Having settled in my hotel at Lake Ohrid it was now past 4pm and I only had what was left of today to look around the town. I didnt anticipate losing a lot of time with the back and forth to Struga earlier today. Also the rains had moved back in to add to the dampner.Walking past the old theatre I first wanted to scout out where to get the bus back to Struga for tomorrow as I had my 930am bus to Tirana I had to catch.I didnt find a bus stop and there werent actua...

This morning I was leaving Bitola and travelling further west to the popular tourist and pilgrimage destination of Lake Ohrid (Okh-rid) on the Albanian border. I left the hotel 8am and got something fresh from the bakery across the road for 10 MK ($0.25).I was heading first to Struga at the northern tip of Lake Ohrid, 12 kms from the town of Ohrid itself which is on the eastern side. The reason was I had to scout it for the bus to Tirana Albania tomorrow as there...

Leaving the Military Museum Bitola is easy to navigate with a north-south main st Shirok Sokak St. The rain was still coming down as I looked for landmarks on my mapAt the top of the street was the Clock Tower, an easy landmark to navigate to. At opposite sides of this main plaza are two Mosques.The first Yeni Mosque is in a poor state of repair and not open to the public. Across the river is the more prominent Isak Mosque.Before crossing the river I went to the ...

Today I was leaving the Macedonian capital Skopje and heading south west to Bitola. This was the provincial capital of the region in Ottoman times so played an important historic role.I tried to rest in at my comfy Skopje apartment and got to the bus station by 10.15. The next bus wasnt till 11am and the ticket was 480 MK ($7.50). I tried to get some Albanian money for my later stop but they didnt serve that currency at the money exchanges.I took a corner seat on...

This was my second time in Skopje having visited on my last Balkans trip in 2013. Last time I spent most of my time north of the river in the Turkish old town. This time as my apartment was south of the river in the new town, I also wanted to visit some of the sights here.The apartment owners told me you can take a bus and cable car to the mountain in the south for a city view. I had no idea about this so hadnt budgeted time for that.Instead I went to the City Mu...