Adventurous Albania: A family-fun destination

My highlight of the trip was taking a rib boat ride across the waters of the Karaburun and Sazan Island Maritime Park. We ventured into a cave and jumped into the cooling waters for a swim. Afterwards, we stopped for lunch on a beach - it's easily one of the most beautiful beaches on the peninsula. 

Our tour leader was Tedi, who's from a family of tour leaders - his dad and brother are also with Explore, so he's sort of grown up with it. Tedi has been an Explore tour leader for a couple of years, and this was his first family trip. 

He did a great job of explaining everything we needed to know about Albania and he got on really well with the kids. Tedi celebrated his birthday during the trip, too, which was a nice special touch for all of us!

This Albania family tour is graded as Moderate, which I think is accurate. The trip starts off quite busy, with river wild swimming, exploring the UNESCO-listed town of Gjirokastër and short hikes, but once you reach the coast the itinerary settles down a bit.

Day six of the trip is a free day which you can spend as you wish - either with a visit to a medieval castle, museums and monuments in the Old Town, or simply relax at your own leisure. 

We ate traditional Albanian food, such as börek (or byrek), an Albanian pie made with filo pastry and filled with cheese, vegetables or meat. Albanian cuisine is a blend of Mediterranean and Balkan dishes, offering seafood, feta cheese and Mediterranean herbs. Albanian red wine is delicious, too;  it seems the country is becoming better-known for its wine.

Interestingly, Albania has an vast Italian food scene. A lot of Albanians have been to or lived in Italy - it's just across the Adriatic Sea from Albania, after all - so there were plenty of Italian restaurants and cuisines to choose from. This especially went down well with the kids, who tucked into pizza and pasta. 

We stayed in three different places on this trip: Tirana, Gjirokastër and Vlorë. Each were great in their own way, and Tedi explained why we stayed in each place. In Tirana, we stayed in a four-star hotel which offered a decent breakfast buffet.

In Gjirokastër, our traditional-style hotel sat just below the castle, and offered a lovely swimming pool. Our hotel in Vlorë was right opposite the beach and had a swimming pool, and the breakfast area overlooks the Ionian Sea.