Albania fits in a week. Choosing does not.
Which boat actually lands on Sazan. Whether the Blue Eye is worth the drive up from Saranda. What a wine afternoon below Berat costs. Every tour in Albania, reviewed and priced.
The days Albania is famous for.
A spring so cold it looks lit from underneath, four islands you can wade between, a UNESCO town stacked up a hillside, and a valley the road only reaches in summer. Most Albania trips get built around these six.
Saranda is where the south coast gets organised.
Boats leave the promenade all morning for the bays at Krorez and Kakome, the Blue Eye is forty minutes inland, and Butrint sits at the end of the lagoon road. Almost every southern day trip starts on this seafront.
The Blue Eye: pick the day that fits.
Every Blue Eye tour →
The spring itself takes twenty minutes. What decides your day is what the driver puts around it: Roman Butrint and the Ksamil water, a long haul down from the capital, or the stone lanes of Gjirokaster on the way.
Spring, Butrint and the Ksamil islands
The spring while the light is still low, Roman Butrint under the pines before lunch, then whatever is left of the afternoon in the shallows off Ksamil.
The capital to the south coast and back
A five in the morning start, four hours down the coast road, and Saranda, Ksamil and the spring in a single sweep. Long and cheap, and the only version that works if the south is off your route.
Gjirokaster, the spring, then the castle
Ottoman houses and the castle above them in the morning, the spring after lunch, and last light from Lekursi over the Saranda bay.
From a $12 lake hike to the Sazan boats.
Every review →These carry more travellers than anything else in the country. Half of them are the same walk above a reservoir an hour from Tirana, which tells you plenty about how Albania gets travelled.
1
Bovilla Lake & Gamti Mountain Hiking Day Trip
Hike Gamti Mountain above Bovilla Lake with hotel transfers from Tirana, mountain views, local stories, and a budget-friendly group tour.
From · $12
Read our review →
2
Bovilla Lake and Gamti Mountain Tour
from $29
3
Bovilla Lake & Gamti Mountain Hiking Tour
from $12
4
Kruja Castle, Old Bazaar & Sari Salltik View
from $23
5
Sazan Island, Haxhi Ali Cave, and Karaburun Boat Tour
from $35
6
Bovilla Lake & Gamti Mountain Viewpoint Hike
from $12
7
Saranda, Ksamil, Blue Eye Day Trip
from $57
8
Komani Lake and Shala River Day Trip
from $60
Tirana: painted blocks, a cable car, and every road south.
The capital is small enough to walk in a morning and connected enough to reach the canyons, the coast and the Alps by minibus. The long day trips leave from around Skanderbeg Square before six.
In the Albanian Alps the road runs out, and that is the point.
Theth sits in a bowl of limestone at the end of a pass that only clears properly in late spring. The walk over to Valbona takes a full day, and the ferry through the Koman gorge looks nothing like the coast four hours south.
- 1Day Tour to Theth and Blue Eyefrom $50
- 2Albanian Alps and Theth Village Day Tourfrom $50
- 3Theth & Blue Eye Tour (Smll Grp)from $57
What $12 buys you in Albania.
Every priced tour on the site, grouped by what it actually costs. The single most booked day out in the country runs at twelve dollars a head.
Lake walks, city mornings, the cable car and the bazaar run up to Kruje.
The long day trips: the whole south in one sweep, Berat with the canyon, the Sazan boats.
Private drivers, multi-day trips into the Alps, and the boats you charter instead of share.
Three things Albania has that its neighbours do not.
Beaches and old towns run the length of this coast in every direction. The ferry through the Koman gorge, the undammed Vjosa and the concrete bunkers belong to Albania alone.
The Koman Ferry
A car ferry works the Koman reservoir between the dam wall and Fierze, through a gorge narrow enough that the walls close in on both sides. It was built for villages the road never reached, it still carries their shopping, and in summer the deck space goes to whoever booked first. Most day trips pair the crossing with a fast boat up the Shala river, which is the shallow green water everyone photographs.
- 1Komani Lake and Shala River Day Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 1,520 reviews
- 2Shala River and Koman Lake Boat Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 409 reviews
- 3Shala river & Komani lake -Day trip departure from Tirana/Shkodra★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 309 reviews
The Vjosa
The Vjosa runs from the Greek border to the Adriatic without a single dam on it, which makes it the last big wild river in Europe and, since 2023, a national park. Rafting goes from Permet while the snowmelt is still in the water, roughly March to June. By August the braided channels drop far enough to swim, and the thermal pools at Benje sit right beside them.
- 1Vjosa River National Park Guided Rafting Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 291 reviews
- 2Vjosa River Rafting from Permet or Berat city★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 239 reviews
- 3Amazing Horse Riding Experience at Vjosa National Park in Permet★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 199 reviews
The Bunkers
Between the early 1970s and 1985 Albania poured concrete for something close to 170,000 bunkers, about one for every fifteen people alive at the time, and most are still exactly where they were left. Two of the largest, dug under Tirana for the leadership, are now museums. The guides who lead these walks generally lived through the period they are describing.
- 1ATV Guided Tour in Kallm with Secret Bunker Visit★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 164 reviews
- 2Tirana’s Communist Past; Small Group Walking Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 59 reviews
- 3A Communist Manifesto: Tirana before and after★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 50 reviews
The Ionian goes gold around seven, and the boats know it.
All sunset cruises →
Sarande, Blue Eye & Sunset tour at Lekuresi castel
Read our review →Two weeks in Albania, top to bottom.
Kruje
Theth
GjirokasterFour Albanian days that will not wait for you.
Most of this country can be arranged from your guesthouse the night before. These four run on a ferry timetable, on snowmelt, and on a mountain pass that closes, and they go early in July and August.
- 01Komani Lake and Shala River Day TripOne ferry a day up the reservoir. In summer the seats and the deck space go days ahead.
- 02Day Tour to Theth and Blue EyeThe pass into the valley is only reliably open from late spring until October.
- 03Sazan Island, Haxhi Ali Cave, and Karaburun Boat TourSazan is a former military island with a cap on how many people land, so the July boats fill first.
- 04Osumi Canyon Rafting/River Tubing TourCanyon rafting runs on snowmelt, roughly March to June, and stops when the water drops.
Rain on the coast means a kitchen table in Tirana.
The wet months here are winter and early spring, and a shoulder-season day can turn for hours at a time. None of it touches a cooking class, a cellar in the hills above Berat, or the thermal pools at Benje, which are better in the cold anyway.
By region, north to south
Tirana173 tours
Shkoder7 tours
Durres22 tours
Berat34 tours
Gjirokaster25 tours
Vlore55 tours- Saranda57 tours
- Every region →
The newest Albania reviews.
All recent →
“Pëllumbas Cave, Erzeni Canyon & Petrelë Fortress Excursion”
Read our review →
Paragliding Tandem Experience From Dajti Mountain
Read our review →
Tandem Paraglading Logara Drimades/Palase Albania
Read our review →
Tirana Evening & Night Walking Tour History and Architecture
Read our review →
Kruja by Night: Castle & Bazar Tour from Durres/Golem
Read our review →
Albanian Riviera in 3 Days;Semi–Private Tour with Tour Leader&Car
Read our review →
Private Sunset Boat tour to Kroreza & Kakome with snorkelling.
Read our review →
Walking Tour “The Old Bazaar, Cfake, Dunavat, Ali Pasha Bridge”
Read our review →
Walking Tour Baazar – The Argjiro Castle – Zekate house
Read our review →
Saranda Hidden Gems: Sunset at Lekursi,Blue Eye&Wine Tasting
Read our review →