7 Day Albania Itinerary
A 7-day Albania road trip — Bovilla Reservoir, Gjirokastër, the Blue Eye and the Llogara Pass, and why the hardest beach to reach is the one worth reaching.
The best thing I did in Albania was hike up to a viewpoint over Bovilla Reservoir — turquoise water ringed by mountains, with barely another soul in sight. The second best was a beach you have to climb down a cliff to reach.
That's the theme of this trip, and it's the one piece of advice I'd actually press on you: in Albania, the effort of getting somewhere is almost perfectly inversely proportional to how many people are there. The famous beach is the worst one. The hard beach is empty.
I went in October, which turns out to matter in both directions — it emptied out the coast, and it also dried up a canyon I'd been looking forward to. Seven days: two nights in Tirana, three in Sarandë, and a last night back in Tirana. I was solo for the first two days, then a friend joined and we picked up a rental car.
Days 1–2: Tirana and Bovilla
Tirana is thin. I'll say that plainly, because it's where you fly into and you should plan accordingly — a night to settle in, an evening walk around the centre, and that's about the size of it. The hostels are social and easy if you're solo, which I was.
Bovilla Reservoir is the reason to give Tirana a second day, and it's the highlight of the whole trip. It's a turquoise reservoir up in the mountains, and there's a short but steep hike up to a viewpoint above it — that view is the thing.
How to get there is the useful part. I booked a tour from Tirana, because most rental companies won't let you drive the road to Bovilla — it's specifically excluded in a lot of contracts. Tours run through GetYourGuide or straight through your hostel.
But here's the thing: I've since driven that road, and honestly it isn't bad. If your rental agreement allows it, drive it yourself. The warnings are heavier than the road deserves. Just check your contract first, because that's a rental dispute you don't want.
Bunk'Art 2, back in the city, is a Cold War bunker under Tirana turned into a museum about the dictatorship. It was good, not great — but Tirana doesn't have much else, so do it while you're here.
Day 3: Berat, Osumi Canyon and the long drive south
Car collected, and this is the biggest day of the trip by a distance. I'll be honest: it's too much. Berat, then Osumi, then all the way down to Sarandë is the better part of ten hours with stops. We did it, but you should know what you're signing up for.
Berat is the "City of a Thousand Windows" — Ottoman houses stacked up a hillside, a castle on top, UNESCO-listed. It's pleasant. But you'll also pass through Gjirokastër later in this itinerary, and if you only have room for one Ottoman town, skip Berat and give the time to Gjirokastër.
Osumi Canyon was my one real disappointment, and it was a timing problem rather than a place problem. In October the river was almost completely dry. We hiked down to the river bed and there simply wasn't much water in it — none of the drama it's photographed for, and no chance of rafting, which is the main reason people come. If rafting is what you're here for, come when there's still snowmelt in the river and check conditions before you commit a whole day to it.
Then south to Sarandë, which is your base for the next three nights.
Day 4: Blue Eye and Filikuri Beach
The Blue Eye (Syri i Kaltër) is about 30 minutes from Sarandë — a spring where impossibly blue water wells up from a depth nobody has properly measured. It's short, it's easy, and it's genuinely beautiful. Go.
Filikuri Beach is the one I'd send you to. You park, and then you hike down — and it's a real hike, steep and rough enough that you want a decent level of fitness and proper shoes. It is not a stroll.
And that difficulty is precisely the point. Because it's hard to reach, there's almost nobody there. You get a beautiful cove with clear water and a handful of other people who also earned it.
We drove up the coast towards Dhërmi afterwards, but having already had our beach day we just drove through. In hindsight that leg is skippable — you cover this same stretch of road properly on day 6 anyway, so if you'd rather have a slow afternoon in Sarandë, take it.
Day 5: Gjirokastër (and why I'd skip Ksamil)
Ksamil is 15 minutes from Sarandë and it's the beach every article about Albania puts at the top. I went, and I wouldn't go back.
To be fair to it, I was there in October, so the famous crowds weren't the issue — it wasn't busy. It's just that the beach is wall-to-wall tourist-trap restaurants and Instagram props, decorations put there to be photographed rather than to be anywhere nice. After Filikuri and Gjipe it felt manufactured. The other beaches on this coast are raw and full of nature. Ksamil is well marketed. That's the whole difference.
Go inland to Gjirokastër instead. Another UNESCO Ottoman town — a hilltop fortress, steep cobbled lanes, stone-roofed houses — and the one I'd keep if I had to choose between it and Berat.
Day 6: Gjipe, the Llogara Pass and back to Tirana
Gjipe Beach is the instructive counterpart to Filikuri. It is just as beautiful — genuinely, no complaints about the place itself. But from the car park it's a flat, well-marked, 30-minute walk, and so it is busy. Same coast, same quality of water, completely different crowd, and the only variable is how hard it is to get to.
Go to both if you can. If you can only do one and your legs are up to it, do Filikuri.
The Llogara Pass was one of the best drives of the trip — a mountain road climbing high above the Ionian and then dropping down towards the coast. Two things worth knowing: the road is in good condition, so it's an easy and genuinely fun drive, not a white-knuckle one. And it's a weather lottery — it can be completely socked in with cloud, in which case you'll see nothing at all. We spent a chunk of it in cloud and then got a window where the sky cleared, and it was extraordinary. Build in the time to wait one out if it's grey.
Vlorë for lunch on the way north. Its promenade genuinely looks like a film set — wide, palm-lined, faintly unreal. It's not a place to stay, but it's a very good couple of hours.
Then the drive back to Tirana for the last night.
Day 7: Fly home
What I'd tell you
- The hard-to-reach places are the good ones. Filikuri over Gjipe, Gjipe over Ksamil, in that order.
- Check whether your rental allows the Bovilla road before you assume you're taking a tour. If it does, drive it — the road's fine.
- Day 3 is too long. If you can spare a night, break the drive south rather than doing Berat, Osumi and Sarandë in one go.
- October is a good trade — an empty coast, but a dry canyon. Come in late spring if Osumi and rafting matter to you.
- Gjirokastër over Berat, if it's one or the other.
- Don't overplan Tirana. Two nights is enough, and one of them is really just Bovilla.
Albania gets sold on Ksamil and the Riviera postcards. The parts I'd go back for are a reservoir above the capital and a cove you have to climb down to.