Road trip · six corridors
[ Albania is a driving country ]
There is no train worth the name and the bus network thins out exactly where the good roads start. These are the six drives the rest of the site keeps referring to, each with the line it follows and the season it keeps.
The map
The basemap loads when you reach it. Every marker below is a link, with or without it.
| The drive | Road | Distance | Router | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tirana to ShkodërThe northern spine on the SH1, and the drive every Alps trip makes twice. | national road | 98.6 km | 1 h 56 | August: avoid |
| Shkodër to ThethPaved since 2021 and shut for four months of the year, over the Qafa e Thorës into the Alps. | mountain road | 91.7 km | 3 h 27 | August: best |
| Tirana to BeratOut across the Myzeqe plain to the white Ottoman town, with a monastery and a Greek city on the way. | national road | 152.7 km | 2 h 32 | August: avoid |
| Berat to GjirokastërThe inland road between the two UNESCO towns, over the hills and down the Vjosa through Përmet. | mountain road | 152.3 km | 3 h 30 | August: ok |
| Gjirokastër to SarandëDown out of the Drino valley to the sea, with the karst spring of the Blue Eye on the way. | national road | 58.8 km | 2 h | August: avoid |
| Vlorë to Sarandë, the RivieraOver the Llogara pass at 1,027 m and down the SH8 along the Ionian, which is the drive people come for. | coastal road | 125.2 km | 3 h 35 | August: avoid |
| Tirana to Pogradec and KorçëThe road east to the lake and the highland, and the one drive that gets better as the coast empties. | national road | 179.8 km | 4 h 10 | August: ok |