Ferrytale...

Yesterday, we woke up early, still very satisfied with the delicious fish soup from the day before yesterday.

We then drove along the southern coast of Lake Skadar, which often turned into a cliff. There were beautiful views of the cloud-covered lake from our road. The road was single-lane, but it was not a problem. We only encountered three cars in 45 minutes, but we had to reverse more often during the hairpin turns because they were too narrow to navigate in one go, even using the entire width of the road. (Montenegro is very steep and mountainous)

Then we were already in Albania. The main roads are well-built, many secondary roads are as well, and (I say this to satisfy Michelle) some secondary roads are theoretically paved, but often the second gear is already too fast to navigate the best way between potholes and puddles (never drive through a puddle you don't know the depth of!).

The traffic discipline is very relaxed, you can park on the highway or ride a bike against the direction of traffic, no problem.

A note for travelers: Google Maps is not up to date here, intersections and bridges are often confused, so you might be sent in the seemingly right direction, but unfortunately, you cannot exit the highway without an exit.. Even if the navigation lady says it many times: turn right now;)

However, I regret that we were only in Albania for a short time, we need to make up for it. We will do this on our Black Sea tour in two or three years :-)

Our overnight stay from yesterday to today was at an Albanian dream beach, complete with palm trees, straw umbrellas, and a bridge to a small island - very romantic.

However, since Montenegro and southern Croatia, I am very spoiled and now I don't want to go into the water unless I can see the bottom, and this sandy beach had only slightly cloudy water. (Michelle teases me about it... rightfully so, she says)

Now we are on the ferry from Durres to Bari because there are no more available spots from Durres to Ancona for the next few days.

We were glad that we got a spot on the ferry, all the other ferries for the next four days are fully booked (according to the booking program and the lady from Directferries), but this is the emptiest ferry I have ever been on. Johann shares a whole deck with three other cars, the restaurants are almost empty or not open at all.. and we have already seen about 10 other passengers - very surreal.

Actually, we were sad that we couldn't drive all the way to Ancona, but now we think it might be better this way, because 10 hours on the ferry is already long when there is so little going on... Unfortunately, we still don't know where we will sleep tonight.. we were going to research all of that during the 10-hour ferry ride.. but of course, there is no Wi-Fi :(

The boarding of the ferry was also exciting.. they said we should soon drive into the first entrance.. but then we were gestured to stop - we are currently recovering from Albanian road traffic with beer and coffee.. at 10 in the morning ;) - we should drive in.. but the gate further to the right.. I think Johann is now a truck ;) From here on: no one speaks anything other than Albanian after the first check.. but they speak it quickly and a lot even if you look at them incomprehensibly ;) They wave a piece of paper that they want from us.. but we don't have it.. Security... hmm, and now? We don't understand anything.. first he mentions something about dogs.. so we think they are bringing drug-sniffing dogs.. but then an Albanian customs vehicle comes out and someone waves at us: we should follow them.. he races out of the area with his hazard lights on.. right, left,.. we follow behind Johann (without signaling of course, he has hazard lights; we can only guess where he is going at that speed) and off to the scanning.. aha! Johann is getting his first? X-ray.. We are excited.. but who knows, maybe Johann has experienced all of this before, he has been everywhere, almost in Iran. Apparently, everything is fine :)

Anyway, back again, back to the guy who wanted the security paper from us earlier, he said to drive through.. aha. but not quite so far, now he signals us to hurry back.. he wants to take a closer look inside Johann again.. why not, he is beautiful too :) He prepares his approval for us, which is a matchbox-sized piece of paper on which he writes his signature, license plate, and the date.. Now we can finally board the ship.. Reverse up the ramp.. and park with the other trucks ;) I think, if we had taken gate 1.. we would have never gotten such a great souvenir from Johann ;)