Just a quick update from Agrigento on Sicily’s southern coast. I originally planned on visiting Selinunte as part of my stay here, but since the buses are uncooperative and since I ended up seeing it from Palermo in my one day rental car, I found myself with some extra time. So I visited the ancient city of Akragas, also known as The Valley of the Temples, and the only other thing I had planned, at a much more relaxed pace….
My eleven hour train ride from Naples turned out to be just the rest I needed, and it rained most of the way, so it was a good day to avoid that. Finally around 7:30pm I arrived in Palermo in Sicily and found my hotel for the night, slept, and then hit the streets first thing in the morning. Just a little sidenote, Sicily has what has got to be one of the craziest flags in the world. The three…
Strap in everyone, this is gonna be a long one. I left Spoleto in the wee dark hours of the morning and made my way down the narrow streets to the train station. Once the train started I promptly fell asleep and didn’t wake up until everyone had almost disembarked at Rome’s main terminal. I guess I was tired. I quickly got up and figured out where my connecting train was and about two hours later, I arrived in Naples…
Not too far from Orvieto is my next medieval town, Spoleto. Spoleto was also an important Roman town, but it’s real claim to fame is as the Lombard capital from the 6th century on. It has a lot of narrow medieval streets and it’s also very hilly. Walking around Spoleto involves plenty of up and downhill hiking. The restaurant in the pic below left is where I ate both nights here, Taverna dello Spagna. They had the best pasta noodles…
From Viterbo it was two very quick and very very early morning train rides to get to the beautiful hilltop medieval town of Orvieto. The train station is at the bottom of the hill and my hotel is up top in the historic center, but that’s not a problem here. Orvieto has its own funicular that runs from the train station straight to the top where a bus is waiting to drive you to the center, and all for just…
After a fairly quick train ride north, I arrived to calm and sedate Viterbo, a primarily medieval built city with lots of gothic architecture, still standing city walls, medieval gates, and amongst the narrow stone streets are the occasional peaceful piazza. After my super busy time in Rome, the slower change of pace was very welcome. Viterbo is mostly famous for it’s Papal palace and was the home of most of the popes during the 13th century. The Palazzo dei…
Well, it’s about time for another adventure. It seems like I just got back from the last one. Anyway, this time I decided to go to a country that I had planned on visiting three years ago, but got derailed by global insanity, Italy! I finally made it! After around 24 hours of flying, I arrived in Rome in the evening, found my hotel and crashed for the night. I woke up early my first morning and hit the streets….
I said goodbye to Mt Korab and Radomire and finally made my way to Tirana. Usually, I explore the capital of a country first and then make my way around the rest. This is the first time I did the opposite and it feels a bit wierd honestly. Tirana is a huge city, but all the interesting stuff is in the very compact and busy center. It was easy to get around in on foot and turned out to be…
I left Gjirokaster and drove about 240 miles all the way back to the northern part of Albania, the northeast corner this time. You may remember, I tried to hike up Mt Korab, the highest peak in Macedonia AND Albania when I was in Macedonia a few weeks ago, but was denied by the Macedonian border cops who said that the trail was closed. Instead, I hiked Medenica, which was an awesome hike, and got a pretty epic selfie with…
It wasn’t a very long drive to Gjirokaster, but actually being allowed into the city was quite a challenge. The roads are all cobblestoned and narrow and steep. I took the most logical route to my hotel, but got turned around by the police. So I tried another way up, but all the roads were pedestrian only, so no dice. Between the pedestrian only sections and a bunch of construction going on, I just parked down the hill in a…