About Albania Tours

Dear travelers, Why not visit my Albania?

Albania is open to open hearts. Albanians are very welcoming people.
I am sure it will be a tremendous experience for you, a country where reality surpasses imagination. Visit it! Love it! (A. Neza)

Albania is a country blessed with natural assets, with spectacular mountain scenery, vast forests and lakes, and fine sandy beaches.
Albania is situated in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula. Albania shares borders with Montenegro, Kosovo, North Macedonia, and Greece; to the west and southwest are the Adriatic and Ionian Seas.
The Albanian people are one of the most ancient people with the long-standing civilization in the Balkans. They were occupied for 500 years from the Ottoman Empire, 50 years under the most oppressive communist regime in the EU, and almost 30 years to now with a democratic society.

Population:around 2.860.000 people (INSTAT: 2019)

Surface:28.750 km2 (11.000 square miles)

Capital:Tirana

Money:ALL (Albanian Lek)

Origin:Ancentors of the Illyrians

Religion:Islam, Orthodox and Roman Catholic

Language:Albanian (Indo-European branch)

LANDSCAPE

Albania is mainly a mountainous country, 28% is made of mountains, and 47% are hills, whereas the plains comprise 25% with an altitude up to 300 m above sea level. The average elevation of the country is 708 m above sea level, two times greater than the average height of Europe.
Albanian’smountain landscape is magnificent and breathtaking, with forests of oak, beech, pine, and coniferous trees, clear and cold streams. The highest regions, where peaks rise to about 2.700 m, are the dramatic Albanian Alps in the North and arrange of forested mountains, which stretches the length of the country and to the Eastern border.
Based on territorial peculiarity and structures of relief, four natural regions are distinguished: The Alps of the North Albania, The Centralmountainous region; The southern mountainous region, The Western Lowlands, and it’s the coastline of 427 km long.

THE CLIMATE

Albania is situated in a zone with the Mediterranean climate.
Albania is characterized by hot summer, bright sunny days (around 300 sunny days), generally mild winter, and abundant rainfalls. The period from June to September is warm, while from October to May it is cold and wet.
The meteorological conditions change rapidly from southwest to Northwest, the temperatures and the precipitation diminish in this same direction. The amount of rain and snowfall is sufficient (about 1.300 mm per annual), but is unevenly distributed during the year.
The average annual temperature varies from 14.8°C to 40°C. The hottest month is July with an average temperature of 25°C and the coldest month is January with an average temperature of 6°C. The eastern part of Albania has frigid winters.

SOCIAL CONVENTIONS

In general, the Albanians greet and shake hands with the person they meet. We ask about health and family, even if we reach a foreigner for the first time. For 50 years, Albanian have been forbidden to invite foreigners into their homes. The old tradition ‘Mikprites’ (Hospitable), which gives a guest almost godlike status, is reasserting itself, and you will enjoy excellent hospitality.
Marriages used to be arranged by matchmakers. Women suffered from the discrimination determined by the feudal moral norms and backward customs. The birth of a girl was considered a misfortune and a burden on the family. In nowadays, the woman’s position has changed. At present, you do not find women wearing yashmak, and there is a large number of women working in all walks of life.

MUSIC & DANCE

The traces of Albanian musical folklore belong to 14th and 13th centuries B.C. The figures of folk musical instruments, costumes, dancers, singers are on different archaeological objects such as sculpture, vases, and pots, etc. The Albanian songs are divided info folksongs of nature, lullabies, wedding songs, love songs, ballads, and historical epics.
Albanian musical folklore is expressed in the existence of vocal music from the single-voiced type to the many-voiced one, including the music of human voice and instruments, music for the accompaniment of folk dances. The folk instruments are classified into four groups, known as membranophones, chordophones, idiophones, and earphones.
The folk dances give high emotions with their temperament and plasticity. The hops are accompanied by traditional instruments such as the drum as well as modern instruments like accordion, clarinet, etc.

TRADITIONAL COSTUMES

The various costumes with their ornaments are closely linked with the spiritual world, history, resistance, and the efforts of the natives to defend and affirm the Albanian identity. Folk costumes are mostly made by hand. The characteristic motives of the decoration on the folk costumes, especially on the bridal gowns and grooms suits, are geometric figures, eagle, different flowers, the sun, etc.
The famous Albanian kilt (‘’fustanella’’) was the traditional dress for men from south Albania in the 13th century, where it was regularly worn by a tribe of the Dalmatians, one of the Illyrian progenitors of the Albanians.
In the north of Albania, the casual trousers were called ‘’tirqe’’, which were made with the woolen cloth with two black lines sideways of the white woolen trousers. The men in the northern part of Albanian put on a white fez called ‘qeleshe.’
Women in the northern part of Albania, especially in the region of Malesia e MAdhe and Theth, have one of the oldest costumes called ‘’Xhubleta’’, which is made of black wool and has the form of an umbrella.

‘BESA’ & the KANUN (CODE) OF LEK DUKAGJINI

‘BESA’ – a term rich in meaning and use (‘word of honor, faith, trust, protection, truce, etc.’) as well as hospitality, which involves uncompromising protection of guests, even one with whom the host is in a stake of blood-feud.
Albanian customary law has left its mark on the character of the people, a fact confirmed by their moral and ethical standards, such as the sense of honor, vengefulness, courage and decisiveness in critical situations, and a feeling of closeness within the family, the brotherhood, and the clan.
‘KANUN’ – (Greek Kanon ‘rule; measure’) is the collective term for the customary law of Albania, which is a collection of laws that determine how one behaves with acquaintances and strangers. For the clans of Northern Albania, the maxims of the Kanun were primary. They took precedence over all other laws, and for that reason, both the church and the state opposed the application of the Kanun.
Leke Dukagjini, Lord of Dagnoad Zadrima, who fled with others to Italy in 1479 when Turks captured Shkoder, returned after the death of Sultan Mehmet II 1481, and prescribed and enforced by a Council of Tribal Elders Vendetta (called like this from Sicily) because a blood feud could quickly have degenerated into mass extermination without a code of honor to which all males had to subscribe (there was no blood feud affecting women protected wither alone or escorted by the menfolk, as well as children, cattle, house).
The Kanun is the expression and reflection of the Albanian character, which embodies an uncompromising morality based on justice, honor, and respect for oneself and others. The law of Leke Dukagjini covers inheritance and crime, especially murder, bodily assault, and theft.

Religion

The official census figures out that 70% of Albanians are Muslim, 15% are Orthodox Christianity, 10% are Roman Catholicism, and 5% other religions like Bektashi, Evangelism, Jehovism. There is a beautiful religious harmony between the religions in Albania. During the communist regime, as a result of atheist policy propagated by the Albanian government, all these mosques, churches, and other religious institutions were closed down in 1967. Religion went through a hard time. Religious propaganda being considered as anti-state and subversive was prohibited by law. The bible and Koran were fiercely criticized. Mosques and churches were transformed into the palace of sports, museums, cultural centers, etc. About 40 priests and members from the other religions were murders without a trial or any guilt.