Thursday 4th September 2025 – easy border crossing from Macedonia. No customs checks of the vehicle at all on either side. Purchased 30 days insurance for €65. Unfortunately he did it for 14 days so we had to wait while he scanned and emailed the wrong certificate to cancel it! Language issue (or possibly that he was always on his phone and not concentrating).
We heard back from the Land Rover specialist in Tirana and George will be seen at 10am tomorrow.
We have seen many British registered vehicles here. I believe it is part of the roughly 100,000 Albanians in the UK visiting for summer. I am told the cars will soon depart back to the UK.
We came through a delightful river gorge on the way. The road in places (as we were trying to avoid high mountain passes) was pretty bad in places.
Friday 5th September 2025 – a frustrating day. The mechanics checked out George and found his transfer box (the gearbox that gives four wheel drive high and low range) was low on oil. They adjusted the rear wheel bearings there was noticeable movement that needed to be eliminated. They checked all the other differential and gearbox oil levels and all were OK. Went on a test drive with the supervising mechanic driving and the whine seemed reduced. The mechanic did confirm that the noise is wear in the transfer box. Not the safest looking vehicle lift in the world (with mechanic underneath):
However on leaving the capital and getting to higher speeds it was clear that the noise was just as bad. I did some research and saw that a rebuild kit is available. So I called the garage back and asked them if they could source one. I told them that if they couldn’t I could have it shipped from the UK. They then said they didn’t have the parts and didn’t have time to remove the transfer box anyway and couldn’t help. I asked them why they were turning away business but they didn’t reply.
We are going to visit another mechanic for a second opinion tomorrow. Todays mechanic didn’t even attempt to identify the problem with the transfer box (whether on input or output, bearings etc).
Some people drive Land Rovers for years with noisy transfer boxes! But we really don’t want to have a catastrophic failure a long way from home. One option is to have a rebuilt transfer box shipped from the UK (there is a speciaist company called Ashcroft with an excellent reputation who do just this). They are heavy and the cost of shipping the crate by air with DHL will be expensive but it may prove to be the best option in both the short and long term.
Poor George really is getting like Trigger’s broom. We seemed to have had a run of major components failing. But we have to deal with whatever life throws at us and move on! It is all part of the adventure.
Tonight’s sunset at the beach:
Saturday 6th September 2025 – decided to visit a different mechanic in the hope of a more precise diagnosis and a repair plan. We were told to wait 30 to 40 minutes while they dealt with another car. This became more than a 2 hour wait. Eventually the mechanic drove George and decided the problem was the gearbox (but he speaks very little English). They then checked both the differentials and topped them up and said the gearbox and transfer box were both fine for oil. They then lost interest.
I contacted the owner and said that we needed help to find a solution. He said he was on his way but we ended up waiting a further 2 hours. Admittedly the traffic is horrendous around Tirana.
When the boss arrived he drove George up the road and decided that the problem was the turbo losing pressure somewhere. I explained that the soot on the right manifold was from a spacer breaking up and blowing out that I hadn’t cleaned up because it was behind a heat shield but they decided that it was proof that the seal between manifold and turbo wasn’t airtight. So I have cleaned all the soot off to prove this either way. The owner wants to take the turbo off and seal the joints with a high temperature compound. I read that this is only ever a temporary solution. To be honest I can’t bear for the turbo to come off again because we don’t have new gaskets to seal everything properly.
We agreed that 5:30pm that we would go back on Monday because there was no more time.
Sunday 6th September 2025 – Went to see the most extraordinary bunker built in the 1970s. It has 106 rooms and is nearly 3,000 square metres. It even has a huge assembly hall. There are machines that use a chemical reaction to generate oxygen in every room – made by the Chinese – how effective they would have been seems doubtful. It was supposed to be able to withstand nuclear fallout and chemical attack. There were 12 such huge bunkers built in Albania together with 172,000 other bunkers (although some people say there were over 750,000, there are even 6 in our campsite!). Legend has it that the engineer who designed the one person bunker was forced to occupy one while they bombed him! He survived but came out with blood coming from his ears and nose. Huge curved concrete entrance door:
It felt very claustrophobic. One of the long corridors:
Interesting display about the communist era and how children were indoctrinated with political ideas from a young age, had to wear scarves (like the Hitler youth) and do “voluntary” work.
Nearly had a serious accident coming out of Tirana on Saturday. We were on the dual carriageway and the guy in front just literally stopped dead in front of me. To make matters worse he had no brake lights so I didn’t realise he was slowing. I had to brake sharply and swerve so we didn’t tail end him. He then did a u turn on a busy dual carriageway! It seems he missed the exit slip road. Terrifying. They are seriously poor drivers here.
Monday 8th September 2025 – decided that the mechanic should solely torque up the turbo manifold bolts to specification. I couldn’t bear to have the turbo taken off. The noise is still with us but I am sure it isn’t the turbo. They wanted to seal the joints with kitchen foil!!
We have driven to Kruja. In the last town called Fushe Kruje there was a 10 foot statue of George W Bush, two bakeries and a car wash named after him! GWB did a “welcome to Democracy tour” in 2007 (only slightly patronising!!).
Just met charming 70 year old Mister Yoo and his wife from South Korea who are travelling Europe in their camper van. He is an engineer who had a company manufacturing steam cleaning equipment. They kindly gave us packets of spicy Korean noodles. They tell me that they have all of their food with them for 6 months!
Tuesday 9th September 2025 – went into the town of Kruja first thing. We visited the remains of the 15th Century mosque:
And the Dollma Tekke a Sufi (Dervish) shrine:
Then the Skanderbeg museum which is dedicated to Gjergj Kastrioti Skanderbeg, Albania’s national hero, who led the resistance against the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century.
This is Skanderbeg in bronze:
The fortress tower behind the museum is in a sorry state, held together by tensile cables and ratchet straps!:
We have stayed two nights here. The lady who does the cooking makes delicious food (the mother of the family). We had Roast Lamb with saute potatoes. Roast stuffed pepper (Spec i mbushur), spicy sausage with cheese and tomato and a dish called Speca ne gzize – peppers with cottage cheese and garlic. Last night we had a dessert called Shendetlie with nuts and honey.
Wednesday 10th September 2025 – visited another mechanic. This time a 4×4 specialist who lived for 18 years in Italy. He spoke to me entirely in Italian!! And I don’t speak a word of Italian unfortunately. He tightened the nuts on the leaking front differential and replenished the oil. We went for a test drive and he decided that the noise wasn’t a problem but we need to go slowly and put minimum stress on the transmission. He decided George was overweight because his 3,500 kg lift struggled to lift him. We weighed him after West Africa and he was 3,000 kilo. The mechanic was impressed by George’s rear suspension setup with dual shock absorbers and dual springs. We bought some more gear oil from him as a precaution. So we still don’t have a diagnosis but some small reassurance that we will be OK. Still plan to visit Tony Skidmore the ex REME mechanic in Zagreb to hopefully get a knowledgeable insight.
Thursday 11th September 2025 – driven to Gushtë. Probably the worst road we have driven on this trip. Under major repair. Lots of the bridges look pretty dodgy, concrete cast in situ and crumbling in places. Lots of subsidence. They are putting in lots of new drains and culverts. Saw 4 tortoises crossing the road on the way, one was only maybe 5 or 6 centimetres long. In one place some people had stopped their car in the middle of the road to remove a tortoise from danger! We plan to get a ferry up the river gorge and back tomorrow. The road is a dead end so we will have to traverse it again tomorrow. View where we are staying:
Found a good family run restaurant that uses local produce. Had kebabs with garlic yoghurt, stuffed peppers and a chefs salad that had orange and different nuts in it.
Friday 12th September 2025 – we went along the Drin river through gorges from Koman to Fierze through the Albanian alps on a ferry like this (George stayed at base and had a day off):
The gorge is beautiful with stunning scenery:
Will probably eat at the same restaurant tonight as it was so good before returning on the dreadful road tomorrow.
We were given “kimcha” or kimbça or jujube fruit (Ziziphus jujuba), also called Chinese date, which tastes like a crisp, tart apple when unripe and resembles a date when fully ripe. It is native to the Balkans. The sisters at the campsite also gave us red and white grapes from their garden.
Saturday 13th September 2025 – visited the Ottoman Mesi (Ura e Mesit)
bridge built in 1768:
We headed up the river gorge in the Maranai Park to Prekal where we are staying the night beside the river. The valley here is remote, no mobile signal. There are small fields on the valley floor growing maize and Alfalfa. Some pigs and cows with bells wandering around. The river has cut into the bed rock 2 metres in places. Achingly beautiful. Single track road to get here, although we saw a Dutch registered unimog camped by the river. Must have been tight getting it there between stone walls!
We visited Shkodra Lake (many different spellings) on the border of Montenegro and Albania. Lunch of carp from the lake and fried Calamari.
