Travel by the insanely confusing Albanian Bus Transportation System? Check that off my bucket list…
Part of my leadership role on The World Race is being the Logistics Coordinator for my squad. This role is basically a position made to ensure everything the squad does on the race runs smoothly, like traveling from country to country, planning debriefs, etc. One specific job it includes is sending receipts back to the US, from all the squad money spent here in Albania. Unfortunately for me and my partner Sam, not all of our squad is in the same city.
This means that Sam and I have to find all of the teams in the different cities at the end of every month to collect the team receipts. This wouldn’t be a problem, if the Albanian bus system made any sense at all.
There’s a few things you should know going into this before I tell you about our logistical “adventure” day.
- There are no exact bus routes for anywhere in Albania, so basically if the buses decide they don’t want to stop, they won’t. And the stops are always changing.
- There is absolutely nothing on the internet about the buses and their routes.
So basically if you want to travel by bus anywhere, you’re on your own.
Now Sam and I are fairly confident people, but overall this is kind of an intimidating adventure to take on. Luckily we both live in the same city, so it didn’t take long to find each other and get to the official interurban station of Tirana.
Expectation: A modern building, clean windows and a clear place to buy a bus ticket, with chairs for waiting.
Reality: A rusted gate, that upon entering you are greeted by a sea of Albanian men, yelling in foreign tongues that was beyond my comprehension level. (And I’d like to think I’m pretty cultured in my foreign languages too. Cómo se dice this is not what I expected?)
Granted, I knew going into it with my American expectations that my dreams were a little out of reach, but still. I knew as soon as I saw what the “station” really was, Sam and I were in for more than just a quick bus ride.
We knew the first city we wanted to reach was Durres, a common tourist town on the coast of Albania. But the more we yelled “Durres,” the more people responded with “Fier.” It didn’t take us long to assume that “Fier” was another city in Albania; We just weren’t entirely sure where it was. We decided to follow the overbearing man yelling “Fier” onto his bus, probably with a little too much trust in him. The more we tried to ask if it was the right bus, the more we realized our driver didn’t speak a word of English.
We took the only seats left on the bus, and tried to ask our neighbors if the bus would actually stop in Durres, but the only girl who spoke English either had no idea what we were saying, or just wanted to play clueless to get us to stop talking. (The rest of the bus just gave us Americans dirty looks for being loud. I have learned they are a VERY quiet culture, and have actually gotten yelled at before for talking.) The bus left a minute after our conversation, and suddenly Sam and I were locked into our bus decision.
Sam decided to look up where the mythical city of “Fier” really was. Unfortunately this city actually does exist, and was 45 minutes SOUTH of where we wanted to go. Still, we had trust in our driver that he would stop in the city we were promised. It didn’t take long to start seeing the signs point in the right direction- Durres, straight ahead. We sat with a bit of our anxiety going down, but still on edge because who knew if the driver would stop. Eventually we saw the final sign for Durres pointing straight ahead. And when it came time to go straight, the driver turned left.(:
Lucky for us, our “English” speaking friend knew we needed to get off, and started summoning our bus driver. This had the rest of the bus in hysterics, for some of them were yelling to help us get off, and the other 99.9% were just upset about the noise. Finally the driver stopped, and Sam and I were off the bus in a somewhat shady spot.
I looked at Sam confident that we were done with that bus, but he looks at me, hands me his backpack and starts panicking that he forgot his wallet. Meanwhile, I’m getting a call from the team we’re trying to meet, so as I’m talking on the phone, I see my partner get back on the moving bus we just got off. You can only imagine the thoughts going through my head as I see the bus leave along with my friend/life line. Especially when I have his phone, and after looking through his backpack, I find his wallet too.
A nice 100 yards out, I see the door swing open, and with a James Bond tuck and roll, my partner Sam is off the bus and running at me. Only do I find out later that while on the bus, he trampled the ticket collector and knocked him off the bus when he jumped too. Yes, we are leaving such a good reputation for the Americans here, why do you ask?
So basically at this point we’re both in hysterics about the past five minutes of events. Luckily we did get off at the right place, and the rest of the trip to Durres was smooth sailing. We met with the team in Durres, and luckily the host they brought with was able to help us catch the right bus to our next city, Lezhe.
Because our whole squad spent the first two weeks of our trip in Lezhe together, we found this city much easier to navigate to. Unfortunately again for us, the bus we were on was going to the town over, so when we stopped in Lezhe the driver literally let us out on the side of a highway.
If we hadn’t been to the city before, Sam and I would have been lost ducks. Luckily we found a familiar soccer tent and found our way into the city to meet the final team of the day.
The rest of the story isn’t really that eventful and basically we just found a van to take us home, but then again the day’s earlier adventures gave me enough anxiety for three weeks, so I would still decide this story is worth sharing. And at the end of the day, it’s all worth it when you have views like this of the mountains outside your bus window. (Take that Colorado.) Every morning I wake up and ask myself what adventures will I encounter today, because in Albania, you never really quite know.
I’m having an amazing time here, and miss you all so much. Don’t forget to subscribe to my blog with either an email or phone number to be notified every time I decide to write about my somewhat exciting life!
