From Copacabana to Catalina, from Magog to Melbourne, from Seattle to São Paulo, the Daily News of Open Water Swimming has covered and traveled the world to cover open water swimmers and events of all distances and types. Special Olympics races in Athens, masters swims in Tokyo, charity swims in the Caribbean, mass participation swims in Rio de Janeiro.

But
We drove through a small section in Bosnia then it went back to Croatia. It was a
beautiful drive along the coast of Croatia and then into Montenegro. I figured it
would be some kind of faster roads but all of them were very curvy. The road to
Albania from Montenegro was up this steep windy road without lines. We stopped at a
gas station and coffee shop before crossing into Albania. I have never seen anything
like Albania! Once we crossed over there was a huge line of cars maybe 3 or 4 hours
they would be waiting in line to get out of the country. Then it was like something
you see on the news with people walking cows down the street and begging for money
along the windows. There was garbage everywhere and it was really dirty. There were
car washes …lavazh …every other building basically , lots of gas stations, and
wedding places. Those were the three main things that I saw over and over again. I’m
so glad we drove instead of flew because I am seeing so much and have been intrigued
the whole ride. It could take anywhere from 12 to 15 hour hours or more depending on
how long you get stuck at all the borders. Crossing into Macedonia while I’m typing
this so I don’t know when I will get wifi. Will write u more later!
Riolbania…..
No need to quote me on this but maybe you can incorporate it into traveling to these races
I guess the Czech girl sylvie took a different route because they are ok with Serbia and Croatians aren’t as much. And some countries are not good with the Albanians so they choose not to go through that country. It is strange .
If I had one word for Albania it would be carwash. Every other “business” was “lavazh” . Some were kind of like an actual car wash like the crappiest gang banging kind you would see in la and others were just a tarp with some ghetto hose out in the middle of the dirt.
Where we crossed the border from Montenegro to Albania was kind of scary. There were people begging for money … or anything …who would go up to the windows and stare at you. There were kids playing in the dirt under these tarps they probably called homes. There were cows just walking in the middle of the road. The line getting out of Montenegro the opposite way was about a 3-4 hour line of cars waiting. It probably depended how long they spent on each car investigating them or checking passports. There were a ton of Mercedes which I’m Guessing were stolen. The road would be paved ok and then go to dirt even in the middle of the capital city. Tirana was the name of the capital and it wasn’t as bad as the border. It was ok…. id compare it to the most hood /Mexican part of la with Albanian people. They were the poor ones though not like scary drug dealer areas where it looks like they have some money. It was just dirty and lots of graffiti. Their country flag is even scary… It’s like two mean black dragons/birds on a red flag. If you don’t know what it looks like just google it. It looks like nothing but anger and rage. There was basically just a general road going to the capital just one lane on each side… Then when you got to Tirana there were more lanes but still in the middle of the city it would just go to some crappy unpaved street all of a sudden. There were women just breast feeding children, horses , cows pulling carriage like things . When we got past the capital it actually started to look better as we got onto a new highway they were making. There was more greenery like Montenegro up in the hills and parts looked ok. It was also weird because at times I looked over and saw a pleasant looking “club” where there was some nice 50 meter pools or close to it with painted black lines on the bottom. Only no one in them. Maybe they were for tourists. But this was more out in the country. When we got out of the Albania side on the Macedonian border it didn’t take that long but there were just a few kids that were begging for money that we ignored. The car behind us gave them water bottles but the little shit head boys just threw it down the hill . It was rude. They also just kept trying to make the dog angry in the car when we were waiting in line. You have to allow so much time to go through the borders by car. Sometimes it takes 10 min other times it could take 3 or more hours like the Albanian /Montenegro border.
Hmmm trying to remember what else… Lots of wedding chapels (I don’t know if I could even call it a chapel) and lots of gas stations . We stopped to go to the bathroom one time but it was a semi decent bar /smoking lounge.
These are the kids trying to bother the dog through the windows

Carwash

A nice carwash
Sent from Lexie’s iPhone :-*

Lady walking a cow… I took most of the pics through the window so they wouldn’t see me doing it bc I didn’t know if they would be mad

O
kids at the border of Albania and Montenegro and lady begging

n

Also I learned that Macedonia is not something to call it with the Greek macedonias. They called it former yugoslavian republic of Macedonia. Some guy wrote me on twitter saying it was offensive to call it that. I didn’t realize how much all these counties either like or hate each other… Some to the extent that they will take a completely different and longer route to get somewhere

Hope this is more in depth . Sry so poorly written!
Copyright © 2013 by Open Water Swimming