Albania – Korce (En)
Korce is located in the southeast of Albania, 36 km from the border with Greece and 50 km from North Macedonia. It is the sixth largest city in the country, also known as the City of Serenades which are local songs that are sung in taverns. It is the most multicultural town in Albania, and here modern Albanian was created the first Albanian language school was opened in 1887 and they organize the largest carnival in Albania.
We stayed at Camping Villa Mano (40.614002, 20.782482 lat, long) right in the city centre just 150 metres from the Cathedral. It is a hotel where you park on the side and you have electricity, a full toilet with shower at the hotel, emptying and filling of black and grey waters and water for drink. Dorian is the manager and he speaks really good English, also he helps you with all your needs and does an amazing typical Albanian breakfast with fig jams, butter, crepes with cheese, rolls with honey, ham and cheese, coffee, several juices, toasts, tomatoes and olives. He did my breakfast without eggs as I am allergic, all for 7 euros. We really recommend staying here if you want to visit the town as you are in the heart of it.
We stayed for several days to visit the town and try the typical food and its famous beer called Korça. There are many things to see in the town. We started with the Orthodox Cathedral of the Ressurection of Christ, built-in 1994 in the same location as the old St George’s Cathedral (19th century) destroyed in 1968 by the communist regime. The Cathedral is located in a square full of restaurants with a butterfly sculpture in the middle. You can go inside the Cathedral but for respect, as it was a religious event I just took a picture from the entrance.
Just in front of the Cathedral is the pedestrian street full of typical bars and restaurants, where you can still see the remains of the carnival. On the pedestrian street on the right side, you find the National Museum of Education located in the house that housed the country’s first Albanian-language school. This school was established in 1887 with the permission of the Ottoman authorities. At the end of the street, you find a wall where the Shen Gjergji orthodox church was built in 1905 and demolished in 1971 by the communists to build the public library. Also at the end of the street, you find the Red Tower, a 33-metre-high platform that was built in 2014 and its architect was the same as that of the Medieval Art Museum, the German Julia Bolles-Wilson. For us, the ugliest building in the town but offers panoramic views.
Next, we saw the Theatre and a very strange building but pretty cool until we arrive at Old Bazar Street, for us the most beautiful of the town and full of life, with its stone houses, cobbled streets, the terraces of its bars and restaurants and its typical shops. During the Ottoman era, it was the commercial centre of the city. With the arrival of the Communist regime, the merchants and artisans disappeared and the neighbourhood was left empty and it was not until 2014 that the Korçë city council decided to rehabilitate it.
We decided to go back to the pedestrian street for lunch and we shared a typically mixed meat platter: chicken stick, pork stick, greek meatballs which are more like a hamburger and Albanian sausage with spices which was really good, with chips, bread, the Korça beer and white wine, all for 15 euros!
Another day we went to see the Clock Tower and the Mirahorit Mosque both in the same square and we passed through the Park Rinia. We did not take Asha with us because there are many street dogs all over the place and more in the parks as you can see in the pictures, so it is not safe for her. We met Gabriel, a local man who told us that he had lived 20 years in the USA so he spoke English well, and with whom we spent some time while he told us about Albania.
Another day we went to explore the city at night and we found the sculpture of fallen heroes who fought against the Italian fascists in 1941. Later we decided to dinner some typical Albanian tapas, we shared a platter of mushrooms stuffed with ham, cheese, tomatoes and peppers which was delicious and a platter of baked goat cheese with tomatoes and red peppers. And finished our day viewing the Cathedral illuminated at night.
And that’s how it ended our adventure in Albania, our next stop will be in Greece, which you can see in the next post.
