Day 9

Left the hotel and took a circuitous route to Apollonia. It is an amazing archeological site covering 100 acres. Originally a Greek city from 400 BCE then a large Roman city from 300 AD. At its peak, it had about 50,000 inhabitants, and Julius Cesar visited it. The major excavation was done by a French archaeologist from 1924 to 1936. The Albanian govt. is not funding additional excavations and only 1% has been unearthed. The number of artifacts in the museum numbers in the thousands. We then drove to a national park which is a wetland preserve. It is famous for its large number of Dalmatian pelicans and its ferocious mosquitoes. Many places for outdoor lunch but we insisted on sitting indoors. Bo found it memorable for her lunch selection of eel, which is a local specialty. The eels were small and grilled whole. After cutting off the heal and tails, you just eat the meat around the spine. Very tasty (Al didn’t think so and had a pizza). From there we drove to Durres, our final destination in Albania. It is the second largest city and the principal port. We toured the archeological museum which contained thousands of artifacts from 3rd cent BCE to 8th cent AD, all excavated in Durres, which was a major Roman center on the trade routes with Greece and Constantinople. From there we walked to a dig that contained the remains of a very large amphitheatre /coliseum for 20,000 spectators Evidently you cannot dig anywhere in this city and not find Roman ruins. From there we went to our hotel (The Palace) which is exquisite, right on the beach. We are sitting by the pool under an umbrella with the rain falling around us, enjoying Albanian wine (Bo) and beer (Al) and fantastic freshly made tiramisu.

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