2 September 2025 (sunny and hot 30C) 57km

We have seen some atrocious driving in Montenegro, so much so that I googled their road toll. In 2023 it was 74. However, their population is only 650,000. Compare that to NZ last year when our toll was 289 in a country of 5,000,000. So they really are as bad as we thought.

Today we saw a big snake (dead thankfully), entered a country neither of us has been to before and saved two lives.

Awake at 5.25pm after a "screaming child" free night. I had a fantastic sleep. Not sure if my body was just grateful to be off sharp stones and onto mostly hard packed dirt with the odd unripe olive making a solid bump in my bed, or maybe it was the glass of red wine with dinner.

Gathered our gear together and away by 6.15am. Over to Pete.

Up onto the main road and immediately turned off it up a very steep incline, for the next 4.4kms.

The following 4kms was undulating with some short sharp climbs and then we plateaued out.

Looking back at Uvala Maslina where we were camped last night.

It was a helluva way to start the day, but we both felt strong.

The road surface was okay and even the scenery was lush with nice mountain views.

The big plus was virtually no traffic on this secondary road and it was a weight removed from our shoulders.

We could once again do what we love and focus on the riding for enjoyment. 

At the crest of the climb, we came upon a flagpole and concrete rest area. The Montenegran flag proudly flying above all the rubbish collected around the perimeter, with rusty chairs for us to sit on.

Didn't look like it would get used much for anything other than a quick look over the gorge and mountains, before leaving whatever rubbish you had to dispose of.

We had been impressed with this country on entry, but soon discovered their efforts to keep their country clean and tidy, was confined to the touristy coastal part.

Talking to Emma and Bruno who had cycled the mountains for a month, they said there was plenty of rubbish being dumped up there.

Why put bins out, if your inhabitants choose to throw it everywhere. This is not a tourist issue. It is the locals.

The places we are cycling, no tourist is going to venture and it is a very sad mindset to have. 

After our breakfast, we rode down to meet the main road, which we had spied from the rest area. We were dreading the amount of traffic.

As it turned out, the surface was great, the traffic was excellent except for one idiot, who overtook heading straight for us, even though he could see I was in the middle of our lane in a vain effort to prevent such idiocy. We also had cars behind us who I feared would try to pass us while there was oncoming traffic.

Soon, we were riding into a short queue at border control, where an officer called us over to a separate “travellers” booth.

Everything checked out and we began our ride to Shkoder, on equally good road surface.

Immediately, we noticed the amount of cyclists, mainly old men puddling along, but very pleased to greet you with a smile and a wave. 

Ju here. It was here that we saved our first life. A little tortoise was crossing the road. We were amazed he'd survived the madman who had just flown past us, so leapt into action to get the little guy off the road. I held Pete's bike while he carried out the rescue mission and deposited him in some long grass, a respectable distance from the road.

Our ride continued and soon we were approaching Shkoder.

Firstly, the traffic began to increase in numbers and the intensity level went up. This is where we spied our second wayward tortoise. Pete quickly leaned his bike against the roadside crash barrier and scooped up the little fella in a rare moment when there were no cars about. Back to Pete.

On the outskirts of Skhoder and suddenly there were cars everywhere. Pulled into a cafe with a bankomat outside, but not knowing what an Albanian Lek was worth, decided to ride into the city.

Well Dot....I don't know what Nicola's Aunt-in-law was looking at in Shkoder to impress her so much, but it wasn't what we saw.

It was a grimy, filthy hole, with rubbish everywhere and we couldn't wait to get out of there. There was a cardboard (and anything else they could get their hands on) town about 50 metres from the back of the supermarket and plenty of unsavoury characters and stray dogs about. A rubbish dump was their front yard which made it convenient for the ghetto inhabitants to find things to salvage. 

There was a woman with three kids, headfirst in a dumpster, pulling out shoes which the kids were matching up, and lining them up on the footpath for sale.

A lot of young men strolling the streets and the driving was exactly like Montenegro.

There are a lot of mosques in Albania, definitely more than Montenegro.

Virgil, is this Thunderbird 6?

Due to the ATM in town being out of order, we quickly cycled back to the Cafe on our way out of town and pulled out some money.

Hit the road for our campground, but it was a main road and chaotic and we were back to keeping concentration levels high.

Eventually we reached the turnoff for our camp for the night, Gardenland Resort. Sounds fancy. Hoped they took tents.

The traffic dried up straight away and normal services were resumed.

Pulled into the entrance and immediately thought we were going to get stung again. 

They rolled out the red carpet for us.

As well as a big hotel, it also has villas, a campground and massive pools.

Went in and the girl, who was fluent in English, said "Euro 14"

That's nearly half of what we paid last night. The pool is Euro10, so we can do without a $20 swim.

The camping site had something we haven't seen for weeks….lush grass! After so long on rocks, stones, concrete or dirt, we are so looking forward to that.

Ate lunch on the groundsheet in the shade as we are waiting to see where the sun is going to be later, to pitch the tent.

We both showered (cold ones, by choice), did some washing, blogged and caught up with stuff from home.

About 5pm, two coach loads of Muslims turned up, which must be what this place survives on as there were no other campers.

We are still carrying our back up tins of tuna/corn/beans with a Mexican flavour, but thought we'd check out how expensive the restaurant was.

Chicken risotto and chicken Caesar salad were both 600 LEK.

Upon investigation, we realized this was $12NZ per meal. We decided to keep our cans of tuna as back up and went for dinner at 6pm.

The restaurant was completely empty and we enjoyed a delicious and filling dinner. No red wine or beer tonight though as we are catering to the Muslim crowd. Just a chilled bottle of water to share which cost more than a pint of beer ($5NZ).

Back to the tent at 7pm where we received a message from Sharon, who was up early, so had a nice lengthy chat with her as the Muslim coach travellers filed past for dinner.

It's fantastic to travel, but boy, we do miss our friends and 

family and realize what an awesome life we have at home.