End of 2020: 920 km of motorways

August 2026: 1476 km + 143 km expected to be opened by the end of 2026

Source: 130km.ro

The Peaks of the Balkans is stunning the entire time, as you'll trek for 10+ days through Albania, Montenegro, and Kosovo, taking in gorgeous views of towering mountains, deep valleys, and expansive flower fields.

However, hands down, my favorite day was hiking in Montenegro's Prokletije National Park.

My trekking group started down in the Grbaja Valley, looking up at what is often called the "Yosemite of the Balkans."

The trail starts easy with a shady, gradual climb through the forest, though once you emerge the challenging climb begins.

Making your way up Mount Talijanka at 2,057 meters is steep and a definite calf-burner, but you've got gorgeous views the entire time.

I am not being dramatic when I say my jaw dropped at the top. Looking one way, you'll see stone spires and sheer walls that look like the Dolomites. Then the other way it's rolling mountains that seem to stretch on forever.

Here is a photo I took from the top:

The neat thing about this day of the Peaks of the Balkans trek is you can actually do 3 peaks (it's technically part of the "3 Peaks Trail"). These include Mount Volušnica, Mount Talijanka, and Mount Popadija.

Or can skip Mount Volušnica and just do Mount Talijanka and Mount Popadija. These two are connected by a flat path, so you don't need to do much extra work to also summit Mount Popadija.

Tip: the way down is steep and slippery, with lots of loose sand and shale, so bring trekking poles.

Have you hiked the Peaks of the Balkans or Mount Talijanka?

I recently finished painting this 200 mm bust of Ioannis Makriyannis, one of the most important figures of the Greek Revolution of 1821.

A general, revolutionary and later the author of his famous Memoirs, Makriyannis remains one of the most recognizable personalities of modern Greek history.

Hope you enjoy our interpretation of him.

Here is the playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3xNOttcantQvVBIrR6o9Lx?si=ee2289c0889a414f

I see that Ratko Mladic ,AKA the butcher of Bosnia, died in prison earlier this week. 31 years ago, he was the war criminal who was supposedly responsible for up to 100k murders in the Balkans.

I have personally visited Srebrenica and learnt about the horrors there, as well as the appalling failure of the UN peacekeeping force.

What I'm struggling to understand is why some Serbians see him as a hero. Why do they praise him? And why was he buried with full military honours?

Are there any Serbians here who share their perspective? I'm genuinely struggling to understand.

Are there some Serbians who don't see him as a hero? Is opinion divided across the country? And are his actions taught in schools today? Please help me to understand

Jaz beach taxi warning:

License plate: BD TX307

(Best Taxi - 19505)

My son and I (45 F) just had a very scary experience with a taxi driver from Jaz Beach. He took us the wrong way, tried to overcharge us, and when I refused to pay extra he drove, at high speed, in a car without working seatbelts, back to the beach - refusing to stop and let us out despite repeated pleas to do so. He was then physically and verbally aggressive towards me, and swore at my young child. I have had to report the matter to the Police. Please can travellers be aware of this vehicle and keep themselves safe!

He died alone in the Hague a few days ago. His father was killed by Ustase during World War 2 and he clearly took his nationalist rage out on the Bosniaks, Srebrenica in particular.

Mladic was rightfully condemned for organising mass murder and rape of civilians and POWs, of course I agree with it. Him and Karadzic aimed to cleanse all Bosniaks from their own country, just to replace them with Serbs - it sounds familiar to Israeli settlers in the West Bank today.

But with the modern Israeli genocide on Palestinians in Gaza, and the settlers aiming to wipe out Palestinians in the West Bank, it makes it clear that the actions of Serbs in the Yugoslav Wars during the 1990s is something that if it happened today - it would not receive as much outrage.

Just look at how Netanyahu can travel from country to country as a free man despite voting in support of a bill to mass execute Palestinian prisoners, and Trump handing over the World Cup to Spanish players only months after the US struck an Iranian school and killed 150 - primarily schoolchildren.

Fuck Mladic, and I am in no way trying to play down his crimes by comparing them to others, but we should surely have the same energy for our current war criminals, even if they are in uncomfortably powerful positions.

On August 27, Ratko Mladić, who served as commander of the Army of Republika Srpska during the Bosnian War and was later sentenced to life imprisonment by an international criminal tribunal, died in prison in The Hague. Mladić’s death has sparked discussion and once again brought back memories of the series of bloody wars and ethnic massacres that took place in the Balkans more than 30 years ago. Meanwhile, the increasingly disharmonious relations and growing conflicts between countries and among different ethnic groups within countries in today’s world have also raised fears that such tragedies could be repeated.
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Looking back at the history of the Balkan Peninsula, where the Bosnian War took place, one can see the region’s long-standing ethnic differences, conflicts, and accumulated grievances. Although most of the people there could broadly be described as South Slavs, they can more specifically be divided into Serbs, who are predominantly Eastern Orthodox; Croats, who are predominantly Catholic; Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), who are Muslim; Slovenes; Macedonians; Kosovars; and others. Because of differences over religion, land, interests, and the influence of major powers behind them, these ethnic groups have long been in conflict and have accumulated deep grievances against one another, with mutual killings recurring throughout history.
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Following the upheavals in Eastern Europe in 1989, Yugoslavia—a state comprising six republics and two autonomous provinces, held together by the communist ideology and authoritarian power of the strongman Josip Broz Tito and his followers—gradually disintegrated. Ethnic tensions increasingly intensified and eventually erupted into war. The Bosnian War was the bloodiest part of this process. Members of different ethnic groups committed war crimes against members of other groups, including killings and the rape of women, and even acts of genocide. The best-known was the Srebrenica massacre carried out by Bosnian Serb forces, in which more than 8,000 Bosniaks were killed and many women and girls were raped.
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Later, with intervention by the United Nations and international forces, the Bosnian War and the other Yugoslav wars gradually came to an end, but not before they had caused approximately 140,000 deaths and displaced millions of people, turning many into refugees. These wars were also among the most recent tragedies involving large-scale ethnic conflict and massacres. Later, a number of participants in the wars who had been involved in massacres of civilians were internationally wanted and arrested, including Mladić. Both Mladić and Radovan Karadžić, another major figure responsible for the massacres, were sentenced to life imprisonment.
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In the decades that followed, the Balkans and the world as a whole experienced a long period of peace and development. The global economy grew rapidly, international cooperation deepened, democracy and human rights received unprecedented attention, and wars and conflicts declined substantially. The vision of people sharing the prosperity of a “global village” regardless of ethnicity or national borders seemed increasingly within reach. For a time, the world really did seem to be getting better, and people were generally optimistic.
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But if we carefully examine international affairs and ethnic relations within multiethnic countries, we can see that divisions and tensions never truly disappeared; they were merely obscured by economic development and the superficial order of a civilized society. Beginning with the rise of conservative populism around the world roughly a decade ago, the globalization-based order dominated by center-left and center-right establishments began to unravel. Extreme nationalism and populism among different countries and ethnic groups have grown increasingly powerful, and conflicts have once again increased.
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From racial tensions between white and Black Americans within the United States, to conflicts between Europe’s traditionally Christian populations and newly arrived Muslim immigrants, to a series of ethnic problems in China’s Xinjiang region, and tensions—and even riots and civil wars—between dominant ethnic groups and minorities in countries such as India and Myanmar, all these developments tell us that today’s world has not achieved “universal harmony.” On the contrary, it is becoming increasingly divided and polarized.
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Compared with conflicts between countries, tensions among different ethnic groups within individual countries can be deeper and potentially more dangerous. This is because ethnic groups within the same country have more frequent contact with one another, conflicts rooted in religion and interests are more direct, and historical grievances are often more extensive. During periods of peace and stable social order, superficial harmony—or even the appearance of being “one family”—can be maintained. But when tensions accumulate, regimes become unstable, upheavals occur, and the old order collapses, conflicts between ethnic groups can erupt abruptly and deteriorate rapidly, leading to violence whose intensity and scale spiral upward and creating a vicious cycle of retaliatory killings.
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Under such circumstances, the once-kindly uncle next door may turn into an executioner, harming women and children of another ethnic group who used to visit his home regularly and with whom he had a generally decent relationship, despite past favors and grievances; a seemingly simple and kindhearted teenager may raise a butcher’s knife against his former playmate. Historian Jan T. Gross’s \\\*Neighbors\\\* describes the massacre during World War II by Poles of Polish Jews whose families had lived alongside them for generations. The killings between Armenians and Azerbaijanis, massacres of ethnic Chinese by indigenous Indonesians, and armed conflict between ethnic Ukrainians and Russians in eastern Ukraine all demonstrate this terrifying possibility.
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Therefore, tragedies such as the Bosnian War and the Srebrenica massacre could occur at any time and in any place in multiethnic and multireligious countries around the world, with particularly high risks in countries where ethnic relations are tense, historical grievances run deep, and the ethnic composition and distribution resemble those of the former Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav wars and the country’s disintegration were also partly attributable to the fact that the strongman Tito and the ruling party concentrated their energy on maintaining their own rule and were overly confident about the survival of the regime and their ethnic policies. Not only did they fail to actively guard against the foreseeable possibilities of disintegration and civil war, but some of their policies even exacerbated ethnic differences and divisions, sowing the seeds of later tragedy.
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Relying solely on repression and control to conceal ethnic tensions and the risks of conflict cannot work indefinitely and merely leaves hidden dangers behind. Attempting to preserve harmony solely through economic development and improved welfare likewise treats the symptoms rather than the root causes. Only by respecting and protecting the identities, religious beliefs, rights, and dignity of different ethnic groups, while simultaneously developing the economy to enlarge the “pie” and treating all ethnic groups equally, can long-term stability and peace become possible.
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How multiethnic countries should properly manage ethnic relations is a very difficult question. Both bullying minority and vulnerable ethnic groups and excessively suppressing larger ethnic groups and majorities can lead to tragedy.
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For example, the Burman-majoritarian policies of Myanmar’s central government have intensified separatist tendencies among ethnic minorities, while local armed forces of various ethnic groups have maintained control over different areas for prolonged periods;
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In Sri Lanka, where the majority of the population is Sinhalese, the Tamil minority was marginalized and treated unjustly and its rights were violated, leading to a prolonged civil war;
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One of the causes of the Yugoslav tragedy, meanwhile, was the excessive suppression of the Serbs, the country’s largest ethnic group, during the Tito era, which generated resentment among Serbs toward other ethnic groups they perceived as “benefiting at their expense” and triggered a backlash;
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The Rwandan genocide was also related to Belgian colonial policies that favored the minority Tutsis while suppressing the Hutu majority, contributing to divisions among Rwandans and resentment among Hutus.
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In reality, maintaining genuinely even-handed ethnic policies is not easy, and governments often address one problem only to create another. Another possible path is to weaken ethnic identification while strengthening civic identification, allowing civic consciousness to take precedence over ethnic consciousness and fostering loyalty to the state and the civic nation that exceeds allegiance to any particular ethnic group. Countries such as the United States and Brazil have followed this approach. However, in an era when identity politics is widespread, appeals based on civic rights are often less attractive and less capable of mobilizing people than identity politics based on ethnicity.
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Meanwhile, Czechoslovakia’s “Velvet Divorce” and the relatively peaceful dissolution of the Soviet Union offer another possible approach to resolving ethnic questions: respecting the wishes of different ethnic groups and allowing them to “peacefully separate” through democratic self-determination, rather than insisting on unity even at the cost of “domestic violence” in the form of civil war and massacres. As the saying goes, “a melon forcibly twisted from the vine is not sweet.” Maintaining peace, avoiding bloodshed, and respecting the autonomous wishes of different ethnic groups are better than preserving superficial unity at any cost, including through violence and authoritarian repression.
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Ethnic relations and ethnic conflicts are extraordinarily complex, and the author does not have many better solutions to offer, so I will leave the discussion there. But whatever the case, we must never underestimate the tensions among different ethnic groups around the world or the danger that large-scale ethnic massacres could occur again. After news of Mladić’s death was announced, some anti-Muslim users on social media platforms such as X expressed admiration for him, glorifying him and portraying him as a hero. This further demonstrates the need for vigilance.
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People should not regard Mladić’s death as a symbol that this brutal chapter of history has been closed and erased. Instead, his death should serve as an occasion to sound the alarm once again, reminding people in today’s world, which seems to be reverting to the law of the jungle, to anticipate ethnic problems and take precautions before crises emerge, and never to take such issues lightly, lest tragedies that are not so distant in the past be repeated in the future and in many more places.

(The author of this article is Wang Qingmin (王庆民), a Chinese writer based in Europe and researcher in international politics. The original text was written in Chinese.)

I went to Shkoder knowing it was the main gateway for Theth, Koman, and the Albanian Alps. I ended up staying three days, which turned out to be just enough time to discover the city.

The center is small. From The Wanderers Hostel, where I stayed, I could reach the pedestrian streets around Kolë Idromeno in about five minutes. I ate at Vila Bekteshi twice, found plenty of vegetarian choices around town (I eat meat, but sometimes it's nice to take a break), and eventually I borrowed a bicycle to ride toward Lake Shkodra with a few people from the hostel.

That bicycle ride was my trip’s least dignified moment.

I hadn’t ridden in six years, and I got confident too quickly. I decided fixing my bangs with one hand while taking a curb was within my skill set, but boy was I wrong. I ended up jumping off halfway through the fall and landing on all fours beside the bicycle.

Everyone else went swimming when we reached the lake, but I stayed on shore cleaning up the blood, applying bandaids, and repeatedly announcing that I was fine. A strong performance all around. 🎉

The lake was worth the ride, though, with thick vegetation along the shore, fishermen, a ridiculous number of birds, and a pretty sunset.

Three days also gave me enough room to notice how much variety sits around one fairly small city. You have Rozafa Castle, Mesi Bridge, the Marubi photography museum, Kolë Idromeno and Gjuhadol, Lake Shkodra, the Buna River, and then the routes farther north toward Theth, Koman Lake, Shala River, and Valbona.

I put everything I learned into a single detailed Shkoder guide, including where I stayed, where I ate, cycling, Lake Shkodra, day trips, current transport research, and the things I’d still do differently next time:

https://www.the-travel-bunny.com/visit-shkoder-albania/

For those who’ve spent time there, how many days did Shkoder get from you before you headed farther north?

#Shkoder #AlbaniaTravel #BalkansTravel #NorthernAlbania

I went to Radio Bar in Tirana expecting a decent cocktail and ended up staying because the place is unusually easy to settle into.

The interior looks like an eccentric vintage living room that slowly accumulated a bar. Old radios cover the shelves, the armchairs rarely match, Balkan film posters fill the walls, and the lighting stays low enough to make the whole room look better after dark. At the back there’s a covered courtyard with plants and a large tree, which I preferred when I wanted easier conversation.

The drinks were the other reason I stayed. My Old Fashioned was properly made, and I liked the Spiced Mojito with ginger and cloves. The menu also has Albanian raki cocktails such as Kaipiraki and Rakberry, which are far more interesting in Tirana than ordering the same drink I already know from home.

A few practical things I’d keep in mind. Radio gets much busier on Friday and Saturday, so I’d arrive before 21:00 if you care about where you sit. The bar currently states an over-20 entry rule. Prices are reasonable for a specialist cocktail bar in Blloku, but I wouldn’t call it a cheap-drinks place.

I also compared Radio with Nouvelle Vague and other Tirana cocktail bars because they serve different kinds of evenings. Radio is the one I’d pick for retro character, conversation, local spirits, and music rather than for rooftop views or highly technical mixology.

I put the full Radio Bar Tirana guide here, including current prices, what to order, opening hours, recent reviews, the courtyard, food, WiFi, dress code, and how to get there from Skanderbeg Square:

https://www.the-travel-bunny.com/radio-bar-tirana/

Curious where people here would rank Radio among the better bars in Tirana now.

#Tirana #AlbaniaTravel #Balkans #Blloku #TiranaNightlife

I would like to ask all the Balkans that date someone that is a different ethnicity but have xhenophobic parents - how did you deal with this?

In such situations we are not supposed to put our partners in such environment since they obviously won’t feel safe there.

But in future as well we will have kids with them and still it won’t be good for the kids to be around our racist parents.

Even if the parents pretend to be good to our partner, it still would feel off when he and me know how they actually are.

So I would like to hear your experiences and how you dealed with this or did you deal with it or had to seperate your paths? Or maybe cut off your parents to protect your relationship? Your experiences will be appreciated.

Edit: By outside of our culture, I mean Africans, East Asians, Central Asians or South Asians

And I am not talking for cases where we have different religions and in order the relationship to work the one partner will have to change it, i am talking about a relationship that the main problem are the racist parents. The person next to you still might be so interested in your culture and wants to learn something about it just like you would want to learn about hers/his.

Been following soccer closely for years, mostly watching in pubs or at home, and one thing I keep reading about is how different the atmosphere is at matches in the Balkans versus what you get in, say, Germany or the Netherlands. Not the top tier stuff that gets televised everywhere, but a regular league match on a weekend, the kind where the crowd is maybe a few thousand and everyone seems to know each other.

What I want to know is whether that reputation for intense atmosphere is real across the board or specific to certain clubs and cities. Because the way some people describe it, a midtable match in Belgrade or Thessaloniki sounds more genuinely charged than a lot of topflight games I've watched in western European stadiums where everyone sits politely and checks their phone.

Also curious about the practical side. Showing up as someone from outside the region, how easy is it to actually get in and follow what is happening. Whether tickets are a walkup situation or require knowing someone, that kind of thing. fwiw I've been in enough environments where the vibe shifts fast and you need to read the room quickly, so not worried about that part, just the logistics. ymmv by club and city I imagine but any firsthand takes are useful.