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Via Egnatia (towards Jerusalem)
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[QUOTE="timr, post: 763870, member: 5237"] Via Egnatia Day 13 (but I am adding this here in July 2019) Wednesday 8th May Resen to Trbono 30.77km Somewhat (characteristically) unplanned..... I am not much of a planner-aheader. I hardly ever have a return plane ticket when I set out on a walk. I have only the vaguest idea of when I will finish. And I generally do not book accommodation ahead or at least, not more than one or at the most two days ahead. Who knows what will turn up? Clearly this attitude and lifestyle are much more appropriate for someone travelling alone than for someone taking someone else's point of view into consideration. I felt a sense of achievement after yesterday's walk and thought I was entitled to a gentler day and perhaps even a lie in. An advantage of walking in spring is that you don't have the high temperatures of later in the year to contend with and there is no need to rise early to beat the heat. So I got up around eight and went across the road for a light breakfast and headed off. I planned to stay in Capari in a monastery, though I had made no contact with them. [URL unfurl="true"]https://bitola.info/st-petka-monastery-in-village-capari-bitola-municipality/[/URL] The walk was gentle enough and the first surprising thing was a large French-style chateau on the side of the road. A pleasing diversion. Here is what I said on Facebook. [COLOR=rgb(41, 105, 176)]Have I gone to France overnight? Well no! But this is the "French House" in Resen, a Chateau built by a Turkish chieftain in the 19th Century. It is like a Chateau on the Loire! I passed it as I left the city and went in. Slightly showing its age but it houses an amazing and very unexpected collection of contemporary ceramics. Well worth the €1 to get in. [/COLOR] [COLOR=rgb(0, 0, 0)]The path continues past an industrial area with an old Soviet factory and then you proceed through many acres of orchards, (and a little bit of getting lost) bit a friendly ancient beldam put me on the right path. I reached Sopotsko. This is a very rural area. Old road, old tumbledown buildings. a bit of fording of rivers and lots of apples. Sopotsko was fast asleep. The shop was not open. No one seemed to be around. The 'old communist cultural centre building' was there and was open, but no sign of life inside. The book recommends an local English-speaking guide for the following section. "Ditar is a hunter and knows the deserted woods between Sopotsko and Djabato well. If you are concerned about safety, take him with you." It sounds a bit alarming doesn't it? I was not concerned about my safety, even in 'deserted woods' so did not look for him. The notes at the bottom of p129 - p130 are useful at a confusing junction of paths. Strangely the road shortly after is a partly tarred road, parallel to a main road, and rises up (quite gently) to the Djavato pass, with a church (closed) at the top. No traffic, not a single wheel to be seen for many kilometres along the path, though the road was busy below. [/COLOR] The book proposes 'three sides of a square' through Dolenci (which sounded attractive: 'a Muslim village where time seems to have come to a standstill centuries ago.') It would bring you to see cobbles and the remains of a castle. Meh! I thought about it, as the day got hotter, and decided against it. So I continued straight on and soon got to the turn for Capari, hopeful that this was the end of my journey. Capari had a huge church and huge cemetery, but not a lot else. I went looking for a shop where I hoped to by something to bring to the monastery. There was a sign to the monastery, to the right, before you get to the village, but I decided to go into the village first. I will put my Facebook notes here. [COLOR=rgb(41, 105, 176)]Day 13 walking. Resen to Trnovo. 31km I'm in a place called Трново or Trnovo. Difficult to pronounce. I'm picking up a bit of Macedonian now and I can read the alphabet easily...but...tomorrow I'll be in Greece! I planned for a short day as my legs a bit tired from previous days big climb. So I planned on Capari where I think I might have had a Campari & soda. Well probably not as the plan was to stay in nearby female Orthodox Monastery - "no food supplied." The walk was lovely through apple orchards and grassy tracks. Unfortunately a lot of streams to be 'forded' which is a posh word for walking through water over your ankles. My feet were wet all day. But it was sunny and warm. After a while I reached mud- building village of Sopotsko. No sign of life. Then to the Pelister National Park and a quiet road up through an ancient pass at Djavato. Not a soul to be seen though I could hear motorway near by. "If you are concerned about safety take Ditar the hunter with you" says my book, without specifying why you might be concerned. I wasn't. I did come upon the bones of a large cow at one point. The book recommends a significant diversion to visit Roman remains and cobblestones. By this stage I'm pretty well done with cobbles so I kept on and reached Capari. I found a man who came to retrieve his snappy dog. Yes he knew the monastery. No I couldn't stay there - it's closed. No one there. He then confirmed there were bars and shops in the village - but all closed down..[/COLOR] [COLOR=rgb(0, 0, 0)]This was disappointing. I had no reason to disbelieve him, and so I didn't go to the monastery, even though it looks very convincing on the website. [B]I am not able to confirm whether or not it is open.[/B] [B](May 2019) I would be interested to hear from others. [/B][/COLOR] [COLOR=rgb(41, 105, 176)]I needed a bit more fording of streams (not!) so I continued to Rotino, which made Capari look positively metropolitan. Less than nothing there. I asked a weedy looking (fact not criticism) scrap metal collector how long it would take to walk to Trnovo. '3 hours' he said. (This is a bit speculative as it was conducted in about 50% English, 30% Macedonian and 20% Albanian. His Albanian was weak but better than his English!) But he and his dad entered into the spirit of the moment and brought me alont to see another strapping fellow about 6'8" tall. He should be playing professional basketball but he was doing something important with apples. '1 hour' he said. Well it took me an hour and a half through nice deserted country and so after 31 unexpected km I reached a beautiful upmarket hotel. "I've only got the deluxe suite left said the manager but I'll give you a discount." Deal done. It's FULL of young European tourists here for the mountain - it's over 8,000 feet. They are mostly Finnish. I suppose they won't mind the snow on top. [/COLOR] [COLOR=rgb(0, 0, 0)]So that was my unplanned day. Not the ideal follow up for the exertions of the previous day, but not [I]too[/I] strenuous, apart from the distance. If I were a planner I might have done things differently. I learned Biblical Greek from an American in Rome many years ago and he was big into conditional sentences, for which there are strict rules in Greek. He would have analysed that sentence like this: "If I were a planner [but I am not] I might have done things differently [but I didn't]. This would have helped us to pick the right tenses in Greek! As ever I met some nice and friendly people who were encouraging and kind, even if somewhat bemused about what I was doing. And as is proving very common I had wet feet (in my dying shoes) for much of the day. But did I enjoy it? Yes.[/COLOR] Afterthought [COLOR=rgb(0, 0, 0)]I thought I was still 16 or more km from Bitola when I stopped in Trnovo - that is what the book says, but in fact I was only half that distance - the route in the book takes a huge diversion. My walk from Trnovo to Bitola the next day, straight along the road only 7km So on a well-planned day(!) (whatever that is) it would be feasible to get to Bitola (a fabulous city) in one (long) day from Resen, taking lunch and plenty of water and perhaps having a rest along the way. But probably not in the heat of high summer. I look forward to hearing how others solved the logistic difficulties of this stage. [/COLOR] [/QUOTE]
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