I prefer my nightclubs in rural settings

A trip through northern Albania, considerations when storming a castle, plus updates from a makeshift fish market.

If you've often thought that driving is too boring, that you wish you could weave in and out of traffic blindly on single carriageways, not be restricted by annoying lifesaving seatbelts, and that people don't beep their horns enough, then Albania might be the place for you.

Albanians drive with the confidence of a teenage boy; some with the ability of one. I've heard Albanians tell me this too, so I'm not saying anything that isn't well known. Perhaps in the way that we all declare other drivers to be idiots, but never ourselves. There's that study where most people rate their own driving to be above average, which is obviously statistically impossible. We're all guilty of false confidence in that way.

Perhaps part of the problem is that there is too much to look at whilst driving, especially when you drive north from the capital of Tirana. A two-hour route we took on our trip to Shkoder, a first step on our intention to set out and explore the country proper.

We kept waiting to see the space open up, to see fields and untouched countryside, but it never came. Or only in short bursts. Instead it felt like an endless industrial zone, broken up briefly by an extravagant-looking hotel, often claiming to be deluxe or premium or 5 stars, when next door there would be a car scrap yard or an empty field with a long abandoned half-finished building.

At one point, we drove past an unremarkable-looking building declaring itself a nightclub, with window decals featuring silhouettes of women in various poses. On a trip down south we'd seen another nightclub in the middle of nowhere. This one was called 'Dreams' and had a faded pink exterior. I reflected on whether I'd ever had that dream before, the one where you're at a nightclub in rural Albania, next to an empty field and a service station. Bad Dreams or even Night Terrors might have been better names.

We saw men waving unmarked burnt CDs inside paper sleeves, seemingly burdened with the difficult task of selling a mystery CD to traffic whizzing by. Not usually how people like to buy music, and not to mention Spotify is doing a roaring trade these days. We would later find out that these CDs often have traditional Albanian music on them, sometimes hip hop as well, which did narrow it down slightly.

In amongst the CD sellers were fruit stands stacked with watermelons, people selling rabbits, and flower sellers crossing busy parts of the highway and risking their lives to cut fresh stock growing wildly in between the central barriers. In some spots people were happy to stop their car in the middle of the lane to make these purchases, despite it being a main road.

In the absence of bus stops, people stood anywhere along the edge of the highway all the way up to Shkoder. This was one of the charming aspects of bus travel in Albania. After you'd waved the bus down, upon boarding you would buy your ticket from the ticket collector, whose job it was to move up and down the aisle collecting money, coordinating seating, and generally keep things operating smoothly. On one bus we caught up north, he also kept the bus driver amply supplied with biscuits. We could observe this from our vantage point at the very back of the bus, where a hand holding a plastic tray would extend with regularity across one side of the aisle, and a floating hand would appear from the other, search around in the crinkly plastic tray for several moments, before gratefully plucking a biscuit or two.

Aside from biscuit duty, his was a tough job, especially during summer. There may be hotter places on earth, but not many hotter than a north-bound Albanian bus on an afternoon in June. After having abandoned the idea of doing our own driving in Albania, having experienced the wild west of the north, we'd decided to give bus travel a go. As we got on the bus, I noticed the temperature displayed on a digital screen at the front of the bus read 42C, not before my body and entire soul had registered the temperature moments before. After staving off a minor panic attack, or what may have just been my body shutting down, we somehow survived the two-hour bus ride. It made me consider what travel options we had remaining and how much a helicopter transfer might cost.

Not for the first time during our time away, and having made it safely to our destination, we decided to climb a hill up to a castle. This one being Rozafa Castle in Shkoder, in the north of Albania. Walking out of the caravan park where we were staying across the road from the castle, we encountered a man washing some large fish in a plastic tub next to a busy road. They didn't seem to be moving so I assumed they weren't pet fish. Or if they were, they didn't appear to be thriving in their shallow plastic tub.

We crossed the busy road and almost immediately found ourselves lost. An embarrassing thing to realise when you're navigating to a castle that is just above your eyeline. Spirits were high however, having made a similar hike in recent times, and we realised this was one of those 'come in via the back way' kinds of places, and so we ducked around the corner, past a church and an eager taxi driver, and got back on track.

This brought us down a quiet road through a neighbourhood and past a lot of houses which, perhaps by osmosis, appeared to be more fortified and secure than the castle above it. High walls, razor wire, and broken glass glued to the tops of the wall. One place had successfully grown some lovely roses in amongst the razor wire and broken glass, which seemed to signal mixed messages. 'Strictly no trespassing! Do so at your own risk. But don't forget to have a wonderful day! Isn't life grand'.

The heightened security put us on edge as we walked through the neighbourhood. It was spookily quiet until we noticed a man sports-walking in our direction. We could tell immediately that he was on a sports walk and not a casual stroll because of his sports hands. You can identify sports hands because the fingers are tight together, pointing straight with thumbs locked in and arms bent at the elbow. It was comforting to see another person in amongst all the razor wire and broken glass. The man zipped by us quickly, his rigid extremities cutting aerodynamically through the air.

We passed a creepy, abandoned-looking mansion, set back on the property. An old and grand fountain sat in the front yard. Grass ran wild, benefitting the two cows who stood nearby chewing happily and watching us through the gate. The property looking exactly as it should if its custodians were two cows.

The streets started getting steeper, a good sign, and we rounded several switchbacks past more houses and under a little stone bridge. A man on a bike saw us and, having looked us up and down and assumed we were hopelessly out of our depth, kindly pointed upwards towards the giant castle directly above us. A not unwarranted assumption given our earlier struggles. Either way, had the generous man on the bike not been there, the presence of several souvenir stands up ahead also suggested we were headed in the right direction.

Our steps slowed as the incline got sharper, and we finally arrived on the main cobbled path that led up to the castle gate. As we got closer, we realised we were too early. The castle wouldn't open for another hour. I briefly considered gathering a small army, the man on the bike, sports hands, and the two cows alongside KB and myself, and storming the castle, but decided against it. Not because I didn't have faith in our abilities. It seemed the barrier to us gaining entry was a very out of place, shiny chrome turn-style with an electronic barcode scanner, set into the cobblestone path. Sure, the cows might have had trouble gripping onto the shiny chrome surfaces if we were to try and hoof it over (pun intended), but I’m sure we could have managed. Or, because there was a huge open space over to the left, highlighting the pointlessness of this modern, shiny chrome turn-style with electronic barcode scanner, simply walked through that. Considering the castle and surrounding area had surely seen enough aggression across history, ultimately I thought it best not to interrupt the peaceful times the people were now living in and we decided to return later in the day. This time we paid the admission and went dutifully through the turn-style and up into the castle.

We were slowed down briefly by a horde of school students, a mass of shouting and laughing mixed with apathy, before coming through a tunnel and then out into the open air, crumbling walls, and long, thick grass. Other people wandered around slowly, climbing steps around the outer edges and taking in the views. Disappointingly, there was also plenty of rubbish. Lying around everywhere inside the castle, enough that it was hard to look past. This unfortunately was not an isolated incident and there had and would be plenty of landmarks and places in nature we would visit that would also be tainted with rubbish strewn everywhere.

Further in, the castle ruins were more impressive and following a cobblestone path towards a gated archway, for a brief moment I imagined what it would have been like to take these steps all those thousands of years ago. I even said something to this effect to KB as I passed through the gate, setting myself up perfectly as we came out into an opening where, off to the side, was a tired-looking cafe built into one of the stone inner walls of the castle. The white cafe furniture and beer branded umbrellas rounding out the depressing scene. This, plus the rubbish, had slightly soured the hike and we were feeling a little flat. I was glad I hadn't rallied the army and brought them here so they could see this. Although the cows would have loved all the wild grass.

‘You don’t think the roses make us look too soft do you?’

We made our way back down again, from cobblestones back onto bitumen, past the mansion and all the fortified compounds with their rebellious roses. Back to the man and his fish who was now several fish lighter. He was chatting to a customer who stood leaning on a parked car that was holding up traffic in one lane. He seemed to be slightly annoyed at all the people beeping him. Waving a hand at them, before returning back to his conversation.

‘Some drivers, honestly.’

‘Tell me about it.’