16 September 2025 (hot and sunny 31C) 0km
Awake at 6.10am and just lay in bed until 6.30am. Gear on, nice stroll to the beach on yet another lovely morning. It's hard to believe it ever rains here.
Last day here and it's been a restful break. There are places that we could have visited, one being Butrint, a Unesco World Heritage Site, just 5km down the road.
But we just wanted some down time. Not having to be somewhere, see something or ride x amount of kms to reach a certain destination.
I have to say Ksamil has done that for us and the little routine we settled into whilst here, was just what we needed.
As we walked toward the beach, Veli, the Kosovan man we met yesterday, was driving away.
He got out and with gestures and the odd similar word he asked me if I would marry his supermodel daughter.
"No Veli, I am a happily married man."
He pulled out his wallet and showed me a picture of a stunning lady.
"How many times must I tell you Veli?”
Then he threw in two pigs, a goat and ten geese."
"DONE!"
Actually, he wanted us to keep an eye on his gear, which he'd left on the beach while he popped back to his apartment.
Began this morning with a workout, during which time a few others arrived.
Two different female instagrammers were on the beach this morning. So was some uptight security guard who asked them to move their gear, which was on the private beach area.
Pretty petty really. It was 7am and no one was using it and they were finished by the time anyone arrived.
Enjoyed a nice swim over to one of the little islands. But first sight, upon walking off the shingle beach was a whole pile of rubbish.
Now... to me, if I owned one of the many boats and my business was in close proximity to the island, I would get that rubbish out of there.
They don't think like that.
Back for breakfast and a call to Greg and Keren, just to let Greg know that his boat, restaurant and bar seemed to be in good shape and now we'd seen they'd even named a drink after him.
Julia was on a washing spree again, trying to take the musty smell out of all of her gear and I decided to give the bike a once over.
Afternoon was spent contacting Alexis, who we will be staying with for the first couple of nights in England.
She told us the gig she was playing has been put back to December, which was disappointing, guess we'll just have to sing together.
Contacted Peg and gave her an update as best we know and crashed in the afternoon for a couple of hours, as has become our habit. But we're still managing eight hours each night as well.
Saw Rasul, the owner and through "translate" told him we would be leaving early in the morning to beat the traffic.
He and Nora are lovely people and have made our stay exactly as we would have asked for.
Told them we'd see them in the morning before we go, as they are always up early.
About 6.30pm we made our final wander along to our restaurant, Fourth Island.
Dinner was delicious as usual and a very interesting thing occurred.
The last couple of nights have been very quiet patron wise.
Julia earlier in the day, had given them a Five star rating on Google Maps.
Tonight, the place was packed with nine other tables besides ours and some groups of 4 and 6.
Maybe these reviews really are worth it.
We shook hands with all the guys before we left and thanked them for great service and wished them all the best for the future.
They made our meals very enjoyable.
Gave them a good tip.
"Don't let the grass grow under your feet".
To finish off the evening we facetimed an old friend in England, Andrew. Dave and I used to knock around with him in the late 70's.
Had a good catch up and I'll stay in touch so that we can get together once back in England
Was great catching up with you guys with our chat the other night your time. Was talking with Jimmy and Elsie that same day and we were saying how great technology is now for being able to keep in touch so easily compared to the old days of letter writing and hoping letters from home would make it to the cities post offices you had told people to writeto ,in time for you to get them while there( Post Restante).
ReplyDeleteSounds like a lovely last day in Ksamil ,the place has served you so well as a place to rest up before your last destination in Europe and the UK.
Pete that boat with the even bigger motors than Greg’s wasn’t the one you thought was called Pete, that was the little pedal boat in the foreground of the one of those pics . But hey ,you imagine it as you want . I noticed in the background what appeared to be sports cars that looked like they were in the water. What optical illusion was that ?
So all in all sounds like Kumasi has left you with a favourable impression of the Albanian people ,which is great having made the effort to get there and experience it.
Amazing to think the place basically closes down shortly for the Autumn and Winter months .
Next stop Greece and Corfu. Assume the old cricket pitch come football ground is still in the middle of town ,where we played a bunch of locals all those years ago.
I guess you will have reached there today your time ,so hope you have found a good camp for your first night.
I imagine your arrival in the UK will overshadow that American guys visit there happening right now ,which Im sure will be a blow for his ego, but hey the royals don’t get to meet the Dolan’s everyday ,so he should understand that.
Mirupafshim Albania( yes I took Albanian at school)
What a great comment f0from Chris. Yes a lovely place makes me wish I was 50 again with your mum, but we'd done a lot anyway. Hope you get your bike boxes. Spoke to Peg last night she is looking forward to seeing you both, she was telling me she was one number off sharing a million pounds on the lotto.
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