Macedonia: 25/6 – 3/7
After a border crossing with border guards that were a bit unsettled by us not having original documents relating to the car we entered the land of Alexander the Great. (And it really is – an hour into the country and we had already seen a highway and an airport named for him).
As we have been really enjoying them we did another free walking tour - this time of the capital Skopje. The guide was very enthusiastic about his city but also pretty candid about the large spending by the authorities which upsets many locals because there are many living in significant hardship.
Skopje is a random place. There has been a massive building programme to draw the tourists in. The result is a hodge podge of sculptures, bridges and over the top fountains. There are fountains for Alexander; Alexander’s mother, Olympias; and Alexander’s father, Philip. Each with more over the top sequences of water flying in every direction. And there are sculptures everywhere around the city centre. On the two bridges across the river they line both sides of the bridge about 1 metre apart from each other. Our tour guide joked that Macedonia is running out of famous people to build sculptures of. Not to worry, if you put the sculptures on the roof of multi storey buildings then no-one gets close enough to work out who they are meant to be!
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| Philip II of Macedon plus mighty warrior |
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| Olympias in various mothering poses plus young maiden |
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| Super cool fountains on the Alexander the Great monument - which is too massive to fit the actual statue on top into this photo! |
In addition to large fountains and hundreds of sculptures there are copies of various landmarks from around the world. There was a Wall Street bull, and a London Eye type attraction and CN tower clone were being built while we were there. There is also a triumphal arch. Our guide wondered what Macedonia has to be triumphant about – it has been conquered by various other civilisations pretty much continuously since Alexander.
We also visited the Holy Saviour church which has the most amazing
intricate wood carvings of bible stories inside. You can almost see the
expressions on the people in them – it is seriously impressive carving.
From there we walked around the corner to Mustafa Pasha's mosque. We
were welcomed in by a number of people as we looked at the beautiful
paintings on the roof, despite having been previously warned by our tour
guide that some of the congregation was a bit prickly about infidel
dogs tramping around their holy place.
After wandering the city with all of its various quirks, Mark and I went out to the Matka canyon which came highly recommended as a Skopje attraction. It was a public holiday so the canyon was packed full of people swimming and picnicking on the side of the river. Rather than walk up the road to the canyon walk we took an alternative path (one day I will learn…). It wasn’t really a path and we ended up being scratched by a number of prickly plants. Then eventually the bush bashing got too much and it was easier to just wade a bit alongside the river. Mark continued on the “path” and ended up in the restricted area of the hydro power station where security found him and had him climb over the fence into the canyon pathways. I ended up retracing my steps back down the river and crossing it further downstream before meeting up with Mark for the walk through the canyon. There were some pretty nice views as we wandered along and the sunset was great shining back off the rocks.
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| "I'm beginning to think we might not be on the path any more" |
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| Happy cave tunnel |
From Skopje we drove to Lake Ohrid. We were lucky enough to find one of the best camp sites of the trip – Camp Rino. Rino the owner had boundless energy. As soon as you arrived he rushed over to you and was offering a welcome coffee and a Raki. You woke to free coffee each morning and just randomly throughout our stay he would wander over with a coffee or beer for us – on the house. The campsite itself was right on the lake front and was a great place to relax and recharge for a few days (and this for only 10 Euro a night!)
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| Markie with our very welcome welcome drinks at Camp Rino |
We ventured into Ohrid itself one day for a bit of a wander around the old city, Roman ruins included. But after a couple of hours of wandering we decided it was far too hot and we were much better to be at our lake front camp site.
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| Hurry up and take the bloody photo so I can get back in the shade. (this wasn't the prettiest spot in town, but apparently it was so hot we only manage this single photo) |
Reluctantly we left Camp Rino and headed for Galicica National park to stretch our legs. We walked up Mount Magaro for some beautiful views back over the lake. When we parked the van a swarm of bees circled the van and as we grabbed our backpacks some made their way into the van. We figured that would be a problem for later and walked briskly away. Unfortunately a contingent of the bees decided to follow us... for the whole four hour walk. We were trying to walk very quickly, or slowly, or calmly, or angrily... They just wouldn’t go anywhere. Every now and then Mark and I would be yelling out to each other – “Bee status?” “Woohoo! I’ve only got one – oh no wait, here they are. I can’t count them all” “oh yep there they are – you can’t see all of the ones following along behind you” “Bee status?” We also invented a number of songs, to the tune of the Book of Mormon sound track, politely requesting that the bees leave us alone. After such a lovely walk together we should have been unsurprised to see that the remainder of the swarm had stayed waiting at the van for us. Mark tried smoking them out a bit with the bug repellent candle and bundles of dry leaves but was concerned about the possibility of setting the van on fire. We tried encouraging them away from the van by pouring shandy on the ground but they weren’t interested. Finally we decided on driving down the hill very quickly with the boot and side door open so the bees inside the van would be blown away or unable to keep up with us. After swiftly driving a couple of kilometres down the hill we had success. We closed all the doors and jumped back in the van, just as the bees caught up to us again.
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| ♫ I am the bee queen! And the bee queen just, loves beeeeees ♫ |
After that relaxing walk it was time to cross the border to Albania as we made our way back towards Croatia. As we were leaving Macedonia the guard was a bit unhappy about our lack of car related documents. He let us out of the country with a warning that they wouldn’t be good enough for Albania. We said we would try anyway. But our good luck had finally run out. The border guard at Albania was steadfast - we didn’t have original documents to prove the ownership of the car, we weren’t getting in. After smiles were getting us nowhere we reversed out of the queue and went back to Macedonia. A different guard at the Macedonian border was not happy about the paperwork we had. He was shaking his head and not keen to let us in. The guard we had seen only minutes before was standing there looking at us like he had never seen us before – we are in a pretty nondescript vehicle. Eventually he took pity on us and must have told the other guard, actually these guys were here in Macedonia minutes ago, let them in. With a shake of the head we were in. We just had to get through customs – "Anything to declare?" "No – we have a couple of cans of beer but that’s it." "Do you have a joint?" "Uh no we don’t." "Ok but anything to declare? Any joints?" "Um still no." "Ok but what about a joint?" "Nope." "Ok bye bye." Welcome (back) to Macedonia!
Bitola was our final Macedonian stop. Conveniently it was en route to Greece which we decided was going to be our best route back to Croatia given our original documents issue may rear its head again if we tried to go through Bosnia. Bitola was a nice enough small little town and a good place to end our time in Macedonia. It was in the midst of a summer festival so while out on a night time stroll we came across a covers band in a little amphitheatre in the park singing a whole lot of songs we recognised. From here we were on the road again towards Croatia.
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| Full holiday mode in Bitola |
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| Almost our own private concert |
