Gjirokastër is a small town in southern Albania and being one of the rare examples of an Ottoman town has earned it a place on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. So, if you are planning a trip to Albania, make sure to visit Gjirokastër.

The city may not be that huge, but I guarantee you that it is absolutely adorable. From its castle perfectly framed in the mountains, its typical houses or the bazaar, I promise you that this is a place not to be missed in Albania.

Gjirokastër has hot summers and cold winters, and it can even snow from December to February. July and August are the hottest months and you should go prepared for warm weather. Also, in winter some lodgings close and the town is quieter, so it may not make as much sense to visit Gjirokastër at this time of year.

So, I especially recommend May to October to find nicer temperatures while visiting the city.

Given the size of Gjirokastër, I suggest you stay only one day in the city. You will certainly have more than enough time to explore the main points of interest and properly visit Gjirokastër😊

Gjirokastër has no airport so the easiest way to get there is by plane to Tirana (Albania’s capital) and then by land to Gjirokastër.

To make your job easier when looking for flights, these are some European destinations with direct flights to Tirana:

• Italy (Milan, Bari, Verona, Venice, Rome, Pisa)
• Germany (Memmingen, Berlin, Munich)
• Switzerland (Geneva, Zurich)
• Spain (Barcelona, Madrid)
• Belgium (Brussels)
• France (Lyon, Nice, Paris)
• United Kingdom (London)
• Netherlands (Eindhoven)

The simplest way (as almost everywhere else in Albania) is to rent a car and drive around the country that way. The drive from Tirana takes about 3h15, 233 km.

However, if you don’t plan on renting a car, there are a few alternative options for getting from Tirana to Gjirokastër. The first is a bus from here, costing 12€ (one way). The journey takes about 4 hours and there are several buses available throughout the day. You can check the most up-to-date information here.

💡 EXTRA TIP: The bus terminal is about a 20-minute drive from Tirana airport as well as from the city centre, so the best option to get there is by taxi.

Arriving in Gjirokastër, the bus stops here. However, this stop is still slightly distant from the historic city centre (about 20 minutes walk, 1.7km). Again, if you don’t want to walk all the way you can opt for a taxi or for the local bus (which has several stops at 18 Shtator Bulevardi street).

The second option is to book a tour directly from Tirana. Take, for example, this guided tour of Gjirokastër departing from Tirana.

The official currency of Albania is LEK and as of today’s (September 2022) this is the exchange rate against the Euro: 1 EUR = 117 LEK. Albanian currency can only be purchased and exchanged in Albania!

Albania is a country that still operates very much on a cash basis. You will often hear “only cash”. So, one of the biggest recommendations is to get cash as soon as you arrive in the country and always carry some cash with you as you never know when you’ll be able to use a card 😜

Sometimes restaurants and shops also accept Euros (and other currencies such as Dollars or Pounds), but always check if the exchange rate they suggest is beneficial for you! In my experience, it rarely is.

First of all, I recommend using a Revolut Card, since it will not charge you additional fees for using a different currency (either when you pay with the card or when you withdraw money). You can read more about how the Revolut card works here.

However, although Revolut does not charge additional fees for withdrawing money in another currency, most banks in Albania charge heavy fees for such withdrawals (one of the highest fees I saw was 6.8€). However, I found one bank that does not charge any fee – CredinsBank. Update 2023: I’ve been told that CredinsBank also started charging fees recently.

💡 EXTRA TIP: Since Albania is a country that works very much based on cash, you should still withdraw a considerable amount because you’ll need to use cash a lot. However, if you have subscribed to the most basic Revolut plan, be aware that the withdrawals without extra fees by Revolut have a monthly limit (the months are not fixed) of 200€. In my case, we had 2 Revolut cards and had to exceed the limit in one of the withdrawals.

These days, it is almost impossible to go to a country and not be reachable or not have internet. Since Albania isn’t part of the EU, everyone pays for roaming there. So I recommend buying an Albanian data package as soon as you arrive in Albania.

At Tirana airport there are two companies with identical packages: 35GB for 2000 LEK (~€17). The Vodafone or One stands are side by side right next to the airport entrance/exit.

I ended up choosing Vodafone and the coverage across the country was quite satisfactory! As we were 2 people, we bought only one SIM card and made hotspot between the phones. We spent 10 days travelling around the country and we still came back with more than half of the mobile data available 😉

The process of buying the card was also quite simple. It took less than 15 minutes, 10 of which were in the queue waiting. All we had to do was provide some personal details, sign a document, pay and voilà!

Although I did not stay overnight in Gjirokastër as I was only passing through the city, there are plenty of accommodation options in the city. Here are some options for different budgets:

Before we go through each of the points of interest you can visit in Gjirokastër, I’ll share with you the map version of this 1-day itinerary in Gjirokastër:

Gjirokastër’s trademark is its old bazaar! Here you will find several souvenir shops and a few restaurants, bars and cafés. The atmosphere of these streets and alleys, with Ottoman-style houses, leaves no one indifferent.

Let yourselves wander these streets for a while and, who knows, maybe you can buy some souvenirs for your return home.

Located near the entrance to the historic centre of Gjirokastër, this mosque is the only surviving one of the 13 mosques that once existed in the city. It is thought to have been spared by the communist regime because of its status as a cultural monument.

The mosque is quite simple but very beautiful. You can visit it for free and there is a separate entrance for men and women.

Just below the Castle area, we can visit a tunnel built secretly in the 1970s by the communist regime that ruled the country at the time. Enver Hoxha (the regime’s dictator) was paranoid about a possible nuclear attack and this was one more bunker in the thousands of bunkers built all over the country.

The visit to the tunnel is guided and lasts about 15/20 minutes. The tunnel is about 800 metres long and has 59 rooms which were intended to house the different government departments in the event of an attack.

📝 USEFUL INFORMATION: To visit the tunnel you should go to the Tourist Office (near the Town Hall), where someone will be able to inform you about the schedule of the next visit. The visit costs 200 LEK (~ 1,7€).

One of the must-see sites in Gjirokastër is its castle – one of the largest in the Balkan countries. From the tunnel it is only a few minutes walk, although always uphill.

There is a lot to visit in the castle, such as the beautiful Clock Tower, the United States Air Force plane or the fantastic views over the historic town of Gjirokastër. The castle is still quite large so I recommend that you set aside at least 1 hour to visit it calmly.

If you also plan to visit the two museums inside (Gjirokastër Museum and the Armament Museum), add a couple of hours to your visit. I ended up leaving out these 2 museums as I had no more time available. The visit to the museums is paid separately.

📝 USEFUL INFORMATION: Admission to the castle costs 400 LEK (~3.4€) and it is open from 9 am to 7 pm from April to September and from 9 am to 5 pm in the other months. You can find the most up-to-date information here.

The importance of the Ottoman Empire is clearly noticeable in Gjirokastër and one of the best sites you can visit to prove this is Skenduli House. The house is over 300 years old and is one of the best preserved houses in Gjirokastër.

This house belonged to one of the wealthiest families in the city and is a real treasure. The visit is short, but we were able to visit many of the rooms of the house and still learn how life worked at that time.

The highlights of this visit are the paintings on the outside of the house, the incredible view from the top floor and also the room (the only one you can’t photograph) where the wedding ceremonies were celebrated.

📝 USEFUL INFORMATION: The house doesn’t exactly have proper opening hours, but it costs 200 LEK (~1,7€) to visit and you must pay in cash. When I got there to visit, the house was open and I ended up going inside and joining the tour that was going on at that moment.

💡 EXTRA TIP: Another similar option that you can also visit in Gjirokastër is the Zekate House, built in the early 19th century. The entrance fee is 1€.

Initially operating in the Skenduli house, today the Ethnographic Museum has been moved to the former home of the communist dictator Enver Hoxha (or, more accurately, to the reconstructed version of the house since the original one burned down quite a few years ago).

The purpose of the museum is to recreate what would have been the interior of the houses of Gjirokastër in the 19th century. The entrance fee is also 200 LEK (~1,7€).

This last point of the itinerary requires a bit more physical effort as it is located about a 30 minutes walk from the historic centre of Gjirokastër. The Ali Pasha bridge is a bridge from the Ottoman period.

Although no longer technically located in Gjirokastër, the Blue Eye is one of the places worth visiting in Albania and it is only a 48 min (36 km) drive from Gjirokastër. This natural water source can be a great addition to your itinerary if you plan to stay in Gjirokastër for more than a day.

Although it is a very touristy place, the colour of the water leaves no one indifferent. And if you think that the cold temperature of the water scares people away, you are wrong! Several people decide to take a dip there, even though there is a warning that doing so is forbidden.

📝 USEFUL INFORMATION: You have to pay about 0.5€/pax to enter and the trail takes about 20 min (one way) to get to the Blue Eye. The trail has some ups and downs but it’s super easy.

💡 EXTRA TIP: If you wish to visit the Blue Eye without a car, that is also possible. There are buses that connect Gjirokastër to Sarandë, just ask the driver to drop you off at the Blue Eye.

I only had the opportunity to try one restaurant in Gjirokastër and I really liked it 😊 The restaurant was the Check-in Restaurant right at the entrance of the historical centre. Besides the chicken pie, we tried a traditional dish of the region – qifqi (a kind of balls stuffed with rice). The service was quick and everything was very tasty!

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