Albania – Elbasan (En)
Elbasan is the fourth most populous city of Albania and seat of Elbasan County and Elbasan Municipality. It lies to the north of the river Shkumbin between the Skanderbeg Mountains and the Myzeqe Plain in central Albania.
We stayed at Camping Fridolin (41.1302, 20.1354 lat, long) just at the beginning of the city and where we met John y Sherley, an English couple who advised us about places to stay and we follow their advice for the next stop.
The camping owner and son are really nice and they are mechanics, so they check the things in our motorhome that Ben wanted to be checked and they did not charge us anything, filled our gas bottle and brought us fresh bread. 12 euros per day all included, with a sitting room, kitchen and full bathroom with shower for campers. They got chickens, ducks, chicks and baby ducks running around the place and very cute. There are also really colourful honeycombs, so you can have fresh eggs and honey. We really recommend it if you are going to come to visit Elbasan. The owner speaks German and the son English.
Next to the camping, there is a restaurant with mountain views and typical food really good and cheap which we had lunch. We shared a plate of pork ribs and a plate of typical sausages stuffed with cheese, beer and wine all for only 15 euros! We really recommend it! We also went to take a look at the typical product stands where we bought some veggies and the lady gave us free cherries, apricots and a little green fruit, I wouldn’t say I liked it because it was sour but Ben liked it. We do not know what it is.
To visit Elbasan we recommend parking in the pay parking in the centre (41.109321, 20.082087 lat, long) we paid one euro for several hours and it is next to a supermarket and the street fruit and veggies market where you can do your shopping and where the women selling cheese posed for me!
Although much of the historic city of Elbasan was destroyed during World War II, some remnants of the past can still be seen. The walls that surround the city were built in the 4th century, with 3 entrances and 26 towers. Its fortress was built during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (483 – 565). The ruins of Elbasan Castle and its Clock Tower still exist and there are some churches and other buildings from the 19th century and some even earlier although its main mosque is very new and modern.
The castle includes part of the Vía Egnatia, which runs through it, and the traditional buildings of the characteristic architecture of urban dwellings, as well as other monuments such as the old mosque.
Elbasan has several museums to visit such as the Ethnographic Museum which is housed in an 18th-century house with a cardak which is a special type of balcony.
And we finished our visit walking through the Park until we went back to the parking.
The next stop is Ohrid Lake, the most famous in the Balkans and Pogradec one of the most sought holiday destinations which you can see in the next post!
