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Now that Andrew was comfortable with the car, it was no issue driving through the narrow castle walls and challenging both tourists and tour buses if they got in his way on his exit from Berat. After that it was a smooth drive to Appolonia which is a tentative addition to the UNESCO classification.

This ancient city was supposedly established in the 6th century BC. There were some well preserved and interesting edifices and to be honest there were also some large empty spaces. Overall it was well worth visiting, just don’t bother to climb the hill in the corner that everyone else climbs, and then finds out it there is nothing there…is a real let-down.

We decided to go off the highway and find lunch in a pleasant local place. Only when we did that, the villages we went through either had restaurants that were shut or they just looked like too much of a challenge. So invoking plan B, we made our way back to the highway and into the large seaside town of Vlore. After a few tricky manoeuvres we found a car parking place and pulled up the map to locate a possible lunch spot. It turned out we had parked directly in front of one of the highest rated restaurants in that area – sometimes things just work out. We had a brief walk around the central city before getting back on the road.

We were staying in the beach town of Himarë. It had been chosen as a low key beach town compared to some of the full-on tourist towns further down the coast. The end of August marked the end of the summer season and being mid-September and there were plenty of signs of beach umbrellas and loungers being moved away. The ocean was very appealing with lots of waves, but the 2 days we were there the temperature dropped (temporarily) and we even had some rain. We were just happy to check the town out, eat and relax.

On leaving Himarë we stopped on the top of a hill to look down on a former submarine bunker which was an underwater base for submarines (a 650 metres long and 12 metres high tunnel) for four Soviet-built submarines, each 90 metres long. The submarine base remains in a military restriction zone and is used as a base for fast attack crafts and active-duty naval vessels.

Nearby we visited the Porto Palermo Castle. It was far more interesting than the 10 minute stop I thought it would be. Instead we spent quite a while walking around the castle.

Lunch was another random stop in Sarande city, where we were lucky to find an excellent restaurant. Food has not been a problem here.

The the last drive of the day, was up the hill to Gjirokaster. We were travelling close to the Greek border and in this area local town signs were in both Albanian and Greek. We stopped at the Field of Bunkers and clambered about looking at these monuments to a dark past. I forget how many there were (more than 10, less than 20) but this was in the middle of a rural area, with no obvious large population, and just so many bunkers.