Author: Anthony Perez

Crete: The Big Island of Greece

Post author By Anthony Perez
Post date March 19, 2017
No Comments on Crete: The Big Island of Greece

My 11 Days in Crete

People like to deny it but Crete is just as much a Greek island like Santorini, Tinos, or Siros. Sure it’s way larger than most of the islands which are smaller. But think of it like the island of Hawai’i in the Hawaiian island group, Crete is the BIG ISLAND. Crete is without a doubt an island of it’s own, with it’s own culture, dialect, and overall mindset. “For Christ sake, people in the villages have guns!”, said my host in Iraklio.

I’ve spent a whole 2 – 3 weeks island hopping the Cyclades meeting a number of people who recommend that I stay way longer than just a few days. And that is exactly what I planned to do anyways. I stayed a total of 11 days and still was not long enough to see almost all of what Crete has to offer. But the time I did spend in Crete was absolutely incredible. I arrived in Heraklion after a short and quick ferry from Thira (Santorini). I was welcomed by a young female couchsurfer with open arms into her home along with her cat. Instead of 3 nights, I ended up staying four nights, spending time with some of her friends at the local beach, having massive gyros, endless plates of dinner and drinking bottomless Raki late at night. It’s these moments and memories that makes Couchsurfing so amazing and so glad to have enjoyed some of this authenticity at my first city in Crete.

Crete is not only home to the traditional Greek drink, Raki, but also home to the beginning of Greek history, the Ancient Minoan culture. I made my way to the once massive Palace of Knossos, a archaeological site, I once dreamt of seeing up close and personally. I’m not a big fan of museums, but I fell in love with the archaelogical museum in the city having artifacts from Ancient Egypt, the Bronze age, up to the Roman age. I also made my way to the beautiful southern coast to the formerly hippy beach town of Matala for a nice swim and some body surfing.

My plan in Crete was to try and hit each end of the island aside from the main port city. My next stop was the beautiful seaside town of Chania, a town I first discovered via the movie “Two Faces of January” in which was filmed. In my hostel, I met an older solo traveler who joined me on my venture around the beautiful Venetian town during and after sunset. The seaside is lined up with beautiful street lamps and restaurants, one of which we split the cost of a very nice dinner. Our server eventually did treat us to some more local wine and some more food. These dishes served were by far the most delicious I’ve ever had in my life.

Nearing 6 months of straight travel, I did find myself too tired to make any day trips, but did manage to enjoy some beach time within the town limits. I did however manage to slap myself in the face and have a bunkmate join me on a 7 hour hike down into the beautiful Samaria gorge in the southern part of the island.
Walking in the gorge makes one seem incredibly small as you are surrounded by incredibly high mountains. Once finished with a hike, you find yourself at the coast, and if you decide not to stay, a ferry awaits to take you to several nearby sea villages and eventually a boat to wherever you want to go.The southern coastline differs from the north as it is dramatically mountainous and jagged with steep cliffs.

After dealing with sore calves and barely waking up, my bunkmate decided to join me on my adventure to the east part of the island. This journey brought me to a very cheap furnished studio Airbnb in the quiet coastal town of Ierapetra, Crete’s southeast. Opposite of Irakleio and Chania, this town was far more quiet and relaxing, perfect to take things slow, enjoying a nice dinner on the water with some Raki, checking out the local Venetian Fortress, and simple beach time.

An additional benefit of staying here which also was a suggestion made by several people in the Cyclades, was Chrissi island, a small island off the coast of Ierapetra. About an hour ferry ride from town is the southernmost national park in Europe riddled with beaches that resemble the Caribbean. Here was one of few times where I literally enjoyed the feeling of being on vacation away from the stresses of planning going back home, running out of money, and getting the most of my last week in Greece, and in Europe. Oh, I also practiced the dance from Zorba the Greek here. Kind of suitable eh? 🙂

Anywho, Crete has tons to offer locals and travelers alike. The big island of Greece, surely is one big island. With so much to do and see, you need a trip on it’s own to fully get that 100% grasp of the culture. After all, it is completely different from the rest of Greece. While I’ve seen and experienced quite a bit on my journey, there is still so much more to experience. This is simply another reason why, a return to Greece, is a must. 🙂

Albania Europe General

Hitchhiking Albanian Riviera

Post author By Anthony Perez
Post date August 1, 2016
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With hitchhiking being a fairly new resource to me in the world of travel, I have quickly become very knowledgable in what to do and how to do it despite my intimidation for so long at the beginning of this Balkan journey. Albanians are some of the kindest most hospitable and friendly people I have met in the Balkans. I’ve gotten pretty lucky and fortunate to meet some incredible people either on the road, in hostels, or in towns and cities. For the most part, hitchhiking in Albania I felt should work… almost.. always? I’ve had worse luck in Greece and better hitchhiking in Bosnia. But Albania, was okay. As for heading down the coast, this was kind of a mistake.

I say mistake because for someone who is really active on Hitchwiki, a hitchhiking website that gives detailed info on where and how to hitchhiking in many places, I would have avoided any issues had I read into the website. With 110% confidence, I headed down the beautiful coastline riddled with rocky mountainous coastline and crystal clear water beaches. I’ve had a a number of short rides, but this gave me so many opportunities to stop in so many gorgeous places including a lone fortress on the sea and beautiful coastal villages. This journey really showed me how beautiful this country really is and made me realize, this is Europe’s true hidden gem.

Despite all of the beauty, at a certain point, the traffic flow died down to almost nothing leaving me to walk a total of 10 to 12 KM’s up and down a mountain. Seriously, the traffic literally died out. Maybe it’s me, but how does anyone not want to drive down this beautiful route. Fortunately the views were incredible on foot with views of Corfu island in the distance, the first time I laid my eyes on my dream country. A country I would eventually spend 2 months in. Unfortunately, despite my temporary inner happiness, the sun was beginning to set, and I still had about 20+ KMs left to go….Shit….

I honestly thought I was going to make it to my hostel in Sarande in the middle of the night on foot with nothing to eat. The only thing I had was the power of my laptop and to just keep walking straight until Sarande. Thankfully, I did get lucky. A couple picked me up right at the edge of the sunset and brought me the rest of the way. Oddly, they were traveling the entire south of the country overnight. After declining beer offers, the next step was finding my hostel in the dark.

Despite the trouble I experienced, I remember one hell of an amazing experience, seeing some of Albania’s hidden treasures and meeting friendly locals. For those who decide to hitch Vlore to Sarande, save yourself the trouble and hitch the inner highway. On another note, if you want adventure, do what I did. If I could do it again, I would stay in some of those towns and camp at the fortress with a great morning view of the sea. 😀

Porto Palermo Albania — Wishing I had a tent to camp out on history on the sea. (Porto Palermo)

Europe General Kosovo

My 5 Days in Kosovo

Serbia map with Kosovo — Serbia with Kosovo.

While you can find yourself in so many arguments of whether or not Kosovo is a nation or not, statistically, most of the world recognizes it as a nation while some don’t. Number one is Serbia. But I am not writing this to argue it’s status, I could be on this topic forever. And my time in Kosovo was not to bring up the topic and start debates. Just like the rest of the Balkan countries, I had a curiosity of this place. And as in continued my journey in southeast Europe, I little by little, heard more and more pleasant things about Kosovo.

1) It’s beautiful

2) People are extremely kind

3) Kosovo people exceptionally love Americans (I’ll explain that in a bit)

Arrival – 1st city, Peja
I arrived by bus from Podgorica through the Sandzak mountains of Montenegro across the mountainous border of Kosovo down into my first stop, Peja. Peja is a cool city filled with locals and one hostel, where I stayed. Couchsurfing was a dead stop in Kosovo, which I learned later was due to many families living together in one household due to not so awesome salaries and living costs. In Peja, I spend some time walking around town, but where i really wanted to be was in Rugova valley, the mountainous corner of Kosovo in the same mountain range as north Albania and Montenegro.

A Day in the Kosovo Mountains
My day trip into the mountains was surely not a planned one as I just simply walked into the valley and kept going. The views were insanely gorgeous as a river flows by a small roadway and on each side are high mountains. It makes you realize how small you are. Walking through the gorge led me to a small swing bridge, a restaurant and small makeshift community both with American flags, and to a point where a local offered me a ride on his tractor trailer, without even putting my thumb out. This hitchhiking experience so far is my most memorable to date. I mean, take a gorgeous valley, a flowing river, and riding solo on the back of a tractor like I was the only one that signed up for a school field trip. This was incredible and my video footage captured the cool dude showing the peace sign back at me as he handles the sharp turns of this narrow roadway. While I could have gone further with him to actual hiking trails, I asked to get off at the place near a village I wanted to see. After chucking deuces at each other, I saw him drive away and I continued on with my trek.

My hike wasn’t exactly a hike, but two hours got me through some beautiful and quiet local villages. Even had one farmer stop me from walking just so I can take a photo of him giving me the peace sign, that was also on video. My hike up the mountain was very dangerous, but my adventurous side continued up with 3 scrapes all the way to the top where I enjoyed some lunch and views of the doorway to heaven. I was literally in the clouds. At the end of this long day, I hit up a riverside restaurant on the way into town, enjoy a chicken dish as well as a brew, Peja.

Hitchhiking
Next day was my hitchhiking day, and thumbing it came very easily,taking no longer than a minute to hitch rides with really friendly people. En route to Prizren, I hitched a ride with a friendly local who spoke some English and even got him to say hi to the USA on camera. In regards to the USA, Kosovars love Americans as we practically liberated them from ongoing Serb attacks in and around Kosovo in the late 90s. This resulted in a bombing campaign identical to the one in Bosnia against Bosnian Serbs in the mid 90’s. As for being an American traveler, I am greeted so much more by locals. Not to sound ridiculous, but i really enjoyed it. This guy made an extra stop at an old Orthodox church for me before parting ways. My next ride got me into the next town where I befriended many locals who went insane when I told them I was from the USA, asking me questions and offering me some of their food. I was on a full stomach and I wanted them to enjoy their dishes. After one more ride, I caved in and took a bus to Prizren. The heat is unbearable during June.

Old Stone Bridge Kosovo — Old Stone Bridge

Prizren
Prizren is probably Kosovo’s tourism city, even though the locals outdo foreigners quite a lot. Prizren is home to one of my favorite coffee spots sitting along the river and enjoying views up at the city fortress. Hiking up to the fortress during the evening is the perfect choice as you not only avoid intense heat but the sunsets are incredible as the sun sets behind the mountains I had been in earlier in this blog. What i loved about Kosovo also, is that there is an American style brewery in Prishtina that distributes across Kosovo. After many months, I was able to enjoy a delicious India Pale Ale that had the authentic taste of an IPA from the states. This was in a bar in the city center.


Kosovo Brewed IPA :))

Hitchhiking fail to Prishtina
My second hitchhiking journey to Prishtina wasn’t as awesome as the day before. As the roads in Kosovo aren’t so direct, it was really hard getting a ride that resulted in distance. It was hard getting a ride period. I actually walked many Kilometers out of Prizren to catch one ride into one of the neighboring towns. While Kosovo drivers are fairly persuasive in taking you to the bus station and because of the heat as well, I caved in once again and caught a bus to the capital city.

Prishtina
Prishtina is Kosovo’s administrative center and honestly isn’t too interesting as a tourism city. But it was certainly a cool city with a very active scene with couples, families, and friends walking around aimlessly enjoying a chill evening out. Prishtina does have an interesting National Library neighbored by an unfinished orthodox church, Newborn Monument for the independence of Kosovo (2008), as well as a statue of Bill Clinton. Yea, our most gangsta prez of Merica’ has a frickin statue on a street of the same name with a massive portrait of him above. Hell, there is even a Hillary clothing store nearby.

All in all, the Kosovo experience was very short but was certainly interesting. A memory that I will certainly keep. The beautiful landscape gossip turned out to be true. And the rides from those locals proved how incredibly kind Kosovo people truly are. From Prishtina, I made my way to Macedonian to continue my voyage onto Greece. Shit, I even saw a small replica of the Statue of Liberty atop of an apartment building. lol.

Thank you Kosovo for a proving to be incredible!

Tags kosova, kosovo

Europe General Macedonia (F.Y.R.O.M.)

Hitchhiking Macedonia

In the Balkans, I’ve had some incredible encounters with many incredible and friendly drivers. But the hours long journey across western Macedonia will forever remain one of my favorite journeys in my heart. I started off taking a bus to the end of Skopje with an OHRID sign right at the start of the highway. At almost the 2 hour mark, I found myself with a friendly Macedonian guy who also picked up two more Macedonian guys other than me. Although he was not headed south to Ohrid, he did bring me west to the off ramp outside of the city of Tetovo.

There on the side of the road, I waited another 30 minutes before a nice older Albanian man picked me up en route to Tirana. He asked where I was going, I decided to tell him Mavrovo, a national park on the western most part of the country along Albania. Not sure if he was taking that route or not, but he did decide to take me through dropping me off at the lake where a beautiful orthodox church sits above the lake. After about 20 minutes of photos, I walked to a local grocery store to buy fruit and a day snack to munch on for the rest of the journey.

In front of me at the counter was a lovely Dutch couple who I ended up hitching a ride with outside of the store by asking them if they were going to Ohrid. While they accepted me as a new passenger, they did mentioned that they were hunting for a hiking trail up to a waterfalls. Like this was such a problem. Of course I wanted in on the excursion. We spent an hour hunting for this village and when we did find the village, we asked dozens of people where the trailhead was. This led us to an incredible older Albanian woman who brough us not only to the trailhead, but ALL the way to the waterfalls. This woman was celebrating Ramadan, which meant she was fasting. SAY WHAT?! Incredible.

The falls were gorgeous as was the rest of the 40 minute hike. On the way back we were randomly greeted by some of the people from the village who spoke with us with so much warmth. They lost it when they found out an American was in their small village. The best part and also the sad one, was the goodbyes. a 10 minute conversation felt like days long and saying goodbye was incredibly emotional as we waved goodbye every couple of footsteps until waving out the backwindow of the couples rental car. It’s little moments like these that remain in your memory forever.

Hitchhiking Macedonia Mavrovo waterfalls — Duf Falls in Mavrovo Nat’l Park

The rest of the journey was many stops along the highway in and outside of the park. It was filled with many lakes within the valley and beautiful hillside towns with tiny mosques dotting them. It was near sunset where we finally reach Ohrid town and we hugged and said our goodbyes, as if we had known each other for days. After getting settled in my Airbnb, I managed to catch the sunset over the infamous St John Church on Ohrid. At the end of the day, I realized that If I had succumbed to taking the easy route avoiding the sun and caught a bus, I not only would have missed out on this incredible journey, but I probably would have had zero interaction with anyone. Oh, and I really hate buses. Cheers to hitchhiking, Macedonia, and the incredible people whom I made amazing connections with. 🙂

Hitchhiking Macedonia Sunset Ohrid — Sunset over Ohrid & St John Church

Tags fyrom, Macedonia, makedonija

General Montenegro

My Short Time in Podgorica

Post author By Anthony Perez
Post date July 25, 2016
No Comments on My Short Time in Podgorica

Montenegro is known for it’s beautiful high mountains, gorgeous rocky coastline, and infamous Kotor Bay. Coming from Croatia, I spent a lot of time traveling down the coast stopping in different cities along the way. I’ve met a bunch of people who travel to Montenegro and it’s not uncommon for people to only travel the cities on the coast as well as Kotor Bay. But noone ever talks about the capital city, Podgorica, formerly known as Titograd from the 40’s to the 90’s.

When I told my hostel owner in Ulcinj that I was headed to Podgorica, she was like “Why would you go there? There is nothing there” Well, as expected she was right. I arrived by hitchhiking with a really kind older Montenegrin man that dropped me off right on the edge of town. Getting out of the car it was as if the city was established and created several years ago. The streets are in a perfect square grid and the not so exciting looking buildings have the same shape. Many apartments resemble the socialist bloc apartments that now all have multiple personalities on each terrace.

It was an insanely hot day walking around the city because I had to wait two hours until my couchsurfing host got off of work. It was the longest two hours of sweat and direct sunlight. Meanwhile there are maybe three or four things worth seeing in the city. Clock tower, old bridge, modern bridge, and river. If i was trasiting through and asked myself if I should stay a day or see it in a few hours, I honestly would not feel bad avoiding the city.

However, since I did not couchsurf at all during my time in Montenegro, I felt like Podgorica would be much more worth just going. As always couchsurfing makes any experience anywhere very personal. While there was not much sightseeing to do with my host, we had a good time grabbing a drink in a local pub with some football on TV, something I probably wouldn’t do on my own. At the end of the night we went out into the “center” where there is a two block radius of bars and music to have more drinks and meet up with friends.

Speaking with some of his friends, they asked me the same thing, “What are you doing here?” If I was alone, I probably would have had a less appreciation for the city. But because I was hanging out with locals, it felt nice to be a part of their city which they certainly are proud of. They felt good that I am enjoying there little capital city being around them. So in conclusion, Podgorica may not be a great place to vacation and good for a stopover, it’s certainly worthwhile if you have the opportunity to stay with and or spend some time with locals. 🙂

Couchsurfing Montenegro Podgorica — Beer cheers!

Tags montenegro

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