Albanian Riviera Explorer: Llogara to Ksamil in Three Days

The road from Vlora climbs for forty minutes before it shows you anything. Then the Llogara pass drops away and the whole Ionian coast is below you at once — a hundred kilometres of it, folded between the Ceraunian mountains and water the colour of a swimming pool.

Most people drive the length of it in a single day and remember a blur. We give it three, and the Riviera becomes a different place: bays with no sign and no car park, a fortress standing in the shallows, and olive groves older than the Ottoman empire.

Small group, and one deliberate reversal

Twelve people maximum, in two vehicles. We drive south on days one and two and return north on day three — the light is behind you the whole way, the sea reads turquoise instead of silver, and every viewpoint falls on your side of the road. It costs nothing and it changes the entire trip.

Two nights in family-run guesthouses in Himara, not a resort. Breakfast is on the terrace and the owner will tell you which bay is empty that morning.