Snakes, Lakes and Belly-Aches

We left the mountains and headed for the the equivalent of the sea in a land-locked country - Lake Ohrid. Lake Ohrid is Macedonia's top tourist destination and we soon found out that we were there in the busiest period of the summer. For people who like peace and quiet this could be a problem!

We arrived on Sunday and the town of Ohrid was pumping. The weather was warm and people flocked to the lake's edge. The water was a wonderful temperature. We had a few swims here during our stay. Our apartment was amazing - right on the waterfront and huge by our usual accommodation standards. There were three apartments stacked on top of a restaurant and all owned by the same guy. We were in the middle apartment.

There was live music on in the open-fronted restaurant downstairs that night. We got there early and got a prime spot at the front where we could watch the lake and the music. It was lovely watching the sun set over a cocktail. 

One of the specialties of the restaurant was their rib dish. It was enormous!

Finally the band turned up in matching shirts and pants. They looked very traditional. We wondered what traditional Macedonian music would be like. After a lot of delays, they finally started playing. Their first song was something like 'Release Me' by Engelbert Humperdinck and this was followed by the likes of Edelweiss, and other crooners from the 50s and 60s. I looked around the room. The average age seemed to be about 30 or 40. Why would they want to listen to this?

As if to prove how wrong I was, the crowd seemed to get into it. We went to bed at about 10pm and could still hear the music reverberating through the walls of the building although it wasn't loud. People in the apartment above us stomped around on the floor and banged doors, waking us regularly. At 1am we were both woken when the music was turned up. By this stage they well into the 'woohoo' stage of the evening and it was so noisy! Needless to say we didn't get a lot of sleep. 

We got up early and, while John slogged up the mountain behind the town on the bike, I explored the old city of Ohrid. I made my way to the famous Church of St John which is perched picturesquely on a craggy point.

There was a viewpoint just above the church and the views over the lake were beautiful. The mountains on the other side of the lake belong to Albania.

I walked back along a boardwalk over the water and saw a couple looking at something in the water. It was a snake! I couldn't work it out - there are land snakes and sea snakes but are there lake snakes? It turns out that there are. They're harmless, fortunately.

John and I explored the old town together later. It was lovely.  Rendered buildings lined cobblestoned streets although there was a pizza shop or restaurant on every second corner and not all the buildings were old. 

The top stories overhung the lower ones and were built close to other buildings to cast shade on the walkways underneath.

Flower boxes seem to make everything prettier!

I was surprised how many buildings were falling down, including ones with significant history.

We passed by a shop that called itself a handmade paper museum - "one of only six in the world!" it declared! Being a papercrafter, I had to visit. The helpful guy talked us through the steps of making handmade paper. I tried to find something to buy to thank him for his time but there was nothing we could use. Just as we realised this, an enormous tour group walked in. He didn't mind at all that we didn't buy anything!

From our apartment's small balcony we could see a group of men in their 60s and 70s who hung out together each day on the water's edge in front of our apartment. We soon nicknamed them "The blue boardies brigade" for their uniform of blue boardshorts and white hats. They all had deep tans except for under their boobs and along the creases of their stomachs, the result of spending all afternoon every day sitting in the sun talking to each other. Occasionally, they'd have a quick dip in the water then it was back to sitting on the low stone wall again. We never saw them eat or drink, just sit and talk. We spoke to a couple of them - one had lived in Australia and one in the US. They all come back to Macedonia each summer. Incredibly, the one from the US would only drink bottled water and had done that for 30 years. What a shocking impact on the planet that guy must have!

A friend of ours, David V from the US, had recommended a certain Macedonian wine and, much to our surprise, we found it! Tired from our lack of sleep the night before we thought we'd get takeaways from the restaurant downstairs and eat in, checking out the wine at the same time. It was all very lovely although when we headed to bed I felt a little queasy. I woke during the night knowing I was in trouble as waves of nausea hit me. The remainder of the night turned into a challenge of trying to make it to bathroom before I threw up and trying to find suitable receptacles for the times when I couldn't make it! Soon after, John went running to the bathroom ......

The next day we were both incredibly tired and I later worked out I slept for about 26 hours out of 32 over the next day or so! It's been a while since we were this sick, thank goodness. It turns out that a staff member in the restaurant downstairs had it and gave it to other staff as well as us. Bugger.

There was a lot to see around Ohrid but we didn't see any more. We had to check out and luckily we were just starting to feel a bit better. We could have taken a long route to our next destination and at least driven past the places we missed but we agreed we weren't up to it. We took the easiest route and made our way up into the mountain village of Brascino.

It didn't take me long to realise that I really liked this village. This was authentic 'old Europe' - ancient stone and timber houses and barns were surrounded by well-tended gardens. Elsewhere, rampant greenery hid an abundance of fruit and nut trees. We came across a few mounded haystacks of hand-stooked hay and small tractors rumbled through the village. The locals were friendly and many spoke enough English to hold a basic conversation. Places like this just feel right. It's like this is the way things are meant to be.

A beautiful river running straight from the Pelister National Park above us ran picturesquely through the village.

Enticing laneways meandered between stone walls flanked by that wild greenery.

Most of the old buildings were built in the same style, with layers of wood binding the stones together.

Many of the gorgeous old places were abandoned though.

Some newer buildings were too.

Many of the old barns used to hold livestock on the ground floor and hay on the upper floor. Most people no longer have livestock - it's not worth their while. The old barns are now largely used as storage sheds.

I have to point out that there were many newer houses too - neat, rendered places still built in the traditional style. I wonder if the old buildings simply get too hard to maintain. 

Many old ones, like this one, are being taken over by the jungle of greenery.

This is actually a photo of a house! If you look closely you can see a few tiles at the top of the greenery. That's the only part that hasn't been covered by vines!

John still wasn't 100% but he was able to drive so we explored the area by car. We were very close to the Greek border here and there's a 'beach' on Lake Prespa nearby. The lake is shared by Macedonia, Greece and Albania and it was weird standing on the shore looking at mountains in three different countries. The day was cooler though so we didn't swim although the water was incredibly warm.

The village below ours, called Ljubojno (no, we can't pronounce it either!) is similar to Brascino and has a stunning central square with a cafe so we dropped in for lunch. The cafe was full of a group of teenagers with American accents and the red-faced and obviously flustered owner made it clear that he was too busy to serve us! The group of local men sitting outside started talking to us. Of course, one was from the US and one was from Melbourne, although it took us a while to work out that "Keyordo" was Keilor Downs! We think they were a bit embarrassed that the owner wouldn't get us anything. We ended up sitting and talking to them for a while. They bought us cold drinks (they helped themselves from the shop fridge) and we learned a lot.

Over the half-hour or so that we were there, the group grew. One man arrived on a Red Fergie tractor. He was 'Albanian' even though he was born in Macedonia. The beekeeper from our village rolled up on his motorbike. He had lived in 'Thomaston' (Thomastown in Melbourne) for a while. The man from the US buys honey from this man, two litres at a time! At the next table were a couple of guys from Canada. Everyone comes 'home' to Macedonia for the summer to just hang out and unwind. 

There's one question that I haven't learnt the answer yet to though - where are all the women?

There were plenty of abandoned houses in this village too. This one was very grand in its day.

The men recommended we drive up to a nearby church. It was lovely!

There was a very steep climb up rickety steps to the top of the belltower.

There were great views back over the village and the lake.

The place we're staying at in Brascino is a well-known country restaurant that has four rooms to rent. When we first arrived, google maps brought us to a stone building but there were no signs saying if this was the right place, there was just a big gate. We cautiously opened the gate and peeked inside a door but it was someone's shed. We wandered down the road and bit and found some people sitting outside. We walked across the lawn to them and sure enough, this was the place! Weird.

The rooms were simple but ok. As it's peak season we expected it to be busy but we were the only guests most of the time. This was just as well as the wooden floors were so noisy!. The owners - a fluent-English speaking guy and his mum (the cook) were great but the mum was one out of the box. Her daughter and grandsons live in Australia of course. She spent five months in Melbourne ('Thomaston' again!) helping with the boys when they were little. She hated our 'plastic' food and lost heaps of weight.

In this part of the world, they don't trust food if they don't know where it has come from, and by that I mean they like to know who has grown it if it isn't from their own garden. The season here is late this year due to heavy rain and the tomatoes in 'our' family's garden weren't ripe yet but the cucumbers and peppers were delicious and potatoes, garlic and onions were all well on the way.

The meals here are so casual. Milka (yes, like the chocolate) is the mum and the cook and she just asks what we would like that night. Usually she doesn't make lunches but when we first arrived and hadn't eaten for a day and a half she was more than willing to cook up some vegetables and rice for us. We told her we only wanted a small serve but we got a huge serve of the vegetable rice plus cheese, cucumbers, bread and ayvar (the delicious capsicum spread they have everywhere here). We have asked for small serves ever since and are still getting too much food!

Breakfast one morning was this amazing filo pastry and egg pie. It was wonderful!

We only went for a couple of walks and rides as we were still getting better but a gorgeous track led up into the National Park from our accommodation. We followed the beautiful river upwards and walked and rode past apple orchards, vegetable gardens then lush green forest.

On our last night, five Danish people (a family with three kids) booked in for dinner so Milka spent all afternoon cooking. The smells coming out of her tiny kitchen were sensational!

Dinner was outstanding - I counted eight dishes. The sausages that Milka made herself were the best sausages I've ever had! There was a traditional layered crepe dish that had about 20 layers in it. It was all amazing plus the Danes were fluent English speakers so we all had a good night.

We finished our stay here with a last walk and bike ride. John's in the bottom right of this photo leaving our accommodation for a bike ride. The windows on the top right were in our room. The room was quite basic but the food and location more than made up for it!

'Til next time.

Heather and John