A NOTE TO OUR READERS: We notice that when viewing these posts where the internet signal is weak, many of the photos appear simply as boxes with little question marks in the center. If that happens for you, just click on that little question mark and the photo will pop us. Sorry for any inconvenience! — CK
Sarandë
As we enter the outskirts of Sarandë, we check Google for the location of our hotel and realize we’ll be going right past it. So the bus driver stops for us, and soon we’re in our hotel room just a few blocks from the city’s beautiful shoreline walkway along the harbor. The view from our window really isn’t a big selling point (how many cats do you see crawling on and around the parked vehicle and the trash?), but the room is nice enough, and it’s a comfortable place for us.
So we stash our heavy-duty rolling bags and head for the waterfront. It’s a gorgeous warm day to wander the edge of this ancient land that has witnessed those thousands of years of history-book tales and legends that we've grown up with. Just beyond a tethered schooner is the fabled Greek island of Corfu. The shingle beach edges down into cool crystal-blue waters and demands us to wet our feet.
And under such conditions, who can resist a good afternoon nose-wet and a gourmet pizza at a fine local bistro? We have long proven ourselves defenseless against culinary onslaughts such as this.
The luxury of an afternoon nap (one of the great blessings of retirement!) prepares us for evening explorations past the bright city lights and a brilliantly-lit fountain, and then along the festive lighting of the shoreline walkway. Harbor lights shimmer across silvery waves, reflecting the many lights of restaurants ands for local excursions (Cuddle Farm Animals!), and the hundreds of condos that fill this popular Med resort town. If we had somehow imagined we'd be experiencing the thrill of finding an un-touristed gem, we’d have been badly deluded. By this time, the inexpensive delights of Albania are well-known to plenty of Euro-tourists.
The food is excellent, of course. And how could it not be, in a small country just adjacent to such noted culinary giants as Italy and Greece? A gentle breath of sea air wafts through the evening to ruffle the banana leaves, and a half-liter of the house wine serves as a worthy palliative to all of our imagined sufferings.
In the morning we’re at our table as it becomes filled with – nay, assaulted by! – far too many large breakfast servings and other choices than we can manage. We attempt to wave off a bit of the excess, and are met with the incredulous looks of our well-meaning hosts. They actually look offended that we don’t want to waddle out the front door helplessly bloated by the largess. ("But it’s free!") Plus we get to watch the morning news! In Albanian.
We spend the next day exploring the street-side markets and warrens of Sarandë by foot, and also finding the ferry terminal to buy tickets to nearby Corfu. We’ll depart in a few days and we want to have that out of the way.
We make time for an afternoon coffee, just to watch people on the broad sidewalk below as the sea rolls by. And then we keep wandering until the sun sets. It’s much easier walking here on the broad flat malecón than teetering on the charming, but rain-slippery, cobblestones of Girokastar. And it’s safer than dodging the traffic of Tirana.
Soon it’s time for another memorable dinner, with a good local wine, in a nice little biker-bar kind of place. As in BMW bikers. And then we retire for the evening because we want to catch a morning bus to Butrint, a local historical site that was once of major importance in this part of the Med.
In the morning we ask for only a few breakfast items on the table, and the hotel staff grudgingly accommodates us. I think we look kind of skinny to them and they may see that as a special kind of challenge.
We catch a local bus that takes us down the coast to Butrint, a fortress and protected harbor that long stood guard on the important trading route through the strait of Corfu. This narrow strait is where the Adriatic Sea ends and the Ionian Sea begins, and an inside passage avoids the often-blustery Adriatic where strong winds – the boras, meltemis, etesians, etc – can burst quickly from any direction, including the distant snowcapped Alps, to roil the Sea and bedevil poor sailors.
The bus travels on a road that was built by Enver Hoxha in May 1959 to carry his guest Nikita Khrushchev for an important state visit to the historic site. Khrushchev saw the harbor’s obvious potential as a soviet submarine base right in the heart of the Mediterranean, although he was disdainful of the old historic artifacts that littered Butrint. His boorish behavior was duly noted by Hoxha who felt strongly about the site’s ancient ruins connecting the Albanians to antiquity, and by 1961 Hoxha was denouncing the Soviets as traitors to Stalinism.
Along the way we pass another of Hoxha’s curious little concrete ‘one man forts.’ This one protrudes from a rocky outcropping next to a new wall enclosing someone’s private property.
The remains of prehistoric settlements have been found on this strategic rocky ridge at the entry to a large salt marsh and protected anchorage, and written mention of Butrint (also known by the Roman name of Buthrotum) goes back to Hecataeus in the 6th century BC. Later additions include a 6th century Christian basilica and a 15th century Triangular Castle built by the Venetians on the other side of the Vivari passage.
Octavian, who would become Caesar Augustus, traveled near here to confront the forces of Brutus and Cassius at Phillipi, and later landed his army again just north of here before his final decisive naval battle in 31 BC against Mark Anthony and Cleopatra at Actium, just a few islands to the south.
The Battle of Lepanto (1571) between the Holy League of Pope Pius V and the Ottoman Empire also took place just south of here, and the Christian victory slowed Ottoman expansion into the Western Mediterranean.
And this narrow passage is where Ali Pasha (1740-1822), the mountain brigand and powerful local ruler under the Byzantine empire, whose works we encountered in Girokastar, built new fortifications to collect taxes for safe passage. Or to extort the sailing ships of old, depending on your viewpoint.
References to this site among the literati include Virgil’s The Aeneid (published in 19 BC) which recounts the voyage of Aeneas after he escapes the destruction of Troy. He takes refuge in Butrint, and other ports in the eastern Mediterranean, and finally arrives in Italy to become the founder of Lavinium, which later becomes Rome.
Racine set his 1667 play Andromaque (based on the ancient play of Euripides) in the area of Butrint to include the headstrong King Pyrrhus, whose costly battles against Rome would be called “Pyrrhic victories.”
Lord Byron visited Ali Pasha in Tepelenë, just north of Butrint, during the perambulations of his 1809 Grand Tour which, according to Elizabeth Hawksley, “seems to have involved a lot of drinking, stupendous scenery, and sex.”
Byron was a compelling young man who was described by Lady Caroline Lamb, a married woman and one of his many lovers, as, “mad, bad, and dangerous to know.”
In “Canto the First” of his epic autobiographical poem, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Byron floridly describes himself:
Whilome in Albion's isle there dwelt a youth,
Who ne in virtue's ways did take delight;
But spent his days in riot most uncouth,
And vexed with mirth the drowsy ear of Night.
Ah, me! in sooth he was a shameless wight,
Sore given to revel and ungodly glee;
Few earthly things found favour in his sight
Save concubines and carnal companie,
And flaunting wassailers of high and low degree.
In “Canto the Second,” Byron describes the people he meets:
Fierce are Albania's children, yet they lack
Not virtues, were those virtues more mature.
Where is the foe that ever saw their back?
Who can so well the toil of war endure?
Their native fastnesses not more secure
Than they in doubtful time of troublous need:
Their wrath how deadly! but their friendship sure,
When Gratitude or Valour bids them bleed,
Unshaken rushing on where'er their chief may lead.
The always passionate Byron was equally taken by the elaborate costumes of the Albanians, and this 1813 painting of him in native garb currently resides at the National Gallery in London:
The wild Albanian kirtled to his knee,
With shawl-girt head and ornamented gun,
And gold-embroidered garments, fair to see:
The crimson-scarfed men of Macedon;
After his Albanian adventures, George Gordon (Lord Byron) joined the fight for Greek independence from the Byzantine Empire. He contracted malaria in the swampy Greek city of Missolonghi, down the coast from Butrint, and died in 1824 at the age of 36.
While some of the best-known Romantic Poets of the 19th century lived to a jolly old age (Wordsworth, 80; Blake, 70; Hugo, 83), it was the fate of the dashing Byron to join those who did not live to see forty (Keats, 25; Shelley, 30; Pushkin, 38; Burns, 37).
A quick look at the peninsula of Butrint reveals its obvious value in olden times as a fortification with a natural moat. And again, we find ourselves deep in the swirling mists of ancient history, with its many layers and all its attendant drama. The majestic views from the upper ramparts, of Greek mountains to the south, are worth the moderate climb to the top.
Upon leaving the summit we step carefully down slick-worn cobbles on the back stairway leading to the bottom. We pass bramble and giant cactus that remind us of Sonora. And in the shade of the hill curious mosses rise to greet faint rays of sunlight.
We make our way to a dubious- and ancient-looking cable ferry that crosses the Vivari Channel to the Triangular Castle built by the Venetians in the 15th century. The cables lie just underfoot in grooves carved into the concrete. One can well imagine the potential agony if a loose toe or piece of clothing got wrapped into the exposed cables, as we step gingerly over them.
On the far side, the cables enter a decrepit shed where the grindings of old machinery emanate. On the dock by the shed a crew of workers is sledgehammering a new pontoon together for the ferry, and the noise is ear-splitting. Several caravan campers, after departing the ferry, are heading further south down a road that leads toward the Greek border near Konispol.
A man attending the ferry machinery stands outside the shed, watching the cacophonous pontoon project. I nod at the partially-open door to the shed and show my iPhone as I ask, “A photo?” He’s a man of few words and he grumbles, “No photo.” In my other hand rests a well-worn 500 leke bill. It’s worth about 5 bucks. (A 1000 leke bill is living in my shirt pocket, in case he’s in a bargaining mood.)
He eyes the bill, palms it, and shrugs. As he steps away from the door to more closely watch the sledgehammering, I lean in to get a few pics of the hefty and well-worn machinery.
We take a quick look through the largely-barren Triangular Castle, and I climb the ramparts to check the view. At least once or twice I wonder why I’m doing this, as I thread my way along the precariously narrow walkway beside a ten-foot drop-off with nothing to hang on to. I’m pretty certain I won’t bounce off the ground as well as I did in my teens, and I will probably avoid such an adventure in the future.
After our most recent deep immersion into the endless bloody battles of antiquity –and their obvious parallel with the current brutalities of Russia in Ukraine – it’s time to forget all that for a while. As best we can. It’s time to return to Sarandë and settle in at a harbor-side restaurant for another fine meal and a half-liter of the house wine. After that we’ll enjoy a last glorious Adriatic sunset over the harbor, and we’ll follow it up back in our hotel room with a tot of Raki Rrushi and a cookie.
In the morning we board a local ferry and depart for the fabled Greek island of Corfu.
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Corfu (Kerkora)
On a sunny bright morning we finally bid a fond goodby to the port of Sarandë, and the intriguing country of Albania. As the white condos of Sarandë recede behind us, the island of Corfu (Kerkora) is calling us to us. And the port of Corfu is visible straight ahead in the distance, almost due south, just over our bow.
The ferry trip takes about an hour, and I have time to wonder if we’ve really learned anything of mysterious Albania, gained any deep insights during our past two weeks of travel. After decades of isolation from modern Europe, in the 1990s the country suddenly found itself grappling with the vagaries of the modern world, and then was swept by a wave of economic fraud that impoverished maybe half the population, before plunging into street riots. While we experienced none of that turmoil in our brief visit, it’s painful vestiges were surely lurking just below the surface.
Peter Thiel, the idiot-savant tech billionaire whose world view extends all the way from ones to zeros, has pronounced that, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.” It’s the sort of arrogant Orwellian doublespeak that makes cheap headlines. But I wonder if he’s intellectually lazy and only using a pull-quote from 1984, in hopes that few of us have actually read the book. He is apparently comfortable, like others in the smug and isolated tech-bro-world, with making vast extrapolations based solely on his extremely narrow views. And he’s very much uncomfortable with the messy realities of actual human life. I want to avoid that same easy trap of making quick and poorly-informed assessments.
In the end I’ll need more time – much more time – and more knowledge, before making my own judgements about the state of affairs in modern-day Albania. There are no cheap and easy solutions, no Platonic ‘enlightened despot’ to deal with the complex issues at play. I’m only glad we took a fork in the road of life that led us there.
Soon we’re in the large, cruise-ship-infested, harbor of Corfu. We get quickly through customs (Albania and most of the Balkans are not part of the Schengen area), and we’ve reentered the Euro zone on our way into a very different European experience.
The port of Corfu marks our reentry into Western Europe – and Western European prices. This place is a big step up – in over-the-top charm and amenities – from the simple pleasures of Albania. And these heartbreakingly-beautiful narrow cobblestone lanes are easy to fall for, if your budget can stand the strain. Our several months of travel in Eastern Europe and the Balkans have strengthened our finances and so we can relax here, and enjoy some of what there is on offer.
Again Carolyn has found us a special place, a tidy curl-up called “The Hidden Garden,” where we’ll spend our nights. And our days will be invested in long explorations through the Old Town by foot.
We have actually been to Corfu briefly in 2013, as we managed to cadge a three week eye-opening cruise on the HAL Noordam through the Eastern Med. Our Corfu encounter was just a day-trip, but it left impressions that compelled us to return. This time we’re here for several days to look around the city’s gorgeous Old Town, but with no time for local buses to explore the rest of this interesting island.
It’s clear from the onset that we’re now in the heart of wealthy tourist territory; the streets are flooded daily by thousands of cruise ship ejecta, and all the high-end window prompts to attest. It’s a world where we don’t reside and we seldom visit, but there’s much beauty on display – just behind the glass wall.
So we’ll spend our first evening and the next few days here doing a our own sort of anthropology of the privileged set, while enjoying the good food and painted pottery pitchers of wine. Reality can wait for another day.
And in the morning we return to an enticing little bakery we’ve noticed, for some of their beautifully-presented pastries to start the day.
The charming streets of Corfu are ours to explore, and so we join the cruise ship throngs to see what’s on offer. There are sweet little restaurants where we may try to bag a table later in the evening after the cruise-crowds depart, an enticing wooden bicycle, the island’s famous kumquat cakes and jams, fig trees, and plenty of narrow alleys. The huge Old Fortress looms overhead protecting the harbor, which used to shelter the city’s navy but is now filled with the toys of wealthy people. And a horse waits patiently for coach passengers to board.
The warren of winding streets provides us with endless photo-ops. There’s also plenty of good fresh food to be found in tiny stores, and we settle on a fine cheap lunch back at the apartment. To be followed with a nap.
Another evening in early October finds us again attracted, like moths, to the glowing windows filled with fabulous wares that we have no intention of adding to our minimalist traveling bags. But it’s all excellent to look at. The summer night comes alive in the villages that line the Med. Corfu is among them.
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It’s a warm and perfect evening for outside dining near the edge of the Ionian Sea, when most of the cruisers have gone back to their ships. So we settle in for some Aperol Spritz and embrace the moment. Around us are the quiet sounds of others also enjoying the evening, in numerous languages, as we enjoy another fine dinner at an uncrowded local bistro, with Carolyn’s favorite: soup!
On our way back to the apartment we pass a flower shop, where Carolyn and the owner assemble a gorgeous bouquet to grace our little outside table. And we pass a notice that someone has apparently lost their sweet little pet cockatoo.
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Among the best-known Corfiots (people born in Corfu) would be such worthies as, Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh – Yes, Queen Elizabeth’s husband was born here in Corfu Town, as you may recall from watching “The Crown”; also Vangelis Petsalis, noted classical composer; and Sotirios Voulgaris, founder of the Bulgari line of high-end jewelry and fashion goods.
Among other famous residents of this isle, Elizabeth of Austria, known fondly in Vienna and Budapest as “Sissi”; Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany; plus an assortment of Rothschilds, and other wealthies who have built vacation homes here overlooking the Ionian Sea.
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Among the more well-known literary residents of Corfu was Lawrence Durrell, a keen observer and chronicler of Mediterranean life, who lived here into the early years of the Second World War. It seems to matter little to the Greeks that one of Corfu’s most notable writers only lived here for 4 years, and long ago at that, as Greek memories are long, and there’s much history for them to recall. They have chosen to recall Lawrence Durrell with a bronze bust whose shiny knobby nose is frequently polished by aspiring writers who’d like a bit of his magic to transfer to their own written works.
Durrell was born in India and hated living in dreary Britain. He convinced his recently-widowed mother to move with her children to a less expensive place away from bleak English winters and “the English death” – his stark description of stifling English culture. Although he only lived here from 1935 to 1939, when Greece fell to the Nazis, he described Corfu fondly as “this brilliant little speck of an island in the Ionian,”
Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet, became a major literary event upon its publication in 1957 to 1960. His study of Justine, as seen through the accounts of Balthazar, Mountolive and Clea, is set in the exotic city of Alexandria, Egypt. I still have yet to spend an evening walking along the Grand Cornice in that ancient city, contemplating the compelling Justine and the throbbing sea below.
His youthful 1938 The Black Book, possibly influenced by some of the emerging writers and artists at the 1936 London International Surrealist Exhibition, was published in Paris with the aid of Henry Miller and was banned in England until 1973. And I have fond memories of his later travel writings in Sicilian Carousel (1977), a jaunty bus ride around the island of Sicily that dodges into places of interest, with unexpected consequences. Sadly, I think this bus no longer runs.
His younger brother Gerald, a noted naturalist and author of My Family and Other Animals, set here in Corfu, is also remembered in this quiet corner of the Spianada overlooking the Ionian Sea to Mount Pantokrator, and the rocky peaks of Albania in the distance.
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A note about the “Durrell Grove.”
I was stumped by the top word on the Durrell gate (yes, it was Greek to me!), so I asked Spiridakis, my esteemed Greek Oracle for a translation. He, in turn, went even deeper into the mystery and consulted his fellow Greek Oracle Alkiviadis, for the following explanation – which also illustrates the amazing mixture of languages, dialects, and cultures that comprise the Balkans and much of Europe:
For certain, the word Μποσκεττο is not Greek.
Corfu (Kerkyra in Greek) was occupied for centuries by the Venetians.
The Italian language left its mark on the Island. Italian words passed into the Greek language spoken by the native islanders.
With this in mind, I turned to the Italian language and found that the Greek Μποσκεττο is most probably a transliteration of the Italian word boschetto.
It means grove or orchard, Hence, “The Grove Durrell.”
Hope this is helpful.
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We escape the clutches of Corfu-lux and the special bubble that is the Old Town, to explore the New Fortress, so-called because it was only begun by the Venetians in 1527. Its Great Cross stands against azure skies. (The Old Fortress, built on the heights across town to defend against raids by the Ostrogoths, dates from the 6th century.)
Hardy local souls are enjoying the waters at a rocky beach below us, in the last good swimming days of summer. The Sea is alive with watercraft, from local sailing vessels and world cruisers, to frequent ferries to the mainland.
We cross the old moat to climb various stairways, and the views change with every step. Each fort or castle has its own character, its own construction style, based on the methods in fashion at the time. Here we see more masonry and less rough stone than in some others, although rough stone is always a good choice to repel heavy objects like cannonballs.
The incessant efforts of weather combine with plant life to take their toll on even the stoutest of human endeavors. And the plants happily bloom in their season as if to mock our toils. I, for one, welcome their cheeky persistence on a bright and sunny day.
We make our way up slick-rock stairways with few handholds and eventually we’re at the top, with fabulous views across the Old City to the Old Fortress and the cruise-ships-of-the-day that are docked in the harbor. We can see the leafy Spianada below, where those busts of the Durrell brothers stand.
The Great Cross looms over the city. And frankly, it looks a bit rinky-dink, with slack wires tethering a tall rickety-rusty framework. It’s hardly an image of godly strength and one hopes there’s maintenance, or maybe a stout replacement, planned in the near future before it topples and maybe kills somebody.
Somewhere out there to the east, along the distant coastline of mainland Greece, almost 300 ships gathered in 433 BCE for the Battle of Sybota between the rebels of Corcyra (Corfu) and their former masters in Corinth. Thucydides said it was the largest naval battle in history up to that time. And it was a catalyst for the long and brutal Peloponnesian Wars of 431-404 BCE. It all ended after Lysander, the Spartan admiral, destroyed the Athenian fleet at the Battle of Aegospotami at the Dardanelles in modern Turkey. But the city-state of Athens later rose to prominence and entered its “Golden Age,” after the Spartans proved to be inept rulers of the democracy-loving Greeks.
We make our way carefully back downhill on travel-slick stones, thankful we’re not dealing with the added hazards of a rainy day.
We take a side doorway that leads to an old dock where several hardy folk are taking the waters. We both get in all the way up to, well, our ankles, before retiring to a gorgeous little cafe at the adjacent Corfu Sailing Club looking across a small harbor of sailing boats. Numerous craft are heading out for a local regatta, or just to enjoy a fine day on the water, among gentle breezes.
The rest of the day leads us to additional wanders through Corfu’s maze of narrow alleys. Many of the lush window displays are almost like paintings, and the street scenes also have a painterly quality.
Eventually the pangs of hunger, real or imagined, call us to another fine repast beneath a warm evening sky. We’re grateful for whatever gods, ancient or modern, assisted humankind to develop such fine wines and victuals. They have been kind to us.
A long after-dinner walk takes us through many more alleys we’ve missed so far and we wonder how many remain to explore. The gorgeous night scenes, the simple street cafes, and the artful glowing windows seem endless.
Ultimately we’re greeted by the nicely-lit courtyard of our little apartment, and its promise of another cosy night to sleep, perhaps to dream…
Our last morning finds us back at that little corner bakery, with yet more of their many delights. The local pigeon cleanup crew tends to our wayward crumbs.
The beauty of this tiny corner of the island is truly astounding, and it keeps us occupied for the day. Everything in life does not require the exquisite miseries of sleeping fitfully (or barely at all) on a hard wooden bench while waiting for a train at the Slovenian border; or navigating the complex Budapest transit system – in Hungarian; or slogging through dense rain, clothes drenched, in the northern Saxon villages of Romania. While we’re not averse to some discomfort, we’re also not ‘hair shirt’ types who revel in pain.
Considering the troubling state of the world these days – and judging from the millennia of fraught human history recorded in all the forts and castles we’ve climbed, hasn’t it always been thus? – none of our travails is at all complaint-worthy. And inside our Corfu reality-free bubble, I realize there are no unpleasant reminders of the daily brutalities still unfolding in Ukraine.
So we can enjoy the luxury of a sidewalk cafe on a warm evening, with serenades from a band of roving Greeks. And Corfu certainly fills that need.
A new day dawns, wet and somber, and it’s time again for us to leave this small and special corner of the island of Corfu. We don our usual drowned-rats attire, lock the doors behind us, and trundle our well-traveled bags down the cobblestone streets. We snag a cab to the harbor (four new cruise ships at the dock this morning!), and we board a ferry heading to Igoumenitza, on the Greek mainland.
Ships based at the busy industrial port of Igoumenitza provide most of what sustains the luxury life here, and on other nearby islands. Our ferry is packed solid with heavy trucks as we bid goodby to Corfu, and we make our way for an hour or so through rainy weather. As we approach the mainland we’re greeted by the mournful cries of gulls rollicking in the uplift from the bow of the ship. And soon we’re lashed to the dock with heavy hawsers.
From here we’ll be crossing the Ionian Sea on a large overnight vessel to Bari, Italy. Please join us next for that adventure through some interesting parts of gorgeous Southern Italy. — PRW