Albania
Remote peaks, shepherds' paths and mountain villages lost in time.
Albania is the most mountainous country on the Adriatic, and the least densely populated part of the Balkans. Along the coast lie lagoons and unspoilt beaches, but the interior climbs quickly: the Accursed Mountains in the north, the uplands of Mirdita, and in the south the open plateaus around Gjirokastra. Until the 1990s the country was closed; forests, rivers and ridges are therefore still rough, unpaved landscapes where shepherds move their flocks to the high ground in summer, as they have for centuries. The northern ridges run on into Kosovo and Montenegro and together form the Prokletije massif. The Peaks of the Balkans links the three countries in a 192-kilometre loop of ten stages through the Prokletije, the Accursed Mountains: limestone peaks reaching almost 2,700 metres, glacial cirques, shepherd paths and stone villages where time runs differently. The route has existed since 2012 and, with border formalities arranged per pass, can be walked in either direction, from June to October.
