A dog bit me today (see above)! I had just started my cycle and a pack of about 10 dogs appeared from behind a gate and started chasing me down the road. Usually when a dog from a property begins to give chase they loose interest once you have cycled on for a bit. However, these ones were particularly tenacious and a little while up the road one sunk its teeth into my leg. This caused me to veer off course and ride into the side of the road resulting in me coming to a stop. With me now stationary the dogs seem to loose interest and trotted back to their dwelling, leaving me with two reasonable sized holes in the back of my calf. I rode down the hill and asked the next person I saw if he knew where I could locate a bandage of some sort. This bearded fruit seller seemed to sympathise and pointed me in the direction of a place two towns over that had ‘a clinic’. The clinic turned out to be a pharmacy and the friendly man behind the counter put some anti-septic brown juice on the wound and bandaged it up for me. For the rest of the trip through Greece I was exceedingly wary of dogs, even stopping when I thought I saw a pack of them ahead on the road (they turned out to be sheep). However one more dog did give me a little chase but gave up pretty quickly.
The Albanian Border
I crossed the Albanian border easily and headed off towards Pogredec. I stopped at a bank and exchanged 150 Euros for Albanian Lek. This was a move of excess. I just ate a meal of three kebab skewers, salad, chips, bread, and two beers that set me back the equivalent of about 6 Euros. Having this much money for two days is too much; I will probably go for a really nice meal tomorrow in Tirana. Who knows, it might cost me over 10 pounds. The rest of the cycle was nice. I went through a lot of Albanian farmland and saw people going about their day to day business. I would’ve liked some more photos of people but I felt intrusive cruising in on a bike and taking people’s photograph as they worked. One thing I did really enjoy was a donkey I saw, fully loaded with hay, walking happily along the motorway. I took its picture and wondered where it was going. A little further down the road I saw a man running in the donkey’s direction shaking his stick. He smiled at me as if to say “I have lost my donkey. But don’t worry, I am faster’. My mountain bike also came in handy here as the Albanian idea of a road seems to sometimes be a field you can drive through. There were lots of stony paths and muddy ditches for me to navigate. It was really fun.
When I arrived at the hostel I told my host about my dog ordeal and was quickly whisked away to hospital. The man at the Greek pharmacy had said to seek medical attention if I started feeling weird but the hostel owner thought it was better if we went even though I was feeling fine. The doctor spoke no English but kept saying ‘No problem’ and giving me a thumbs up as he stitched up my bite marks and injected me with what I assume was a rabies vaccination. They didn't charge me for the affair and apart from being pretty painful it was quite a painless affair.
Final thing before I sign off. After my disappointing Cornetto experience I tried another ice cream cone today; it was simply called ‘Nestle Ice Cream’. At first it was a bit underwhelming as the top didn't have any chocolate or nuts on it, just plain ice cream. However, once I got past this the cone was far crunchier than the Cornetto and was very satisfying. When I reached the conclusion I was delighted to find solid chocolate waiting for me at the bottom of the cone. Result. This was a far better experience than the Cornetto and one I would happily repeat. 4 Stars. For more ice cream reviews and hopefully less hospital trips please check back regularly.
Also, I just tried to buy a few cherries for a snack. I offered the equivalent of about 80p and now have over 100 cherries to contend with. Oops.
This is not the best way to hold an ice cream
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