Elbasan County

Elbasan County (Qarku i Elbasanit) lies in the geographic center of Albania, where the Shkumbin River divides the country into the Gheg north and the Tosk south. A trip to Elbasan County takes you to an old trading town with an inhabited fortress and into green mountain valleys reaching all the way to the North Macedonian border.

Elbasan: Life Inside the Castle

Elbasan sits on the ancient Via Egnatia, which linked Rome with Constantinople; the Romans maintained the station of Scampa here. In the 15th century the Ottomans expanded the fortress, whose walls still enclose an entire neighborhood today. Inside the castle, people live along lanes lined with old houses, and among them you'll find the King's Mosque from the 15th century, the Orthodox Church of St. Mary, and small cafés. In communist Albania, Elbasan was home to a huge steel complex known as "Steel of the Party," whose ruins are still visible on the edge of town. Today Elbasan is a lively university city, and its center has been revitalized with new squares and cafés around the castle walls.

Things to See in Elbasan County

East of the city, the land rises toward the mountains. Near Librazhd you'll find Shebenik-Jabllanica National Park, with beech forests, glacial lakes, and, with a little luck, traces of the rare Balkan lynx; parts of the forests are included in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of Europe. To the south, Gramsh nestles against a reservoir on the Devoll River, and the villages around Elbasan have thermal springs such as the one at Llixha. Culinarily, the city is known for ballokume, a crumbly cornmeal cookie that is baked in large quantities for the spring festival Dita e Verës on March 14. The festival is now a national holiday and draws many visitors.

Getting There and Best Time to Visit

An expressway with a tunnel connects Elbasan to Tirana in under an hour. Farther east, the route continues to Pogradec and Ohrid. Spring and fall are ideal; in summer the valley gets very hot. For the national park, it's best to have your own vehicle or a local guide.