On Wednesday (April 30th), after my return from Kamenice, I headed to Ferizaj to catch the 10:30 am bus to North Macedonia to meet up with Thom, my son, Matthew, and his girlfriend, Betsy. It was a beautiful, sunny day, and the bus ride was great. When we reached North Macedonia's border, all the passengers exited the bus and stood in line to present our IDs to border control.
At the bus station, I found out the next available bus was at 6:30 pm, the earlier bus that I plan to take, that I thought I could take, was full, so I had hours to kill. I found a really nice vegan restaurant for lunch, and then I walked around for several hours. I finally made it to Lake Ohrid at 10 pm after a 2 1/2 hour bus ride. Matthew and Betsy met me at the bus station, and then we walked back to our apartment in the old city center. It was so good to see them and we had a nice walk back catching up along the way. It was in a really old but nicely renovated building.
Photos -- Killing Time in Skopje
The next morning, after a good breakfast, we took a meandering walk up to the fortress. Lake Ohrid is one of Europe's deepest lakes; on this day, it was beautiful and blue. On the way to the fortress, we saw many churches, as in Ohrid, there was a church for every day of the year. These churches range in size and are very old. We stopped in the courtyard of one of these churches as we made our way to the ancient theater of Ohrid.
After our lunch, we rented paddleboards and paddled around the lake for an hour. It was a nice day out, but the water was cold and I did not want to go in. Matthew, however, took a quick swim off his paddleboard and confirmed that it was too cold for me. We spent the evening in the old city center with dinner and a walk.
On Friday, we headed to Skopje for the afternoon. We walked to the city center and had lunch at the Mexican restaurant. We saw the main square, the bazaar, and the fortress. Around 5 pm, we met Valon and Sami for a light dinner and a beer. Valon and Sami had graciously offered to pick up Thom, Matthew, Betsy, and me to bring us to Kaçanik. It was nice for Thom to catch up and for them to meet Matthew and Betsy. We arrived Friday evening to Kaçanik and made plans to hike with our hiking group on Saturday on a hike to Jazhince in the Sharr National Park. As the hike started at 7:30 am, we didn't do much except to get settled when we arrived in Kaçanik.
The weather was beautiful for the hike on Saturday, and we had a good group. Our van was full. Everyone welcomed Matthew and Betsy, and we really enjoyed most of the hike. There was still some snow on the trail in places, and it was really slippery. At one point, one of the high school girls slipped, and our fearless leader, Enis, grabbed her, and they both ended up sliding down a long slope. After that, we were all very careful, and most of our group made it to the lake. The lake still had ice on it and it was very pretty, as were the multitude of flowers. I think Matthew and Betsy enjoyed the hike and the hiking group.
Photos from the hike
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The next day, Betsy and Matthew went out for coffee. They saw Fatmir from the hike and he took them for burek. After that, they went to Sherif's (also from the hike) for coffee. After they came back, we had the grand tour of Kaçanik, including the UÇK sign, the Illyrian Wall, and the erosion staircase. We had almost traditional bean soup, ayvar burek, and salad for dinner at the apartment. After dinner, we met Sami, Valon, Remzi, and Remzi's brother for drinks at the newly remodelled Riverside Restaurant. We had a nice evening with good friends and conversation.
Monday, I went to school for my two morning classes. Gazmend was gone as he was still driving back from Germany. Thom, Betsy, and Matthew met Mirvete and me at school. We went to Trofta for coffee and conversation. After coffee, we walked to Bonevet for a tour of the STEAM academy from Elise. Mirvete offered to take us out to Guri i Zi after she was done at school, so we had an early, relaxing dinner at Guri i Zi. It was nice that Matthew and Betsy were able to meet so many of our friends here.
Tuesday, we were planning to take the bus to Ferizaj and then on to Prishtina. I needed to get my photo and fingerprints for my new residence card as well, so it was convenient. We found out that Mirvete was going to Prishtina and she offered to pick us up and drive us, so we didn't end up taking the bus. Mirvete parked close to the Peace Corps Office, so we walked there as soon as we got to Prishtina. We all had backpacks as we were going on tour to Peja, Prizren, and then Albania. We left our packs at the Peace Corps office and then went to the Mother Teresa Cathedral. We went up in the tower for a better view of Prishtina.
We were able to have lunch with Addie and Birgit (our response volunteers). Addie is getting ready to leave, while Birgit has just arrived. We enjoyed a wonderful lunch at Babaghanoush (our favorite vegan restaurant). After lunch, I got my residency card taken care of while Matthew, Thom, and Betsy got a tour of the Biology building on the campus of Prishtina University. I met up with them and we finished with a walk by the Newborn Monument and the library before catching a 4 pm train to Peja.
Stay tuned for Part Two of our visits, as this is already a long blog and there is so much more to say.
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