Set off early – but not early enough to avoid the sun as I was soon baking hot. I slept by a lovely meadow for a couple of hours then it clouded over so I could find no excuse for not moving on. About a mile further on, an estate car offered me a lift – and I accepted. This is setting a dangerous precedent – but much fun. Oban, he said his name was, and he evidently knows everyone and has an excellent reputation in the neighbourhood. It was very kind of him and he wouldn’t accept a drink or remuneration.
So here I am in Rilindja – up the Valbona valley, aside the beautiful blue, icy cold, tumbling over rocks river Valbona and hemmed in by high mountains. I have met more people with English accents in the past couple hours than in the past couple months. They are working for B3P – or Balkans Peace Park Project – and are running a school with the primary aim of giving the children a fun time in the school holidays, while also promoting environmental awareness, teaching English, promoting peace (I’m sorry if I’ve got that wrong, Jen, Jenny, Lucy, Ulrika, Gareth).
I hope to stay here a week and get fat. No, strike that last bit – go hiking in these mountains, read (there’s a library! – where I can save the worthy “Siddhartha” for when I haven’t got access to a shelf full of pulp fiction – there are excellent and worthy books in the library too but it’s the light reading that has caught my eye), blog, knit, spin, paint.
First book I find in the library is ‘Big Magic’ – a non fiction book on ‘Creative Living beyond Fear’. There is a list of fears in there that I recognise! Second book is “The Twins”, a first novel by Saskia Saregensson.
So here I am in Rilindja – up the Valbona valley, aside the beautiful blue, icy cold, tumbling over rocks river Valbona and hemmed in by high mountains. I have met more people with English accents in the past couple hours than in the past couple months. They are working for B3P – or Balkans Peace Park Project – and are running a school with the primary aim of giving the children a fun time in the school holidays, while also promoting environmental awareness, teaching English, promoting peace (I’m sorry if I’ve got that wrong, Jen, Jenny, Lucy, Ulrika, Gareth).
I hope to stay here a week and get fat. No, strike that last bit – go hiking in these mountains, read (there’s a library! – where I can save the worthy “Siddhartha” for when I haven’t got access to a shelf full of pulp fiction – there are excellent and worthy books in the library too but it’s the light reading that has caught my eye), blog, knit, spin, paint.
First book I find in the library is ‘Big Magic’ – a non fiction book on ‘Creative Living beyond Fear’. There is a list of fears in there that I recognise! Second book is “The Twins”, a first novel by Saskia Saregensson.
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