31 May 2022
A relatively leisurely day today…for Tirana is only 40kms away. So we enjoyed a slow breakfast at our wonderful guest house. And it is only here in Albania (& Southern Montenegro, which used to be part of the Albanian kingdom) that we have been offered lots of protein for breakfast…! Makes such a nice change! Not a bad view either!!
From here you can still just see the sea…around 40kms away!!
And after the grind up yesterday…today started with a blast of a downhill!! And we were 10kms on in no time!!
And then we could not avoid a relatively busy road for the trip into the capital. But thankfully there was a good shoulder…and it actually felt a lot more comfortable than the busy roads over the past few weeks!! Even met a bit of livestock once close to the city….
Battery worries continue…so we opted to check out “Bosch Automotive” (which had moved)…& then we found the Bosch machinery place in Tirana. They were delightful…giving us three bottles of water…just because we were looking a bit sweaty!! (It is VERY hot…with midday temps up to 35)….but could not help, pointing us in the direction of an electrical repair shop nearby. The frustration here…is that clearly the battery (or batteries) are holding charge…but the problem exists between the batteries and the input/output!
Anyway….we needed to meet our AirBnB host so did that first! What a wonderful apartment! On the 12th floor….so it was another case of folding ourselves into the lift (which unhelpfully ended on the 11th floor!!). But very smart…with ace aircon…!!
Once we were settled…I then set out on a mission ref the battery. The electrical repair man could not help, so pointed me in the direction of a local bike shop…who could not help…who sent me to the central bazaar area…and one bike shop sent me to another…and then I found an old bike repair man (together with a customer who spoke perfect English!)…& he knew exactly the man I needed to see. So the ‘customer’ took me in hand to visit our man!! It was a lovely experience really…folk were so kind and always ready to help! And not a bad way to have a ‘purposeful’ walk around the city!
We found our man in the cafe next to his tiny workshop. And – good grief – he had two Bosch batteries amongst his chaos…one in pieces, and one attached to his own bike! And a charger! I do believe that he had at least 50% of all Bosch bike batteries in Albania!!
His immediate diagnosis was that the BMS had failed (the sort of battery control motherboard…smaller than a credit card!). Upon pressing..he said he would have a proper look in the morning. Not very promising!
I was very hot and knackered by the time I got back to the apartment…by which time…it was beer time!! Phew!!
So….ref Tirana…there is really no “old” centre. And the main central square is huge and fairly soulless….but, notwithstanding the absence of “things to see”, it has a GREAT vibe. Slightly chaotic but very un-aggressive traffic (and they always stop at zebra crossings!). Difficult to pinpoint really…but we both felt the same way. It feels like a very liveable small city.
In terms of “old” as well…interesting to reflect that during the closed communist era (ie up to 1992)…religion was banned and most churches and mosques were destroyed.
It is quite difficult to believe the quoted figure of 70% muslims here. If so…they are remarkably liberal (not sure if I have seen so many busy bars etc anywhere!!).
We had one beer at a very ‘trendy bar’…
….but then went to take up our seats road-side. Much more interesting!
