The Prespa Lakes

This weekend we have been to the Prespa Lakes that are in Greece, Albania and Macedonia. We went with a group of 9 people; the Dutch girls, Alex and Frankie from France, John from England and Ultan from Ireland. Since its kinda hard to reach the lakes by public transport we had decided to rent two cars for the weekend. Alex and Frankie are allowed to drive in rented cars here so that’s good. We had said to leave Friday night at 18.00, but most people here (and in this case especially the guys) are already totally accommodated to the Greek way of living so we left at 19.30. I don’t think I will ever get used to it. We wouldn’t drive all the way to the lakes, but we would stay the night in Kozani; a town with a university where Frankie knows a French guy who had offered us to stay the night at his apartment. Of course it wouldn’t fit to stay there with all of us, so the girls got to stay in a nice hotel and the guys slept there on the floor. The next morning, after the guys had finally opened their eyes, we continued out trip to Kastoria; a village that’s build up the hills and with a lake. We arrived rather late and the guys still had to have breakfast so we went to a taverna. After that we walked through the village and visited the small Kastorian museum of folklore. Unfortunately, the weather was grey and a bit cold, so that kinda spoilt it. The guys played a football match against some little Greek guys…and lost…LOSERS!! And then we headed of to the Prespa lakes, after spending half an hour trying to find our cars back in the labyrinth of Kastoria. The Prespa lakes were only 21 km away, according to the guys, so it wouldn’t take long to get there, again according to the guys. Reality turned out to be different; we spent about 4 trying to get to the lakes! Firstly, because the road signs in Greece are incredibly bad and secondly because the guys are horrible navigators and guys always think they’re right. Hopefully next time they will listen to us, because then we would have gotten there sooner. First we headed to Albania and a police officer told us to follow the new road to Albania but after 20-30 min. the road ended :S We found somewhere in the small village someone who could tell us where to go. Fortunately, John is half Greek and the man explained to him how to drive. However, John is also the worst navigator. His friends in England have a special nick name for him because he always gets lost. The man drew us a map and with hope we continued our trip. We missed the turn somewhere in the mountains, but we realized that pretty soon so we drove back. And after too many hours in the car we finally arrived in Pserades where we would stay. The hotel was really nice and we played some cards and had some fun.
The next morning I got up at 9.30 and decided to go take a walk myself. If I would have to wait for everyone else it would be around 11.00 before we would leave and I didn’t feel like wasting my time. It was pretty cold but I walked a bit around the lake till I couldn’t go any further and I headed back to the hotel. Some more people were awake now so we had some breakfast in a taverna. It was a total rip of though; 7 euro for a small breakfast! But we didn’t have much choose in this small village. When we girls and Alex were finished the other guys finally arrived. It’s usually the women that are slowest but here, the guys are far worse! When the guys were done as well we went with two boats on the lake to see some rock paintings and churches. The guy of the boat I was in was a speed devil! We truly raced across the lake; it was a bumpy ride! The weather was still grey and cloudy and therefore we couldn’t look very far, which is really a shame, because then it would have been so much more beautiful. We visited a small church and after that we rushed back in the boat. We walked through the village and saw a goat farm. So cute!! The little goats were running like crazy, jumping up and down and the farmer allowed us to come in; really nice. It kinda looked as if we were in the Alps with all the goats, cows and dogs. At the taverna was also a puppy and we played with him and made some pictures. And the children of the taverna were watching us. When we got up to leave the little son came to us with a paper on which was written; 20 euro. They wanted to sell the dog! How can you sell such a sweet doggie. I would have loved to take it to Matsi, but that’s not possible of course. At 16.30 we left again because the cars had to be back at the rental service at 20.00. It wouldn’t be a problem to arrive there in time, according to the guys. However, again reality turned out to be different; again bad road signs, bad navigation, no listening to us….so we arrived…not on time. But ok, lesson for the next time; don’t forget to bring the map and listen to the girls!!