Albania

My son continued his journey to Albania. This is not a place many Americans go. He met one person proficient in English while he was there. Getting around was a bit of a challenge. Yet people were not unfriendly to him. I have an email he sent about his journey and want to pass along a couple quotes from it:

"I loved all the towns I visited other than the capital, Tirana.  I only tooa grand total of 3 pictures there.  The architecture was extremely bland andlooked like a concrete company got the contract to design it.  I was disgusted but don't tell an Albanian, they think its amazing.

An interesting thing about Albania that I don't think the western media
picks up on at all is that it is very tolerant toward religions...there seems to be a pretty even mix between Muslims and Christians. Often Mosques and Catholic Churches are right next to each other.  Nobody seems to care what religion people are and everybody seems to get along.  Its a very nice thing to see, maybe the rest of the world should take note."

He didn't find hostels to stay in but rented rooms in pensions or people's homes. He left a magnet with a woman who served him breakfast, making certain that he was being well attended.

Castle above Shkodra