Macedonia & Kosovo
In September 2025, I spent a few days in (North) Macedonia and Kosovo (with about an hour in Albania). My primary goal was to visit several churches and monasteries with important Byzantine frescoes, created at a time when the Byzantine Empire lay in tatters and new kingdoms were rising in the Balkans.
I was also delighted by the beauty of Lake Ohrid and the stunning mountain landscapes I encountered everywhere in the two countries. I found some ancient ruins, attended a stirring liturgy in a mountaintop monastery, dined on lake trout and homemade brandy, and had an illuminating conversation with a young man about the continued agonies that remain decades after war between Serbs and Albanians had officially ended here.
I made three posts about my ramble: