Right. Albania is full of people who have to sleep outside. This isn't too far outside of the norm.
"What do you want to do?" I asked Tessa at 4:20 after the second car had driven past.
"I don't think they really care that we're here."
"No, but I can't sleep. Can you?"
"No."
"What do you want to do?"
"What do you want to do?"
"Let's find a better view of the lake and watch the sunrise. Then we can go into town and get a coffee and make our next plan."
My body felt stiff and wooden and pained as I stuffed my sweat-soaked sleeping bag into its sack and helped Tessa fold up Judy. My skin itched all over (it's a good thing I like polka dots) and my head hurt from dehydration.
This was not a win. It wasn't a loss... but it was not a win. Lesson learned. Not all lakes are created equal. Some are surrounded by nasty marshes. This is research one should do prior to committing to camping next to them.
Tessa brought up google maps on her phone and attempted to find a better vantage point for the sunrise over Skadar Lake.
We found roads paved with old clothes and plastic.
We almost stepped on a dead tabby colored kitten.
We found more marsh.
And no lake.
This is where we gave up on our sunrise.
We walked the hour and a half back into town and started looking around for a cafe with wifi.
"Do you have wifi?"
"No."
"Wifi?"
"Coffee?"
"No. Internet?"
"No."
"Wifi?"
"No."
This could be a problem.
My head pulsed. My eyes felt like sawdust. The straps of my backpack dug into my shoulders.
I'm not nearly as hardcore as I thought I was. One night of sleeping with Nature and I feel like I've been hit by Hasan's semi truck.
"Excuse me, do you have wifi?" I asked the last cafe in a long line of cafes.
"No."
A group of men sitting at a table in the front motioned us over.
"Wifi on phone," one offered us his phone.
"No, we need wifi for work. Cafe with wifi. But thank-you," and we walked away.
One of them followed us.
"You can come to my hostel. Relax. Use the wifi. Leave when you need. It's right down this road."
Enter, Gregor. Gregor, the Albanian angel after a night spent in purgatory. Gregor made us coffee, let us use his internet, and gave us a tour of his charming hostel near the city center of Shkoder.
To all adventurers intending to visit Shkoder, Albania.
@homehostel is the place to be. Give up romantic notions of sleeping next to the lake and stay in a warm bed with a fantastically caring host.
Feeling somewhat less traumatized and caffeine coursing through our bedraggled bodies, we walked to the edge of town to find a place to hitchhike.
We'd booked a hostel in Tirana. No marshy lakes tonight.
"I'm going to time this. See how long it takes to get a ride in Albania," I turned around, opened my bag and took out my phone to check the time.
I turned around and stuck out my thumb, only to find that someone had already stopped and was backing up the car to meet us.
This is the universe apologizing for pissing all over us last night. Literally. And raining dead kittens.
Our ride dropped us off near the city center of Tirana.
We walked.
A lot.
And now we're here.
Hey they, Tirana.
You still feel like the capital city of nowhere, but I'm so happy you have beds.
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