Three and half years ago whilst riding the coast of Croatia, we met a Slovenian who, as Andy and I were explaining to him how much we were enjoying Croatia as bikers, said “if you think this is good you should ride the Albanian Coastal Road, it is far better”. At the time we both thought that it would be great but perhaps would never happen; but here we are today about to do just that! We’re setting off from Sarande riding the SH8 road to Vlore where we’ll rethink our final destination.
The day didn’t start well. As I dismounted to shut the gate of the apartments parking lot the bike started to topple. As we have found once the bike starts to fall there’s very little you can do other than try and slow the fall. It’s something we re both struggling with. Normally the bike side stand is great for various conditions but when fully loaded if the parking spot is not level both fore and aft and sideways then you better beware. Andy helped me up with the bike, no damage done and we tried to find the route we had planned.
It took us a little while, ending up at some dead ends with the inevitable feral dogs barking at us as we negotiated a u turn on the steep roads of Sarande, which is effectively built on the side of a steep hill that slopes down to the sea. Eventually though we were on our way.
Even if you weren’t a biker it would be hard not to enjoy this road, as round every turn there were breathtaking sights. Of course there were also the usual distractions to navigate around, donkeys, cattle, herds (or are they flocks) of goats, and more stray dogs. The Albanians also have a different approach to roundabouts. It appears that the vehicles joining the roundabout have priority which until we got used to it caught us off guard a couple of times.
The road climbed steeply up into the hills through small Albanian villages and then equally steeply dropped down towards the sea which as the sun shone down on it was a beautiful turquoise with the surface sparkling from the sun. Part of the journey to Vlore requires an extremely steep climb up Mount Cika with the road snaking up the mountain side and sharp 180 degree hairpin bends and steep drops at the side of the road which thankfully was not only good but also well barriered.
The views were amazing and from time to time we would stop at a parking place and take photos of the Albanian coastline. As we climbed, the wind became stronger and every now and then a strong gust would catch you unawares and move the bike as we climbed ever higher. As we neared the highest point of the road before descending again, we rode into the clouds.
I was amazed at the number of cyclists tackling the route as it was so steep and Andy suggested that it was probably an organized event; hard enough on motorbikes in this heat, I just admired the efforts of the cyclists.
As we were on route, Andy noticed that his tyre pressures had dropped slightly so pulled in at a garage to check them and recharge if necessary. Albanian garages , much like most of the Eastern European garages, do not operate a self service system for petrol and sometimes air. With petrol, the attendant comes over, switches on the pump with an electronic fob, fills the bike up and then gives you a receipt. You take that to the cashier pay and in turn she gives you another receipt to hand to the attendant, no doubt the more he fills the more he gets paid. Anyway it was one of these attendants that Andy tried to ask whether there was any air at the garage. The attendant indicated for Andy to ride to the air station where the attendant would top up the tyres. However either this attendant didn’t know how to operate the compressor or it wasn’t working properly because before we could do anything he’d let about 10psi out of Andy’s back tyre. Luckily Andy stopped him before he let anymore out. No matter how hard we tried we couldn’t get him to understand that we needed air into the tyres not out, so cautiously, because of the lower than normal pressure in the tyre we moved onto find a different air source. We must have tried about 20 different garages wasting about 2 hours before we eventually were able to pump up Andy’s tyre to the correct pressure.
As the day was now approaching 2;30 pm we decided to make the 90 minute journey up to Durres and look for accommodation there. The journey from Vlore to Durres was largely forgettable, the landscape relatively flat and featureless with the mountains on the horizon. Only two points of note, firstly irrespective of how busy a road is, and some of them are really busy, you still see, cyclists, unhelmeted moped riders riding the wrong way down the side of the road. Secondly, a renowned Albanian in the 1930s invented a bomb shelter so good that he demonstrated its worthiness by standing in whilst a a tank fired a shell at it with him stood inside. He emerged shaken but alive and as a result there are hundred of these bomb shelters all over Albania and today we saw a few of them as we rode to Durres.
