Change of plans

Sooooo....Croatia was cool. Dubrovnik was a neat old walled city. We stayed within the walls and did much wandering. My recommednation if anyone goes, it is worth it but you only need two days max in Dubvronik. We also went to one of the Elati islands (forget the name at the moment) and hung out at a secluded bach for a day. Weather has been perfect everywhere we have been so far (kncoking on wood). Quite honestly though...not that enamored with Croatia. I think during the middle of summer if you were to start in Zagreb or Split and work your way down the coast visiting islands like the Elati islands and Hvar and hanging out a beaches it would be more fun but Judy and I just weren't feeling it. So we left. We could not get the ferry to Bari in time as we had originally planned so we decided to roll the dice and head south by bus taking us thru Montenegro and Albania. Neither of us knew anything about these places other than the Balkin wars and communism of the recent past. We checked the state dept website to be sure and there were no travel warnings and there were not so we decided to jump. Seriously this was a last minute decision about an hour before we either took the ferry to Hvar or jumped on the bus and we choose bus. The ride thru Montenegro was actually really scenic (as opposed to the dry arid landscape of Croatia) we passed by a bay and a town called Koto (I think that was the name) and it was beau-tiful. Sadly you could still see pot marks on the buildings from the war. Our bus dropped us off in Badva. Where? Right. We met these two girls working for the Peace Corps in Albania who were traveling back to their town (one was from N.C., the other from DC) and they were very friendly. So friendly in fact they assisted us with the next two bust transfers which were last minute, last of the day, hop on and leave immediately no way Judy and I would have made it on our own. After a full day travel and 3 busses and a taxi ride later we made it to Tirana, Albania. During one of our stops in Montenegro when there were no more busses departing for the day we went over to some taxis and Katie 2 (who hadn't said more than 5 words the trip so far) was like, blah, blah, blah, blah (that's how it sounded to me) arguing with the men and next thing we knew we had a taxi! Man that girl can negotiate! The taxi took us across the border (not before the driver hid his taxi sign in his trunk, WTF did they get us into I am thinkin???) where we connected with a mini bus that took us to Triana. Honestly, without them we would probably be in Albania still. Katie and Katie, YOU GUYS ROCK! They pointed us to a place called the Stephen Center (Translated Center of Stephen) which is a restaurant and guest house for missionaries who where happy to provide us with an extra room. Talk about blessed! Middle of Albania and we wind up here. And the food rocked! We bought them dinner and they were on their way. Talk about twists of fate, who knew this is where of all places we would end up! The next day Judy and I wandered from tourist place to tourist place...they all give different answers on tranportation, grrrrr....and eventually caught a bust to Athens that was 13hrs and overnight. Judy and I were the ONLY Americans and the only ones who spoke English on a bus full of q-tips (old people). There was one kid on the bus who spoke broken English. He was from a village in Northern Albania somewhere and we asked how he learned to speak English....TV. Nice. During the border crossing in Greece they made everyone take their bags of the bush and were searching all the bags. They get to Judy and I and ask "tourist"? We reply yes and they move on. No search required. Also nice. A LONG and uncomfortable bus trip later. We are in Greece.