Up at 8. Went out to get money, snacks and trilece - a kind of cake recommended by a home friend who had visited Albania. I bought some from a local bakery along with a kind of savoury buttery bread for breakfast. I’ve just eaten that and written this. It’s now 10:10. I need to figure out where I’m going today.
***
Today involved a lot of uphill. I had planned it to be an easy day. In fact I only went 70km, but it still exhausted me. I cycled out along the seafront of Vlorë, and eventually peeled off the main road to take a smaller side road through some gentle foothills leading away from the coast. This was only a taste of what was to come.
The road was at times serpentine, at times just a steepish gradient as I climbed further and further up the mountainside, re-joining the main road and avoiding the cars which zoomed past me, full of drivers beeping horns and yelling words of encouragement and praise - which increased the nearer I got to the top.
Eventually I entered a pine forest. It felt almost like I was in the alps again. Campsites and restaurants popped up on either side of the road, tourists milled about. There were even mountain bike paths leading off down the hill. I climbed for hours getting through almost a whole tube of oreos, until I reached the top at 14:45. Here I decided to treat myself.
I went into a restaurant with a panoramic view over the sea, and I got a coke and a plate of pasta. From my vantage I could see down the mountain to the coast and across the sea to several islands, one of which was Corfu! My first sighting of Greece!
After the meal I found myself going down the other side of the hill. I sped down the winding roads, glad of a rest for my legs, shivering in the breeze which blew on my sweat soaked skin. When I reached the coast the path went up again. It wound up and down through green trees and beautiful coastal villages. I could tell I was nearing Greece.
Not long later, around 5, I reached Himarë. I resolved to stop. I went to sea cave camping, set up a tent among the pines (my pole is now well and truly broken and my washing line around a tree is the main thing holding the tent up), and went for a swim in the sea.
I jumped off very spiky rocks, swam about until I could see the main beach, then took a disappointing, cold, weak, shower. I made up for this by buying a beer and chilling on a cushion reading my book. Later I took a walk through the woods and the port to the main town (I had to pass through a hole in a fence), got to a sea food restaurant, got some delightful bruschetta and stuffed octopus, and wrote this.
***
I bought some snacks (a milka bar), walked back to the campsite in the dark, read for a while and went to bed. I was kept up by music blaring from the town until 12, and someone shining their torch for the next half hour.
After that I slept.
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