katiesfootprints: Macedonia and a little bit of Kosovo

Our sixteen hour overnight bus was yet another eventful trip for us. A couple of hours into the bus ride I decided to check out on the GPS on my phone where exactly we were... “ummmmm” I said to Helen, “we are heading north, and we want to be going south...”. There was nothing we could do, no one spoke English, no one had checked our tickets yet and we were well and truly in the middle of no where by now. “I guess we just stay on until we get kicked off”. We watched ourselves travel north for another few hours before we decided we really did need to get some sleep and there was nothing we could do about it. We dutifully handed our passports over at border controls to who knows where and continued to hope for the best. Finally fifteen hours later we miraculously arrived in Skopje, Macedonia, an hour early. Who would have thought! After some map trawling I figured we'd headed five hours north to cross into Croatia from Bosnia then into Serbia and gave Belgrade a wide berth to travel down the eastern border. Not sure why not just Bosnia straight into Serbia as that was about an hour from Sarajevo and would have saved nine hours of driving. Perhaps I missed some info on the tour?

Upon our arrival in Skopje we strolled to our hostel and signed up for a trip to Lake Makta – an afternoon hiking, relaxing on a boat and exploring caves. No swimming though, the water was a cool 12 degrees and on 40 degree days can harm your heart with the sudden change in temperature. Later that evening we headed out for some traditional cuisine with some new friends we had made during the day – starters, mains, salads and beers, when the bill came we rounded it up to include a generous tip and divided it amongst us: 300 dina each, the equivalent of about NZD9 and we were absolutely stuffed, if not a little giggly from the beers. The cheapness of the food makes it impossible to not eat too much!

The following day we took a day trip to Prishtina, Kosovo. What an eye opener. We probably could of and should of spent longer there but leaving after eight hours we felt like we had our fill of Kosovo for a while. Absolutely everything was under construction – the clock tower, the Mother Teresa Cathedral, the Kosovo National Museum, after walking up and down a street for half an hour it was pure luck that when we finally located the Independence Museum that the guy was just arriving to open that up, otherwise that would have been closed too. We had a delicious lunch at a place called Tiffany's that serves up whatever the chef found at the markets that morning. Then we found the Newborn sign – graffiti ridden – at which point we decided to mosey back to the bus station. We were getting very flustered from a. the heat (40+), b. the staring, c. the horns constantly being tooted at us, and d. every second car pulling over to gawk at us. At one point we even got hit on by the cops! Yes, we are blonde girls who are very obviously tourists and don't belong, get over it!!! But, this frustration aside, Prishtina, and Kosovo in general, is just finding its feet and has the makings of a fantastic city to spend time in. It was very much what I was expecting Belgrade and Sarajevo to be like but they have had a lot more time to come a lot further, in ten years time it will be a beautiful city.

Our final day in Skopje we spent doing a walking tour - we had explored the old town a bit the night before when we had dinner but during the day time heat it was something else. There are statues galore, of everyone imaginable, all brand new and part of the 2014 upgrade project – this is, in a nutshell, rebuilding the city of Skopje post war – in time for the next election, of course. We did a quick run through of the markets to purchase Skopska salad ingredients, about 4kg worth of tomatoes, cucumbers, olives, onions and peppers came to the equivalent of less than a quid, am really starting to question why food is so expensive at home!?

We headed for Lake Ohrid that evening and managed to get there only an hour behind schedule – our bus just stopped working as we went up a hill, no one seemed concerned with this and ten minutes later they had it started again. We made and devoured our salad and washed it down with some beers once we were settled in the hostel. A rather large night out ensued. The next two days were spent doing absolutely nothing except making our way to the lakeside to bask in the sun and wallow in the lake. Bliss. And again I'm pretty sure the only thing the sun should do is set. It was another over night bus for us last night and we have arrived in Sofia, Bulgaria safe and sound despite the very tetchy taxi driver at 4am this morning. For the first time this trip I think my blog is on time xxx

Lake Makta, Macedonia - my first encounter with Bats while caving.