We had a nice sleep in this morning. The shower in the room turned out to be a good one, and when I got out I opened up the window to hear the river streaming by outside – it was a nice background noise.
We went upstairs to get breakfast, and they had a pretty good setup. There were some things set out – cold cuts, cheeses, fruits, yogurt, and a big jug of fresh-squeezed OJ – nice! Once we got those we sat down and the staff came by and asked us about eggs: omelette? Scrambled? Fried? With or without bacon? Big decisions. The friendly waiter also took our coffee order and made our cappuccinos from a big espresso machine behind the counter. The lady making the coffees looked really unhappy – I hope she was OK.
Also there was an older Asian couple, Japanese? We saw them now and then.
Today we set out to take a look at some of the details and sightseeing spots around Skopje. We started with the square that we visited last night. I realized that there were casinos on the square – two of them on opposite sides, and that felt a little odd for such a central cultural location. The big fountain with Alex the Great looked a little bit more dignified in the daylight without all the LEDs. I could see more details at the base of the statue, where Macedonian soldiers stood in a circle facing a ring of lions that sprayed water from their mouths. We saw a few more statues in each corner of the square. They are big on statues in this city! We noticed another boat on the river – that would make it boat #3 – we wondered if that was also converted into a hotel?
Beyond the square we spied an interesting tower, so we went to take a look and discovered a memorial house for Mother Theresa, and next to that the very impressive Church of Saints Constantine and Helena. The architecture was beautiful, coupled with a golden rooftop on each section, and the tall tower that had brought us there.
Seeing that church reminded us that we had passed a fairly dramatic church when we came in on the bus yesterday, so we set off to look for it. It was a nice walk across town, again with the shaded avenues, and small storefronts that were aimed at regular residents rather than tourists. The trees provided shade but also a buffer from the cars running on the street – it was a nice touch for pedestrians.
Finally we reached the building we were looking for, the Church of Saint Clement of Ohrid. The design was rounded and eye-catching, and we stepped inside the foyer to look around. Since I was wearing shorts I gestured to one of the staff to figure out if it was OK for me to be in there, and the guy gave a sort of resigned nod – I guess I should have been more prepared. We poked our heads into the main church, and the interior was simple but beautiful. There was a ceremony in progress so we didn’t stay long. As we left we passed a friendly beggar at the gates, who didn’t seem surprised that we weren’t giving out any cash.
Continuing our exploration we walked a ways towards the fortress on the hillside, doing our best to avoid the sunny side of the street when possible. Already it was getting hot. We crossed a bridge with two lion statues done in a traditional style on one end, and two more lions in a modern art style at the other end. Continuing on a pathway that led around the fortress walls we climbed a bit of a hill. We passed a Greek restaurant, all white and blue, and then passed a woman who was being followed by a dog. She turned and tried to get the dog to leave her alone but the dog wanted to hang out with her and I think it wasn’t going to give up.
We turned and walked through a warren of bars and nightclubs, all shut down in this morning hour, and then walked around the old town area. There were lots of restaurants here but it was way too early for anything to be open. We poked around, found a street with umbrellas arranged above, and I took some pictures of some good tile work that was done near some staircases in the area.
We followed the streets to the bazaar area, and maybe we missed it but were soon surrounded by locals, mostly around the mosque nearby. The shops took a more Turkish and Muslim slant here. Since it getting time to get something cold and alcoholic to drink we felt the Muslim quarter was not the right place to look.
Consulting our maps we walked alongside a busy street filled with cars and traffic, doing our best to avoid the sun as we went. Finally we reached the river and the broken ship, so we knew we were close to our hotel. Then just before reaching our hotel we stopped at a restaurant and sat outside at a nice table in the shade of the trees, to drink some white wine and the local beer, Shokoko smooth. Kuniko’s white wine came with a chaser of water, and we enjoyed cooler temperatures while watching people walk by. The restaurant was playing some old, traditional music despite the staff mostly being quite young.
After our drinks we walked over one of the nearby bridges to take a look at the statues. One bridge to the west of our hotel was lined with famous ancient people with roots in this country, and the bridge to the east of our hotel was lined with statues of famous modern people that were apparently Macedonians. Strangely about half of the name plates at the bottom of each statue had been stolen or removed. On the other side of the river a hired tour guide was explaining some more statues in detail, while a stray dog lay in the shade near him with its head on its paws.
The shopping center that was all closed up the night before was open for business so next we went to check it out. There was a supermarket inside, and we scored a bottle of local sparkling wine to try out later, and bought a few souvenirs to hand out when we get back to Japan. The cashier at the supermarket was really kind and spoke perfect English – I wondered that she was working at a supermarket and not in international business somewhere.
Elsewhere in the shopping center we saw a bank that had people lined up outside it, and wondered what was going on. The timing felt weird, and the staff were metering people inside. Hmm…
We also saw an interesting souvenir shop, so after some hesitation we went in. There was a customer already there talking about football (soccer) scarves, and the shopkeeper walked him through the options that she had available. I had no idea that it was sort of a collector item. We scored a good keychain to hang on our Christmas tree, and then went on back to our hotel. The room wasn’t cleaned yet, but we popped the bubbles into the fridge and dropped off our souvenirs. On our way back out we asked the desk staff to clean our room, and then went right across the street to have lunch at a Cuban restaurant.
So far this trip we have been really good about focusing on food that is local and traditional. But finding a Cuban restaurant is pretty rare – I don’t even know if there is a Cuban restaurant in Japan. This might be the closest we were going to get without going back to Cuba so we jumped on the chance. Right across from our hotel, it was a no-brainer.
We sat on the porch of the restaurant in the shade, and perused the menu. We ended up ordering ropa vieja and Cuban sandwiches with pulled pork. I had a beer, Zlaften Dab, and Kuniko took a chance on another cocktail, this time a piña colada. Turned out that everything was great – the ropa vieja was a little more tomatoey than what we had in Havana, but the flavors were great and even the cocktail was a solid choice.
Our waitress, a tall blond with yellow fingernails, was working alone and very busy trying to keep people in food and drinks. Later someone else came and helped out. We enjoyed chilling on the porch with some great food, and it made a nice break from the Balkan food that we had been eating for the last week or so.
By the time we finished lunch and came back to our room it was all cleaned up. The sparkling wine was already cold in the fridge but I took a nap first, following our siesta protocol. Once I woke up we popped the cork and sipped the bubbles while I caught up on journaling. The sparkling was really good – our third local sparkling wine that we had tried. While sipping we also considered where to go and what to eat for dinner – always an important decision.
We ended up heading back to the old town area, which should be open by this time. We walked across town on a different course, trying to avoid the fiery sun that was heating all the cement around us. There were more statues on this path – including another large Alexander the Great, this time without the horse. He was standing doing a power salute with a raised fist, but mostly we saw the statue from what Kuniko called its “butt side”.
The restaurant that I was looking for showed as being in the center of a square block of the old town. We couldn’t find how to get in, walking back and forth and finally I saw an alley. I couldn’t believe that this narrow alley would lead to a gastronomic revelation, but I checked anyway. In fact the restaurant was back there, but it was completely deserted, with one waiter sleeping with his head down on one of the tables. Not a great omen, so I went back to Kuniko and we went with out backup selection.
The backup was called “Destan”. We sat at a table that recently was in the sun but was starting to cool down in the newly arrived shade. Across the walkway from our table was a big spice shop, and the scent of cinnamon was all around us as we ate. We ordered the signature beef sausages, a shopska salad, and they came with a basket of bread, some onions and a large, pale grilled pepper that the staff warned was quite spicy. We had some red wine from airplane bottles, made by Alexandria the biggest winery in the country I am guessing, because we saw the brand everywhere.
The food was excellent – we ate the grilled sausages like potato chips, sometimes wrapped in bread with onion. They were addictive and I kind of wish we ordered another plate of ten sausages. The shopska salad was also refreshing and I think it might be my favorite kind of salad ever – perfect in its simplicity. We were sweating when we finished the food – we left only some bread and most of the spicy pepper behind. When I came back to the table after paying our bill, the staff was cleaning up and a beggar was taking our leftover bread – he was holding the rest of the pepper in his left hand. I’m glad someone would be able to enjoy it.
We walked back towards the main square, the streets more lively now that the sun was almost set. For kicks we walked down to ship #3. It wasn’t a hotel, just empty, but in much better shape than ship #1. We went back to the gold-roofed church to take more pictures as the sun was lighting up the gold as it set.
We were still able to eat a little bit, not 100% full but not super hungry, so we elected to stop at one more place for a snack and some wine. Right on the square was Pelister, a restaurant that I had marked as a possible dinner place. It is a pretty historic restaurant/hotel, and a little more upscale than the places we’d visited before. Since we were still pretty hot we sat at a table that was in the path of a big misting fan, and that helped a lot.
While we waited for our (second) dinner to arrive we enjoyed the atmosphere of the place. Next to our table a solo diner powered through three big plates of food, while his waiter chatted with him between bites. The table beyond him had a child breaking a glass – the second time we’ve seen it happen this trip.
For food we started with an appetizer of roasted eggplant with tahini cream and goat cheese. We also ordered some zucchini moussaka, and it had a big dollop of cream on top. Then we each had a glass of white wine – I had Lazar Grashevina, and Kuniko had the Berovo Sauvignon Blanc. The wines were quite good, I thought Kuniko’s Sauvignon Blanc was the best of the trip. The food was a lot – both were delicious but each had a lot of cream involved and I think they filled us up. We did our best but had to leave a little bit of the moussaka behind.
With our bellies full beyond capacity we walked back towards our hotel, past the now fully LED illuminated Alexander the Great plus horse fountain. There were a lot more people in the square, with vendors grilling corn on the cob, and some of the casinos opening up for business. But we were off to bed. Another travel day tomorrow as we leave for Kosovo by bus.
