retiredmartin

May 2024. Tirana. Albania.

The homeward leg, now; back from “gorgeous Gjirokaster” (the TIC can have that for a 100 lek) to Tirana, which I had as yet no opinion on at all.

It wasn’t without incident. Mrs RM had booked seats on giirafa for 3pm, and now all we had to do was get to the bus station an unlikely half hour early.

And here the fun started, as the down pour returned. Where exactly is the bus station ?

Yes, I know that big red marker on the roundabout says Bus stop to Tirana, but there was no sign of buses, let alone a sign, and the App (always follow the app) took us 200 yards north to a spot marked “Station Autobusave”. Perhaps that was just for Italian travellers.

And now we got the first incidence of cars pulling up alongside us saying “Where you going”, “Taxi to Tirana ?”, “You looking for Draught Bass ?”.

Eventually a taciturn driver showed up, looked disdainfully at our mobile tickets, and made us visit a portacabin to get paper tickets printed out. We compared war wounds with a young Italian masters graduate on the bus, till he pretended to fall asleep (a typical Gen Z trick) as we passed Lushnje again and bored him with tales of missed buses.

Our luck picked up back at Tirana’s hideous South and North station, where in the absence of reliable information we decided to jump on the first bus rather than stand in the rain,

and 24 minutes later were standing opposite the main square, looking for the Prime Hotel.

“What have you done !” I asked Mrs RM, silently, as I admired the bucolic view from the window.

But Mrs RM is on a winning streak with her budget hotel picks, and PRIME was clean, spacious, well-equipped, and had a nice lady who kindly printed out our boarding passes in the morning (Tirana airport has the fastest electronic passport control in the world but can’t read your mobile ticket).

It was barely 7pm. I’d have done ALL (2) of Untappd’s recommended craft beer pubs that night; Mrs RM wasn’t moving beyond the cafe bar with a nice chap standing outside who’d said hello earlier.

Te Mezeu had a menu outside, the sort of Friday night club fittings you’d expect in Maidenhead, and an advert for Red Bull starring the Mona Lisa (Press PLAY now).

Casual and unfussy, with some dubious Woolworths ’70s esque covers of modern pop,

and electronic screen displays showing prices and pics of a small menu.

Oooh, local, you say ? The mythical Kriko.

I didn’t believe it after Hangover, especially since the lone member of staff went behind the sound system to pour our pints. I went for a look myself;

If I cared about beer, I’d investigate “provenance” and labelling further for you. It was served in a Carlberg glass.

It might as well have been Carlsberg to be honest, but that’s OK. 500 lek (£4.40-ish) seemed a bit steep; Albania isn’t quite the bargain for beer it is for food and rooms.

That burger and fries was £3, and came almost instantaneously. It wasn’t great, and Mrs RM went into meltdown on seeing the mayo and ketchup in the same pot.

“Do NOT mix that mayo and ketchup muck up !“.