Our Balkan Week - Part 1 : Sunny Weekend in Skopje
- Mallaury
- 28 oct. 2017
- 4 min de lecture
Friday, 20th October, we leave Strasbourg by Flixbus in the morning. Our flight to Prishtina takes off at the Euroairport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg. After 2 hours, we land in the unknown Kosovo's capital. We buy a bottle of water - shishe uji - and smoke our first cigarette, enjoying an unexpected warm temperature.
The plan of going to Kosovo was also scheduled to visit a friend of mine, Lucie. We join her in Prishtina from the airport. As she strongly advised us to only pay 13€ for a taxi from the airport to the city center, we try to negociate, but fastly understand that we gonna have to pay 20€ anyway. ADVISE : call yourself a taxi instead of taking those at the airport.
Once arrived at the meeting point with Lucie (in front of the French Ambassy) everything goes kind of fast. We take another taxi to the main bus station, wait for our bus to Skopje, Macedonia for at least one hour. During this waiting time we meet some locals, but also some French expats who live in Skopje for an internship.
We arrive in Skopje after a 2 hours trip by night. A taxi brings us to our accommodation, an apartment in the city center.
Then, we head to the main square of Skopje : Macedonia Square (Плоштад Македонија). On this square stands a huge statue of Alexander the Great. We eat in an Italian restaurant and drink our first Balkans beer.
The next morning, Tobias and me wake up to bring back some coffees and breakfast at the apartment, before leaving to explore the city.
We finally throw ourselves in crazy-Skopje :
We take a break in the Old Town and try out the different Balkans typical cakes (Baklava, Trilece and Ravani), with coffee and cigarettes.
It's just delicious ! It's such a chill time we share at this small table, in the streets of Skopje. Everyone look so nice and relax, it's warm, and it's a real bonus when the muezzin near by is calling to the prayer. This perfect kind of moment when you're absolutely convinced that travelling is the only truly worth it thing among all others.
We walk, then, to the Mustapha Pasha's Mosque. The entrance to the Mosque is free, you only need to take off your shoes and wear "decent" clothes. Unlike other holy places you're allowed to take pictures, they even encourage you to do so.
As it's near by the Mosque, our next stop is the Fortress of Skopje, which offers you an amazing view over the city. If walking along the fortress is free, it's quite unfortunate that nothing is explained about its history.
All day I just couldn't wait for it : hangin'in Skopje's Old Bazaar ! You can basically find everything there : clothes, shoes (lot of shoes), food, spices, furnitures, all kinds of stuff.
After seeing all this food on the market, we're starving. We fast find a cute square in the old town's maze of streets. Our lunch : Macedonian most popular beer Skopsko(Скопско), local white cheese, eggplants, breads, ajvar, and Schopska-Salad.
Ajvar : I would very-simply explain it as a red bell peppers kind of purée. You anyway need to try that !
Going out of the old town, you can cross the Stone Bridge from where you can admire Macedonia Square and Alexander the Great huge statue.
As Lucie needs to work on Sunday, she leaves us to take a bus back to Prishtina at around 6pm. We keep our trip alone until we meet her again in Prishtina.
The next morning (Sunday) our plan is to wake up early, walk back to the bus station and take a ride to Kosovo. The next town in our list is Prizren. The website for the bus schedule - www.balkanviator.com - indicates that the bus Skopje-Prizren leaves at 9AM. NOPE NOPE NOPE. At the station we're told that there's only one bus to Prizren, at... 4PM. Great moment! After a short instant of "wtf can we do now ?" and a coffee we decide to follow Lucie's advise to visit the orthodox Church St. Clement of Ohrid, the largest one in Macedonia.
A short last coffee time in the Macedonian capital, a lunch on the same sqaure we ate with Lucie the day before.
Finally in the bus, we head to Prizren, Kosovo !
Final word about Skopje and tips :
"This city is mad, it's like nothing you've seen before. There is statues everywhere. And weird new-built buildings." That's basically the first thing I heard about Skopje. And it's a pretty good description. The mayor of Skopje spent a lot to renovate the city with huge antic monuments. It looks old, but it's very new...
Macedonian currency is the denar (MKD). 1 EURO worths approximately 60 MKD. To withdraw money I advise you to use the ATM of the NLB Bank.
I also advise you to take a half-empty luggage or an extra bag to bring back shoes freshly bought in the Old Bazaar.
The locals don't really know the street names because they've changes recently. The taxi drivers don't know it neither. You most of the time need to indicate something known, for instance the Parliament, or a mall, ...
Soon next posts about our Balkan week : Kosovo !
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