All our Historic towns guides for Albania, in one place.
Everyone does Berat, Gjirokaster and the riviera. These five are on nobody's standard route, and between them they cover stone architecture, Ottoman streets and mountain valleys.
The easiest half day out of Tirana, and the one that explains why Albanians talk about Skanderbeg. A castle on a cliff, a restored Ottoman bazaar, and a hard sell.
Most people pass through Shkoder on the way north and regret not stopping. A lake, a castle above it, a bicycle culture and the road to Koman all start here.
The largest Roman amphitheatre in the Balkans sits in a residential block, half excavated, with a Venetian tower down the road and a long sandy beach behind.
A Greek and Roman city in a lagoon, two Ottoman towns, a Roman amphitheatre under a modern city, and a hundred and seventy thousand concrete bunkers.
Two Ottoman quarters facing each other across a river, a castle with people still living inside it, and a nickname that turns out to be literal.
A UNESCO listed Ottoman town of slate roofed tower houses climbing a mountainside, with a castle on top and a bazaar street through the middle.
A working port city with a long promenade, the square where the country was founded in 1912, and the road south that turns into the best drive in the Balkans.