Albanian Riviera. Mountain roads with traffic lights

Yesterday's waiter, a young man from Albania, magically found some mustard for us in the morning (the other waiter had said earlier that they didn't have such a thing) and when he brought it to the table he looked Scott long and deep in the eye and patted him on the shoulder. Probably out of sympathy that even the wallet is in wife's hands (I paid the bill last night). The breakfast, despite the rather sparse variety, was still very good. We ate a bunch of bread and sugar, as usually around here.

Today was about 4.5 hours of driving, most of it on narrow mountain roads, so we took off right after breakfast. The first highway greeted us with a traffic jam, we turned around and drove past the traffic jam on a small countryside road.

The first bigger town, where we planned to make a quick stop and enjoy a beautiful riviera beach was Vlorë. We bought a fresh loaf of bread, tried to get some cash from the ATM and then headed to the beach with the help of Google map. Vlorë beach is supposed to be one of the most beautiful beaches in Albania. We arrived there and started looking out for a way to get closer to the beach between the very much of Lasnamäe houses. Finally, we turned into a garbage dump where other cars were also parked, climbed out of the car through empty bottles and cigarette butts and walked to the beach. The beach was practically deserted, but if I'd claim that it had beautiful white sand and turquoise water as far as one could see, I would be lying. The sand was full of trash and the beach area was lined with apartment buildings which probably saw their better days some time in the eighties. In any case, we ate a bit and moved on to get to Himarë. After a few blocks, a wide promenade with palm trees and a beach with white sand and blue sea opened in front of us. Well, the riviera. Where we went earlier, was probably some low-cost budget beach.

The road to Himarë led over the mountain, and the first thing we did was pass the famous Llogara Pass. We stopped again every 5 minutes or so to enjoy the breathtaking views. The road itself was sometimes narrower, sometimes wider, and while driving through another village, I asked Scott if there was a traffic light in the middle of the mountain road and if we had just ran a red light. Since the road was exactly the width of one small car and there were houses or walls on both sides, Scott kept turning the steering wheel with one hand and honked the horn with the other. Just in case someone should come from other direction on that the narrow and winding section. And indeed, at the other end of the section, there was a traffic light.

We walked a bit down the beach to watch the sunset and realized that while the sun set, the weather had dropped about 10 degrees. We went back to the apartment. Scott, who wasn't feeling too well, went to bed and I tried to come up with a plan B in case he didn't feel better the day after tomorrow.