Alternative tourism is becoming an increasingly important part of the global tourism market. Statistics show that people are losing interest in vacation packages, preferring to fill their holidays with various unconventional activities instead.

In keeping with worldwide trends, Ohrid, Macedonia’s most famous tourist destination, has started to offer active forms of tourism, including mountain climbing, cycling, paragliding, and scuba diving. Lately, however, recreational fishing trips have become one of Ohrid’s most popular attractions.

Ohrid native Ljupcho Stojkoski-Lepi is a passionate angler, outdoorsman, and fishing guide who has successfully introduced sport fishing as one of the alternative tourist activities the town has offered in the past three years.

Stojkoski has tried to actively incorporate his experiences from Germany and the Netherlands into his promotion of recreational fishing at Ohrid Lake. He offers tourists a unique way of enjoying the lake’s natural beauty while catching fish.

“A large number of tourists bring their fishing equipment to Ohrid,” Stojkoski says. “I organize day trips on the lake, providing experienced fishermen and amateur anglers with everything they need to catch fish – from transportation and equipment to access to the best fishing locations, whether for shore fishing or open-water fishing.”

Foreign visitors who decide to catch fish at Ohrid Lake are usually recreational fishermen and outdoor enthusiasts. Most of them release the fish they catch, but there are those who want to keep their fish. The organizer provides all of them with a fishing license that allows them to both fish and to keep some of their catch (up to 5 kg per person, or up to two fish if they happen to catch Ohrid trout).

Best of all, anglers can opt to take their catch to an interesting locale, such as a picnic area or a restaurant, where they can have the fish prepared using traditional local recipes, or in their own preferred way.

Many visitors have taken recreational fishing tours at Ohrid Lake, including tourists from the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Norway, Hungary, Italy, neighboring Balkan countries, and even China.

“Depending on the kind of fishing they opt for, tourists can fish from fishing boats, various lakeshore locations, or local fish ponds,” Stojkoski says.

“Some of them prefer to catch the fish that will be their dinner. The positive feedback from the fishing tours confirms that recreational fishing deserves its place among the activities Ohrid offers.”

When it comes to Ohrid Lake fishing, it truly is a unique experience for tourists.

“Catching chub from a boat can rival open-sea fishing since we fish at depths of 20-30 meters. The lake’s clear water, combined with beautiful weather and picturesque surroundings, offers a truly unforgettable setting that, as many tourists have said, cannot be put into words, but can only be experienced.”

Surprisingly, however, Ohrid travel agencies have shown little interest in offering this type of recreation. Even worse, according to Stojkoski, some agencies have tried to improvise unprofessional fishing tours, which risks leaving tourists with a bad impression. Stojkovski adds that hotels along the Ohrid riviera, fortunately, take a more serious approach, recognizing the potential benefit from expanding the recreational activities they offer visitors.

Stojkovski is trying to incorporate recreational fishing into the town’s tourist offerings by suggesting it be advertised alongside the town’s attractions at tourist fairs, even if it means simply distributing brochures.

There is no doubt, however, that the best advertising is word-of-mouth. For example, positive feedback and comments from Dutch anglers resulted in Ohrid Lake’s recreational fishing being mentioned in a specialized fishing magazine in the Netherlands a few years ago. Now, a number of Dutch tourists have already booked recreational fishing tours at Ohrid Lake for their next vacation.

Aleksandar Bachikj

Translated by Magdalena Reed

Nestled in the Maleshevo valley in the East of Macedonia, Berovo does not seem, at first glance, all that different from any other little Macedonian town. But when you meet the townspeople, when you see the beautiful Berovo Lake and the beech, oak and pine forests stretching across Malesh mountain, and when you learn about its cultural heritage, you will understand why this little town attracts thousands of visitors every year.

There are two legends about how Berovo got its name. The first one says it was named after a farmer called Bero. An argument for this is the existence of a field known as Bero’s field between the villages of Machevo and Robovo.

The second story goes that people gathered (in the Berovo dialect: se berele) in that spot, coming from the old villages of Turtela, Selca, Ribnica, Razdolo, Klepalo, Dobri Laki and other small towns in the Maleshevo region.

In recent years, Berovo has become an alternative tourism hotspot, even though only a decade ago few thought it possible.

Tourism has become the town’s strategic priority because of its potential for sustainable development of the community. Berovo’s mayor Zvonko Pekevski says the municipality has been working hard on projects important both for citizens and for visitors.

“One of our major projects,” Pekevski says, “is the repair and upgrade of Berovo’s sewer system, which will solve the problem of wastewater, including surface runoff. So far, we have reconstructed eight streets and put down completely new asphalt.

“We are currently building a water treatment plant and a water supply system for the Berovo Lake tourist area, financed by the EU and the city of Sandanski, Bulgaria.”

The project includes developing an interactive smartphone app and a website listing local tourist attractions, information about various local events and places to visit.

“We are also planning to build a walkway around the lake with rest areas, gazebos, benches, wastebaskets, notice boards, and signposts,” Pekevski says.

Any investment in tourism generates income for the municipality in one way or another. This includes building tourist objects and paying property taxes, as well as charging tourist tax.

“Tourism helps citizens supplement their budget, and it also helps producers of food and souvenirs. For some, it is their only source of income; it is their family business. I am glad to hear plans for building several large objects and expanding existing hotels, which should offer further employment opportunities,” Pekevski says.

Berovo is one of the first towns to categorize its tourist capacities. This helps promote the town, ensure visitor satisfaction, and standardize tourist options. 

“Also important is the fact that we keep track of the number of overnight stays and follow strict accommodation standards. We regularly collect tourist tax, as well,” Pekevski says. 

“At the moment,” Pekevski adds, “there are 45 objects with a total of approximately 500 beds, not including hotel capacities outside of our competences. I am pleased that citizens have started offering improved accommodation conditions, some of which rival the standards of some developed European countries.”

Pekevski assures us that the municipality will continue to support all citizens who decide to provide visitor accommodation. They want to ensure high standards and include more citizens in the promotion of Berovo as a tourist hotspot. 

In addition to improved infrastructure, cultural events are part of Berovo’s strategy to attract more visitors. 

“The Maleshevo region,” Pekevski says, “apart from its beautiful nature and clean air, the abundance of wild fruit and medicinal herbs, healthy food, and local delicacies, is also known for its traditions, which we keep alive by organizing events to attract tourists.

“The Ratevski bamburci carnival has grown from a local tradition older than 2000 years into a regional carnival and a tourist attraction.

“The local custom of selecting the hardest egg, the kachor, has become an organized competition during the Easter holidays when most natives are back in town and many tourists come to Berovo to enjoy their spring vacations or long weekends. 

"During the summer, there are several major events as part of the Berovo Summer Culture Tour program, such as the Vladimirski ilindenski sredbi (“Vladimirovo village Ilinden meetings”), the Maleshevsko dzvonche (“Malesh bell”) children’s music festival, the Etno ploshtad (“Ethno Square”) festival that takes place in August and brings many concert performances to Berovo, as well as the Maleshevijata na dlanka (“Malesh at your fingertips”) fair of homemade food and crafts.”

Berovo will focus its energy on improving its infrastructure in the near future, as well, to build a better image of Berovo as a tourist town.

“We will continue,” Pekevski says, “to improve the conditions, such as the Berovo Lake tourist area water supply and sewer systems. We will also work on pedestrian and bicycle lanes, and traffic signal equipment. We plan to create a pedestrian zone along the Bregalnica river and to improve street lighting by using energy-efficient technology. Also important is the reconstruction of the highway to the Klepalo border crossing between Macedonia and Bulgaria, and we hope the central government will see to its opening soon.”

In collaboration with the municipalities of Pehcevo and Delchevo, Berovo will reopen its tourist bureau.

“Our goal,” Pekevski says, “is to promote the region by providing an integrated approach and building a network of local participants. The bureau will bring us closer to the employees in the tourism sector and, more importantly, tourists themselves. It will offer promotional materials and information on natural resources, hiking trails, local souvenirs, healthy food and local products. Berovo has great potential as a tourist destination and it has not reached its zenith yet.”

The story of the Maleshevo region is known far and wide. It attracts visitors from all over the world, mostly from the Netherlands, Israel, Bulgaria, the UK, and the US. They all want to experience the unique beauty of this area. And, during the past ten years, Berovo’s local government has been busy not only promoting the town but also fulfilling its duties: to visitors by providing high-quality services, and to investors by providing incentives to further develop Berovo’s tourism.

Daniela Takeva, Translation by Magdalena Reed

Ohrid is a stunning medieval Ottoman town on the shores of a mountain lake. The old town drags and clambers all over the hills behind the lake. Terraced cobblestone avenues run between tall, narrow houses, and age has tinted the facades of the buildings so the whole city looks tea-stained. We got lost in the flower-strewn corridors of the old city. We saw a church of dusty brown stone which looked like a dribble castle. We swam in the cold blue of the lake and walked along the beaches.

We went to cafes in the public square in the morning, and we went dancing at a club on the docks at night. We stopped at a café in a stone house which had been a private mansion until it was sold in the 80s. And, while searching for the bus station in the new part of town, we walked through a rustic village and saw a fat brown bulldog lounging on a porch behind a custom-made BEWARE OF DOG, which portrayed the same fat brown bulldog sitting on that same porch in the same pose. Ohrid is a beautiful old Ottoman town in a crater lake in a geographic nowhere and I love it.

Most of what I learned about Macedonia, and the town of Ohrid, happened over a plate of kebab, and came from a Slavic-origin dog enthusiast from New York.

We were walking down the square in Ohrid away from our hostel when a man in a dirty gray t-shirt saw our dog and came over to pet it. His wife, smoking spindly cigarettes, descended on the dog in a frenzy of sweet words, cuddles, and cooing. The guy, Kosta, was from Brooklyn, but his parents were Macedonian and he had partially grown up in Skopje. He recommended a kebab place called "Delicious" (Fkuzna), the thought of which apparently made him so hungry that he and his Slovenian wife came with us and ordered for us. We got Macedonian kebab, called "cevap," tiny logs of meat served with amazing grilled bottle-green peppers. Kosta said that he and his wife visited last summer for about two months and kept meaning to try other restaurants, but they just kept coming back here, every day. This was their favorite restaurant in Europe, maybe the whole world which meant that they ate ten tiny meat logs every day for like two months. Fkuzna.

Macedonia, or the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), was the last state to break away from the former Yugoslavia. The name itself comes from the region of Europe they're in, Makedonia (with that hard k sound), but even that's controversial as it is also the name of a region in northern Greece. This is why when they entered the United Nations, they had to pick a name that wouldn't make Greece upset, hence the somewhat off-center acronym of FYROM.

Ohrid: A medieval town in search of its roots in the 21st century

Secondly, they have a bit of an identity crisis, since their language and the Bulgarian language are mutually intelligible, for the most part. Bulgaria used to have this big ol' kingdom in the middle ages which included modern-day Macedonia. The city of Ohrid was an ancient capital of the kingdom, and Bulgarians still feel like it was stolen from them by the Macedonians, who are certain that it was the Bulgarians who'd usurped the just Macedonian king from his throne. You see how complicated this stuff is.

Macedonia as a nation has this need to distinguish themselves. Though most Balkan countries feel a deep need to assert their nationalism, organized around a heroic figure, Macedonia most recently started playing this game, as they only became a republic in the nineties. Out of this great need for a national pride, in Republic Square in Skopje, a colossal gold Alexander the Great rises out of the earth on a pillar, surrounded by phalanxes embossed into the pillar's base, obscured by a spray of mist from the fountain. When people ask, hey, what's Macedonia? Anyone in the country can say, "Take a look at that enormous pillar."

When we first arrived in Ohrid we noticed none of this nationalism – just a lot of history concentrated in one beautiful spot. It was a bit too late to start sightseeing, so we dropped our things at Sunny Lake Hostel and headed to Çınar restaurant in the Turkish quarter for some kebab. Cinar, for our non-Turkish-speaking readers, means "Sycamore," and an enormous Sycamore tree was rooted in the cobblestone roads, sheltering the outdoor tables at this restaurant.Before being a suburb for rich Turks, Kosta informed us while as were sitting down for meat logs at Fkuzna the next day, Ohrid was a Slavic university town from the middle ages which has 365 churches, actually literally truly one church for every day of the year. Good Christians would actually visit a different church for every day of the year in a peculiar keeping-up-with-the-Joneskis medieval contest. The Cyrillic alphabet was invented here, at the University of Ohrid, by a couple of monks who felt the Greek alphabet was inadequate to describe the liturgy in the Slavonic dialect of the time.

Ohrid: A medieval town in search of its roots in the 21st century

Lake Ohrid is nestled in a hollow between the mountains. If you walk around the lake, you can see the ridges extending far into meadows where you will never walk. From the old town, a boardwalk runs along the side of the lake bolted to a sheer rock wall, and then the trail goes up past a ruined church – the Church of Sveti Jovan (St. John). This is probably the most photogenic building in the whole town. It's easy to see why: against the backdrop of the plaintive blue lake and low sloping mountains, a series of bricked octagons topped by a zigzag tile roof cuts into the horizon. Inside, if you want to pay the 100 Macedonian Dinars as admission ($2) you can peep at all the icons.

Past the church, then into the woods, a trail runs down onto a secluded beach. This was a premium spot, as nobody was there, though we did find a nearby hobo shack and broken refrigerator which had last been used to store hundreds of thousands of spiders. The scenery was ethereal.

Felix, a Swiss guy from our hostel, and I got into the water. I dived in, but jumped out soon afterward because it was too cold. Felix said "You have to meditate into it," and waded in, centimeter by logical centimeter. Cassidy, a Canadian EMT with a probably-not-coincidental zest for life, arrived late and leaped into the lake, and said Woo! Let's swim to that cave over there. His vitality was inspiring and we followed. It is an attitude I wish to emulate: take enormous leaps and then follow them through. But the water was icy: we swam and it was like swimming through crude oil. I had to keep moving to stay warm. Every time my head dipped beneath the fresh clean water, the mountains would disappear, and then reappear back into view.

Then, it was time to towel off and head to Samuil's Fortress, towering above the town. You haven't looked behind you yet? Oh, be careful, because you might get crushed by the shadow of Tsar Samuel's walls. The 11th century was a good time for the Macedonian kings. They had enough money and territory and rocks to build an impressive skyline, most of which still lines the background of any photos you might want to take.

Just below the fortress by the shores of the lake is the Plaosnik church and archeological complex. The church dates from the 4th century, and it's surrounded by the stubby walls common to enormous monastic compounds of the past. This one used to host 3,500 scholarly monks. Most weirdly, one of the mosaics on the floors of the compound features a swastika. It didn't mean anything bad back then! It was a good luck symbol! (Though, I was a bit perturbed by the graffiti swastikas on streetlights outside of town.)

After you've hit up the big names in Slavonic churches, I strongly recommend you spend the rest of the afternoon just strolling past the chunky wooden houses and along the cobblestone roads of the old Ottoman town. There aren't nearly enough gorgeously-preserved Ottoman cities in Europe, with the clean white walls and brown wooden trim of their domiciles, and every time I find myself inside them I feel a great warmth towards the many craftsman who built these houses for the Balkan middle class several centuries ago. Today, you can either rent apartments from the locals or eat in their restaurants – as in most Balkan countries, the residents of antique houses have figured out that they can rent their restored flats out to tourists for as low as 25 Euros a night. Monks in the 11th century probably paid a bit less, but you at least get to order as many meat logs as you can eat. Fkuzna.

SOURCE: DAILY SABAH

It’s barely nine in the morning, but at the waterfront café on the shores of the sparkling, crystal-clear Lake Ohrid, the owner is recommending I try a bowl of traditional fish stew – for breakfast.

I’m spending a week in Macedonia and have already encountered baked snails, giant flaky pastries and huge sausages at random mealtimes, so by this point I just shrug and say, ‘When in Macedonia’ – fully expecting a hearty dish of heads and fins.

But I’m presented with a delicious light, lemony broth, with freshly caught lake trout for just £1.20, and I manage to tear myself away from the stunning view for the few moments it takes to slurp it up.

The historic town of Ohrid is probably the biggest tourist resort I’d never heard of. It’s in the south-west corner of the landlocked Balkan republic, which used to be part of former Yugoslavia, and visitors flock in their thousands from all over the world to enjoy its lake – one of the oldest and deepest in Europe – and charming Unesco heritage sights.

It’s dotted with Orthodox churches , including the stately St John at Kaneo, which perches prettily on a clifftop above the café.

I clambered up to it for great views across to Albania, and the reconstructed, terracotta-tiled Byzantine monastery of St Panteleimon. Dating from the 10th century AD, it has been fought over, demolished and rebuilt many times by the hordes of Romans, Slavs and Ottoman Turks which have invaded over the centuries.

I also visited the impressive Roman amphitheatre, dating from around 200BC, which used to play host to fierce gladiatorial battles. Though nowadays you’re more likely to see singers like Placido Domingo warbling on its main arena, as part of the city’s annual summer festival.

A road trip around Macedonia is a great way to explore this fascinating but underrated country.

Bordered by Greece, Albania, Serbia, Kosovo and Bulgaria, it has over 50 lakes, three vast national parks and several grape-producing regions, which result in some phenomenal, and phenomenally cheap, wine – look out for the robust red, Vranac.

I flew in to the capital Skopje (birthplace of Mother Teresa ) which reminded me a bit of Las Vegas. It has some attractive old neighbourhoods – I particularly loved wandering around the Old Bazaar, a maze of polished stone streets lined with cafés, tempting bakeries and shops selling slightly odd things, like garlic shampoo.

But five years ago the government decided to give it more appeal in the wake of a huge earthquake which destroyed around 80 per cent of the city in 1963.

This resulted in a lot of money spent on building giant, towering statues of some of Macedonia’s historic figures – including Alexander the Great and former ruler King Philip II – usually on horseback, and inevitably sporting a magnificent moustache.

There are also some shiny white Caesar’s Palace-style structures lining the city’s river Vardar, which turn out to be new museums or civic buildings.

I preferred to lose myself in the authentic Green Market, a massive covered sprawl where you can buy fresh fruit and vegetables, order a tasty lahmacun – a flatbread wrap filled with minced beef and salad – or sit with a glass of black tea and watch the world go by.

Just 20 minutes outside the capital, I got back to nature. Matka Canyon is a vast, towering gorge, cut through by the Treska river, home to several medieval ruins and dozens of caves. I took a short boat trip to Vrelo Cave, and climbed down a succession of rather slippery steps into the dank gloom.

This limestone cave has been around for over 2,000 years, and its underground chambers are lined with dripping stalagmites and stalactites.

It’s also home to colonies of bats, which I heard squeaking unnervingly in the roof just a few metres above me.

A further 90-minute drive took me to the lushly forested Mavrovo National Park. In the winter you can ski in its mountains, but in summer you’re more likely to find hikers and campers, keen to spot endangered wildlife like lynx, wolves and even the occasional bear, which are all protected here.

I didn’t see any, but on a lovely wander round its lakefront I was drawn to the iconic, half-submerged 1850 Church of St Nicholas. It was covered by floodwater in the 1950s, but water levels are now controlled by dams, and the church pokes up above the surface.

My last port of call was the cultural city of Bitola, full of interesting monuments. I visited its central clock tower, built in the 16th century reportedly with 60,000 eggs mixed into the cement, which was meant to make the walls stronger.

There are also several large mosques (around 30 per cent of the population is Muslim) and the remains of an ancient Greek city, known as Heraclea.

There are magnificent mosaic floors here in the remnants of old palaces and churches.

After all the sightseeing I plonked myself down at one of the many cafés which line the main pedestrianised street, Shirok Sokak.

When the waiter asked if I would like a huge slab of molten chocolate cake to go with my coffee, what else could I say? When in Macedonia...

SOURCE: MIRROR

The Ottoman houses on the shore of the lake are veiled in the morning mist, as if they were white ghosts against a blanket of white. This enveloping whiteness hovers over the wooden boats scattered around the lake and swallows the crown of houses ranged around it. Nevertheless, I know how beautiful the view is, having seen countless postcard-perfect pictures of this UNESCO-listed lake, which is one of the oldest in the world.

Ohrid in winter

When tourists are gone and winter is in the air, Ohrid becomes again the picturesque lakeside town that has enchanted visitors since the Byzantine Empire.

The pale light of the sun reflects on deserted cobbled streets, and this glowing fog melts in time with the footfalls of the few people wandering around.

The ancient stones drenched with rain emanate a wet, winterish smell, which –here and there- is abruptly interrupted by the warm smell of oven-baked bureks. The churches are scented with incense. Ohrid is well-known for its churches, which were 365 originally –one for each day of the year- a feature which won it the epithet of ‘the Jerusalem of the Balkans‘.

Ohrid’s churches, as well as its architecture, span more than two millennia, but this is just one of the reasons why this enchanting city is recognized by UNESCO. Actually, it is one of the 28 UNESCO World Heritage Sites that are on both the Cultural and the Natural lists.

I didn’t stumble upon any celebrations inside Ohrid’s churches. Rather, I always found a profound silence only occasionally interrupted by footsteps tiptoeing on the marble floorings: a solemn atmosphere I bet you can only find during this time of the year, when the town becomes quiet and idyllic again.

Unlike with my usual ‘travel-style’, I visited a lot of churches when in Ohrid, starting off with an ambitious plan in the early morning, but then slowly adopting a more Balkan approach as the day passed by. This implied Turkish coffees, Skopsko beers, some meaty snacks and the ubiquitous Ohrid trout, which is the protagonist of the traditional cuisine of the area and the only thing that the Macedonian shore has in common with the Albanian side across the lake.

The area is also well-known for its centuries-old tradition of wine making. Macedonians love to drink, and Ohrid’s porches overlooking the lake are the perfect place to do it. During the summer, all these lakeside cafés are bustling, but now the paved promenade is empty and everything looks more authentic.

Even the accordion player at a fancy restaurant goes for Tose Proeski’s very Macedonian songs rather than the international repertoire of the summer. When the music stops, the only sound I can hear is the rhythmic percussion of waves on sand.

As I watch them coming and going, I can’t help thinking about the time when I was on the other side of the lake, on the Albanian shore. The two experiences could not be more different: the touristy, postcard-perfect Macedonian outline of the Ottoman houses and the rough, neglected jumble of concrete on the Albanian side.

Anyone who has visited both sides of Ohrid Lake knows that these two landscapes are not a just lake, but a whole world apart.

Source

Each week, we spotlight a dream vacation recommended by some of the industry's top travel writers. This week's pick is Macedonia.

Macedonia is one of Europe's best-kept secrets, said Margo Pfeiff at the Los Angeles Times. Twenty-five years after it gained independence from Yugoslavia, the landlocked Balkan state remains a developing nation, its roads still plied by Soviet-era cars. But it's a safe, inexpensive place to visit, and "best of all," with tourism in its infancy, the country is still "charmingly unpretentious and warmly welcoming." Earlier this year, I spent a week in this Vermont-size nation, hiking, kayaking, and biking across its "wildly mountainous" landscape. The journey afforded me a chance along the way to peer inside Macedonia's "exotic melting pot" of Eastern and Western cultures.

The capital city, Skopje, proved to be "a fascinating jumble of cultural experiences." Because a long history of invasions and occupations has littered the 2,500-year-old city with Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, and Yugoslav architecture, "it was easy to stroll through the centuries." A new complex of government-backed neoclassical buildings is remaking a section of the city in faux grandeur, but on the outskirts of town, I found real history in a 2nd-century Roman ruin that stands in a field of red poppies. Later, after scaling Skopje Fortress' 6th-century walls, I browsed the Old Bazaar — instantly my favorite neighborhood. Lured on by the aromas of kebabs and sautéed leeks, I wandered happily past carpet shops and teahouses where locals had gathered to chat.

Later, joining a Macedonia Experience group tour, I hiked into nearby Matka Canyon. We stopped at an exquisite monastery filled with frescoes before venturing into Vrelo, one of the canyon's 10 caves. In Ohrid, a small lakeside city that's one of Europe's oldest settlements, I poked around the maze-like Old Town, a UNESCO World Heritage site. There, I came upon a Roman amphitheater that now features summer concerts instead of gladiator fights. When the sun set, I walked to Ohrid Lake, where purple jacaranda trees line the turquoise shore. At a family restaurant built out over the lake, I savored a dinner of grilled trout as the water "splashed gently beneath the planks under my feet" and music drifted from another café. "No crowds, no pressure to leave — Europe just doesn't get any better than this."

SOURCE

The Macedonia capital celebrates the heritage of Alexander the Great, and the world is invited.

Holidaymakers seeking new adventures in Europe, take note: In Skopje, an up-and-coming Balkan destination, all roads lead to the mighty Alexander the Great.

The national capital of the Republic of Macedonia has an international airport and a major highway named after the legendary warrior-king.  

Then, there is the unnamed eight-storey colossus that bears more than a passing resemblance to the conqueror and his beloved steed. Cast in bronze, it dominates the city’s main square alongside other supersized statues that keep watch over Skopje.

These giants are part of Skopje 2014, an ambitious four-year construction project that has placed this former Yugoslav republic high on travellers’ wish lists. Completed in 2014, the neo-classical facelift has transformed the 2,500-year-old city into one the country deemed worthy of Alexander the Great.

A stroll along Skopje’s squares and streets takes you past new statues, bridges, grand monuments, civic buildings and museums that show off the city’s burgeoning cultural hub status. Also not to be missed: Ancient attractions that let you take in Skopje’s richly layered Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman past.

Thanks to Qatar Airways, visitors looking to explore the legacy of Macedonia’s spiritual father need not ride into the city on a war horse. Skopje is now part of the much-lauded airline’s network of more than 150 cities worldwide. Four weekly flights are available between Singapore Changi Airport and Alexander the Great International Airport via the carrier’s hub in Doha.

Qatar Airways was a big winner at the 2017 Skytrax World Airline Awards in June, picking up these accolades: Airline of the Year, Best Airline in the Middle East, World’s Best Business Class and World’s Best First Class Airline Lounge.

Here’s what to do after getting to Skopje in style.

ENJOY VIEWS OF THE CITY FROM TVRDINA KALE FORTRESS

Take in a slice of Macedonian history at the medieval Tvrdina Kale Fortress.

Pay tribute to a soaring architectural treasure that has been protecting the city since the sixth century — the unmissable Tvrdina Kale Fortress (free entry). The majestic Game of Thrones-style ramparts at Carsija, a short walk from the city centre, sit at the city’s highest point and dominate its skyline. A stroll on this medieval structure that has outlasted empires lets you take in fantastic views and a slice of Macedonian history.

CROSS THE STONE BRIDGE

The graceful 15th-century Stone Bridge is a symbol of Skopje. 

In this city of contrasts, a striking medieval symbol connects the lures of the Ottoman-era old bazaar to the city’s newly manufactured grandeur at Macedonia Square: The Stone Bridge that spans the River Vardar. Built on Roman foundations and constructed from solid stone blocks, this graceful, 15th-century icon is an Instagrammer’s dream — stunning by day and breathtaking at night when it is lit.

The enduring charm of Stone Bridge and crowds of people navigating the wide crossing make it easy to forget that the structure has a darker side: The leader of the anti-Ottoman Karposh uprising of 1689 was believed to have been executed here.

BE DAZZLED BY ICONS OF THE CITY

Whichever part of town you end up in after crossing Stone Bridge, you will see a side of Skopje that will make your trip unforgettable.

The Ottoman-era Daut Pasha hamam now functions as the National Gallery of Macedonia. 

On the eastern bank of the Vardar lies the old bazaar that was the heart of the city in Byzantine and Ottoman days. Said to be the largest of its kind in the Balkans, this colourful tangle of streets is worth exploring for picture-perfect attractions such as medieval mosques, cafes serving authentic local eats, and shops selling everything from traditional crafts to fresh produce.

Cultural treasures close by include the 15th-century Daut Pasha hamam (or bathhouse), a gem of Ottoman architecture that now functions as the National Gallery of Macedonia as well as the Sveti Spas Church. The main draws at this 14th-century Byzantine wonder are its exquisite 6m hand-carved iconostasis — a large panel of Christian icons separating the sanctuary from worshippers — and well-preserved frescos.  

Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (482 to 565) was born in Dardania (Republic of Macedonia today), and is now immortalised near Stone Bridge.

On the opposite bank of the river, new landmarks for future generations dominate Plostad Makedonija (or Macedonia Square). Dwarfing visitors to the main square and its main streets are mammoth tributes to national heroes, including the gleaming Warrior on a Horse. Also promising to boost national pride while dazzling foreign visitors is Porta Macedonia — the city’s triumphal arch, illuminated fountains, and a host of cultural and government buildings.

ENJOY A HIKE TO THE MILLENNIUM CROSS

Millennium Cross on Mount Vodno to the southwest of Skopje is a towering icon of faith. 

Here is another goliath begging to be explored during your getaway: The 1,066m Mount Vodno. Located to the southwest of the city, it is home to the most spectacular views in Skopje and the sky-piercing Millennium Cross. A three-hour hike — or quicker, less strenuous bus-and-cable-car ride — takes you to the 66m cross at the summit of the mountain. This towering icon of faith was completed in 2002 to celebrate 2,000 years of Christianity. 

Take advantage of Qatar Airway's promotional fares now. Prices start at S$1,109 for flights to Skopje and from S$869 to other European cities. Terms and conditions apply.

For details, visit Qatarairways

Created by Brand Studio Productions

SOURCE: TODAY ONLINE

Sara Wheeler explores the mountains and little-visited towns of Macedonia

The ranger stooped to pick a black, conical mushroom from the forest floor. “It’s an aphrodisiac,” he said, as he slipped it in his pocket. The scent of wild thyme hung in the air and a pair of wild ducks hovered overhead, wings whirring.We were bear-watching in Mavrovo, a mountainous national park in west Macedonia. The small expedition began at 5am, when mist lingered low, threaded beneath spiky peaks. Mountains faded into violet heights and a golden eagle circled.Following the Adzina, a stream close to the border with Albania, my ranger, Hamlet, picked up traces of bears. He estimated the park population of the European brown bear to be 150 and, having worked there for 15 years, could recognise many individually. Wild lilies sprouted among the beech trees, and in the meadows Shar mountain dogs roamed with flocks of up to 2,000 long-legged sheep. The dog is so strong that it can deal with a wolf; three can bring down a bear.

We had already seen two bear cubs close to the road (they like to lick the salt that is put down to clear ice). At about 10am, 200m off among a stand of oak trees, we saw an adult female that Hamlet estimated to weigh about 300kg (660lb). She was pawing the ground, grubbing up ants. A pair of two-year-old cubs truffled in a desultory way near by.

That night we slept in a hide above the apple orchards of Brajcino. An infrared night-vision camera, hooked up to a battery-powered screen, and a removable window meant that we could lie on bunks, swaddled in blankets, watching a procession of roe deer, wild boar, hares and a bear. The proprietress of our guesthouse had prepared a picnic dinner. As with every meal in Macedonia it included four types of red and green pepper. “How does a Macedonian who doesn’t like pepper cope?” I whispered to Hamlet (he insisted on silence in the hide). “There is no such person,” he whispered back.

The next day I did more bear-watching in the 170 sq km Pelister National Park, in the Baba mountains, spreading from the Pelagonia and Prespa valleys, dividing the Aegean and Adriatic basins. We observed paw prints, grass-clogged spoor and roots that bears had torn up. At one point I heard a low growl, seemingly close by. I raised my binoculars, my heart pounding. The ranger, Pavel, had an admission to make: “It’s my tummy rumbling.”

We didn’t see a bear that day, but we did follow the high-pitched bark of a male roe deer. As we crunched as quietly as we could up the slope, he appeared, antlers proud against the blue sky, watching us. The Pelister landscape differed sharply from that of Mavrovo. Two glacial lakes, known as Pelister’s Eyes, glittered at an altitude of 2,000m, and moraines, called stone rivers in Macedonia, streamed down, especially on the north flank of Mount Pelister above Red Rock (Crveni Steni), named — so it is said — after blood shed by 6,000 French and Bulgarian soldiers who perished there during the First World War.

The star of Pelister, however, is not the bear, but the molika pine (Pinus peuce Grisebach), indigenous to the central Balkans but almost nowhere else, and as tall in Pelister as 40m. The ancients recognised its unique characteristic compared with other pines — it is the only species with five needles. We know this from the mosaics at Heraclea Lyncestis, a site close to Pelister founded by Philip II, the king of Macedon and father of Alexander the Great, in the 4th century BC. The archaeological site is remarkably well excavated and preserved — think Pompeii without the crowds — and includes an amphitheatre (not discovered until 1968) where prisoners faced death by wild beast. The largest of the Roman and early Byzantine mosaics displaying the five-needled molika appears on the 5,000 denar note.

Tourism is in its infancy in Macedonia. It is about twice the size of Northern Ireland with a population of just over two million, a quarter of whom are ethnic Albanian. It sits on a crossroads in the Balkan peninsula, buffeted by the swirling chaos of that region: for 400 years under Ottoman rule; during the first Balkan war; in two world wars; and post-1991, when the collapse of Yugoslavia ushered in independence. Bulgaria and Greece still believe that Macedonia is part of their territory, and it is unsurprising that nationalism and national identity feature prominently in the consciousness of the country.

Bitola, Macedonia’s second city, 15km west of Pelister, was once an important post on the Via Egnatia Roman trade route, and later the diplomatic and cultural centre of the Ottoman empire in the Balkans. After the Turks the city prospered — in 1900 more than 1,000 private houses had a piano. Unlike the capital, Skopje, Bitola has remained largely immune to modern development. A curious government spending spree between 2009 and 2013 plonked wedding-cake buildings in Skopje on a scale of Soviet gigantism, even in the old quarter, obliterating greenery and annoying residents.

To complete the trip I travelled through driving rain to Ohrid, a resort on the shores of its eponymous lake, a third of which belongs to Albania. The streets are so narrow that the upper floors of the houses protrude over the ground floors. In the new town behind the lake, shops displayed frocks reminiscent of the Yugoslavian past and plastic shoes. On the lakeshore, former fishing boats touted cruises and souvenir stalls flogged the fabled Ohrid pearls. These don’t come from oysters — Ohridians fashion them, using a secret method handed down within two families, from the scales of the plasica fish.

It was May and teachers were marching hordes of children around the historical sites. At the amphitheatre (2nd century AD) two boys sat picking nits out of one another’s hair. In the nearby Saint Sophia church 11th-century frescoes depicted haloed figures and angelic hosts, as clear and as moving as they must have been to the first churchgoers.

The Ottomans, who turned the church into a mosque, did Macedonia a favour by plastering the ceiling and walls with mortar, preserving the frescoes. However, the Turks had desecrated the saints’ faces with sharp stones. Is there a more powerful visual image of the clash between Islam and Christianity than a row of saints staring blindly from gouged-out eyes?

SOURCE: The Times

Tom Allan travels to Macedonia and explores the landlocked country's spectacular lake and layered history 

The Italian media called it ‘Lucifero’. The heat has buckled train tracks in Serbia while in Macedonia wild fires rage on the hills around the capital, Skopje, filling the sky with an orange haze.

Lake Ohrid, in the south of the country, straddling the border with Albania, offers a refreshing refuge from the heatwave sweeping southeast Europe. A trip to its clear, cool waters and pebble beaches is an annual ritual for landlocked Macedonians.

"This is the closest we have to the sea," explains a woman on the winding bus journey from Skopje. "I live in Canada now, but still try to come back each summer."

The lake is busiest in July and August so if you come then, expect beach parties and jet-skis as well as Byzantine churches, Ottoman architecture, and one of the most unique ecosystems in Europe.

"The best time to visit is September, or early summer," says local guide Misho Yuzmeski the next morning, as he takes me on a walking tour of the old town of Ohrid, the largest on the lake and my base for the week. "It’s much more peaceful then".

Yuzmeski – writer, translator and fluent in eight languages – is an inexhaustible source of knowledge on his home town.

"However hot it gets, there is always a breeze in the old town", he says as we gaze down over the red tiled roofs and twisting cobbled streets, over the 36 kilometres of silky water and beyond, to the Albanian mountains. Right on cue, a cooling wind springs up, taking the edge off the midday glare.

Ohrid has, to borrow Homer’s phrase, a climate ‘where life is easy for men’. It is one of Europe’s oldest settlements: there are remains here from the 4th century BC. That’s modern compared to the lake itself, which at over a million years is one of Europe’s oldest.

Thanks to its age, Lake Ohrid has more endemic species per square metre than any other lake in the world, according to Unesco. The most famous of these is the Ohrid trout, said to have a taste somewhere between brown trout and Atlantic salmon. It’s now critically endangered and fishing is controlled on the Macedonian side of the lake, so the trout on Ohrid restaurant menus is mostly farmed.

The first thing you notice about the lake is the clarity of the water. This is paradise for a swimmer like me: the white pebble beaches, ochre cliffs and glass-clear water are more like the Adriatic than an inland lake.

Yulvan Sekuloski, who works in the Amfora Dive Centre, 16km south of the town of Ohrid, explains that this is one of the clearest lakes in the world. The springs feeding it filter through the limestone fissures of the Galičica mountains, giving a visibility of up to 22 metres.

"I have dived all over the world, and no fresh water systems compare to here," Sekuloski tells me. Divers shouldn’t miss the chance to explore the remains of the Neolithic stilt-house village in the Bay of the Bones.

These natural splendours are matched by Ohrid’s cultural and religious heritage. For fans of Byzantine churches, this is heaven. Even a non-aficionado can’t fail to be impressed by the frescoes in St. Sofia church, still full of expression and life after 900 years, or the magnificent paintings in the icon museum.

The sheer number of churches has given Ohrid the name ‘the Jerusalem of the Balkans’, though Yuzmeski dismisses the often-repeated theory that there are 365, one for every day of the year.

"That’s something the other guides like to tell people. I don’t know how many there are but not 365!"

One thing is clear though: things in Ohrid are changing. We walk on past the Roman amphitheatre to a hilltop with spectacular views over the lake – and of a string of hotel complexes on the far shore. Once the hill was covered in pine trees and layers of Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman ruins. Now a major construction project is underway, bearing the unwieldy title 'The Instauration of St. Clement’s University at Plaoshnik’.

St. Clement was a disciple of Cyril and Methodius, the two hoary brothers from modern-day Thessaloniki who invented the Cyrillic alphabet. Clement founded a university here in the ninth century and from this hillock above the lake spread the new script throughout the Slavic world. The church bearing his name has been faithfully rebuilt, with new visitor- and study centres also under construction. "They have built the church beautifully," says Yuzmeski. "But the rest, it’s too much," he continues, pointing at the complex of buildings that will soon dominate the skyline.

‘Too much’ could be applied to other government projects in Macedonia. The infamous ‘Skopje 2014’ initiative saw somewhere between $250 and $650 million spent on gargantuan bronze statues in the capital – money, critics argue, that a poor country like Macedonia can ill afford.

The government has other plans for Ohrid, too: a 30,000-capacity ski resort in the mountains of Galičica National Park and further hotel developments along the lake shore. Unesco has warned that it will review Ohrid’s World Heritage status unless the more contentious proposals are dropped.

Macedonia, with the fifth lowest GDP in Europe and 23 per cent unemployment, badly needs tourism. The new Social Democrat government elected in June on a pro-reform, anti-corruption agenda have pledged to review all development that threatens the integrity of the lake.

"Our goal is to develop sustainable and responsible tourism by focusing on the local, authentic experience […] and all the adventure possibilities this area has to offer," government spokesman Mile Boshnjakovski tells me via email.

The government also plan to invest in new cycling and walking trails along the lake shore, he adds, improving access with minimal damage to the environment.

But with a slim majority in parliament and the daunting task of overhauling the country’s institutions ahead, this is far from assured. Yulvan Sekuloski from the dive centre strikes a final note of caution. "If carefully planned the wildlife and the lake could be preserved. But unfortunately there is a lot of damage done already. If it continues at this pace I think the future will not be so bright."

On my last night I speak to a young German couple, who tell me about a ‘performance art’ event they saw in the St. Sofia church the night before.

Part of Ohrid’s Summer Festival, the evening featured techno, UV lights and a male stripper. The 11th century frescoes must have blushed.

This evening the Optina Pustyn monastery choir from St. Petersburg perform. The closest we get to techno is the floor-trembling voice of the basso profondo, reaching depths that only Russians can, but the heat inside St. Sofia’s thick walls wouldn’t be out of place in a rave.

Shirts stick to the backs of chairs, programs are fanned and the choir look close to heatstroke in their black robes. As we empty out into the muggy night a honey-yellow moon rises over the Galičica mountains, casting an avenue of dimpled light across the lake. The soft lights of a nearby cove beckon. It’s time for a final swim.

SOURCE: THE NATIONAL

Every tourist to the Balkans has probably heard about the dramatic remaking of Macedonia’s capital, Skopje. Twenty-five years after the country peacefully won independence from the former Yugoslavia, its capital is in the midst of a huge face-lift: the construction of some 40 monuments, sculptures, facades and buildings.

The transformation is meant to sweep away the post-Soviet pall and attract tourists. I was one of them last year. Everywhere I looked, I felt small, dwarfed by shiny, new gargantuan bronze statues of Alexander the Great and his parents, Philip II of Macedon and Olympias, that lord over the main plaza. Galloping horses here and imposing Doric columns there round out various corners; faux-Baroque facades and balconies reminded me of Josef Stalin’s wedding cake-style apartments along East Berlin’s broad boulevards, which have a certain retro appeal these days but still feel overwrought.

Despite the immense investment here — the current estimate of the project is $727 million, according to the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network — tour operators who aren’t closely linked with the country’s state-run tourism office are championing a different reason to visit the region: ecotourism.

This nascent industry is less interested in Skopje’s overhaul and more keen to spirit travelers along the country’s hiking trails to tucked-away Byzantine monasteries and caves, and arrange cycling tours and homestays with cordial Macedonians who can talk about their country’s culture and history.

My guide, Slobodan (who goes by his nickname, Danko), works for one of these operators, Macedonia Experience, run by Jane Josifovski, which organizes Jeep safaris, horseback riding, caving, diving and paragliding. My visit last year came when Macedonia had been in the headlines, as hundreds of thousands of refugees had crossed the country’s southern border en route to northern Europe. And yet, Mr. Josifovski told me, overnight stays and tourism in general in Macedonia were moving at a strong clip, helped along by cheap flights into Skopje on the budget airline Wizz Air and inexpensive travel within the country.

The morning after I arrived in the capital, Danko drove me to Matka Canyon, one of his favorite haunts. A former student of architecture and the son of engineers, he told me on the way that he had decided to be a mountaineer (and drummer). Most weekends, he heads into the mountains, less than an hour’s drive from Skopje, to hike or ski.

From the trailhead, I followed him up narrow, leafy passes and around switchbacks while he recounted the history of the pathways we’d be exploring. The Ottomans had blazed many of Matka’s trails as they sought to build a railroad from Lake Ohrid, on the Albanian border, into Macedonia’s interior. Danko occasionally turned back to point out the view. We could see the Treska River and forested, misty ravines, as well as spiked ridges, like blades of a knife.

He later led me to see the 14th-century Church of St. Nikola, which was locked, but while perched at a nearby picnic table on a ledge overhanging the summit, he pointed first to hooks driven into the sides of the steep faces, and told me which he himself had scaled. He then pointed to the canyon’s depths, to the cloistered, emerald Lake Matka and to the Monastery of St. Andrew, alongside an attractive lakeside chalet resort, making for a dramatic panorama.

We made our way down the mountain toward the lake and once we reached the shore, Danko hailed a small motorboat with a thatched bamboo roof to take us across to the resort. Once there, we sipped espressos and gazed out at the striated gorge while waiting for the next boat that would take us up the Treska River to Cave Vrelo. It had turned chilly, and the thought of touring a frigid cave didn’t excite me, but Danko insisted it would be worth the effort. Our boat finally appeared, and we sped onward through the cavernous passage, where I saw Robinson Crusoe-esque bungalows and tree houses on the banks and ducks with their ducklings scurrying away from our boat.

Cave Vrelo is among 10 caves in the Matka Canyon, and it is also among Europe’s deepest. As we docked near its entrance, Danko pointed out murky gaps in the exterior where divers slip inside. We were taking the overland route, and as we descended the slippery stairs, I gradually saw that Danko had been right: Before me were jaw-dropping stalactites, smooth in contour, like otherworldly wax, and one most noticeably shaped like a pine cone. Bats swerved overhead as we approached one stunning section known as the concert hall because members of the Macedonian Philharmonic Orchestra once played there after the cave was opened to visitors.

We later sat at the restaurant Mechkina Dupka, or Bear’s Cave, where I ordered the so-called Village Chicken. It was baked, covered in a savory mushroom sauce, and came with fresh squash sautéed in garlic and olive oil, along with a hearty house white wine from Macedonia’s Tikves region. We had a long drive ahead of us, said Danko, via Tetovo and into the Mavrovo National Park, so we toasted our journey before hitting the road.

When we reached Tetovo, Danko navigated heavy traffic, and I wondered if a stop there was worth our time. But as we finally pulled up alongside the Sarena Dzamija mosque, my eyes took in the vibrant painting and graceful half-timbered design. This was indeed a rare find, in part because it is uncommon for a mosque’s exterior to be so adorned — Sarena Dzamija translates to “decorated mosque” — but also because two sisters, named Hurshida and Mensure, rather than sultans or pashas, had bankrolled the construction in 1438. The women are buried in the octagonal stone turbe adjacent to the mosque.

By dusk, we were at Mavrovo National Park, and had checked into the inviting home of Deni and Tina Lazareski in the village of Leunovo, located in the park itself. The pair welcome tourists year-round, and had recently built an addition to their home for guests. Tina had prepared stuffed peppers in a tomato sauce for us, and we sat around the dinner table long after the meal, talking about our families, and in particular, life under Communism, all aided by Danko’s translation.

Danko had hoped to guide me to the summit of Mount Medenica in the Bistra Massif the next day, but we woke to a heavy fog and he didn’t want to risk getting lost. So we chose a trail at a lower elevation that still afforded us pretty views of wild horses in the distance and shepherds with their flocks, as well as clusters of almost supernatural, purple-stemmed cotton thistles.

We departed the pastoral scene for Galicnik, a village renowned for its traditional folk dancing and weddings every July, where we met Marko Bekric, who runs a mountain-biking business. Over lunch at his family’s restaurant, he explained that the business had been inspired by years of cycling the Bistra mountains, scoping out new paths, and thinking that enthusiasts from abroad would thrill to the unspoiled nature, as he does.

The Macedonian government evidently thought the same, granting him a rural development loan to start the venture. After lunch, he led me across the road to show me an abandoned cheese-making factory he’d renovated where he stores the bikes. Someday, he added, he’d like to convert the building into a museum and offer instruction on making sheep and goat cheese.

The tour, though, reached a height the next day when it shifted from ecotourism to cultural immersion in gorgeous Ohrid, one of Europe’s oldest cities at a jewel of a lake bordering both Macedonia and Albania. Our guide, Nebojsa Kamilov, led us up and down the cobblestone-covered hills of the city — whose Slavic name comes from vo rid, or “city on the hill.” At just about every turn we took in sweeping views of the translucent water, none so sublime as those at the picturesque Church of St. Jovan at Kaneo, perched on a finger jutting out into the vast lake.

A student of art and history, Nebojsa gave a fascinating overview of Ohrid’s Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman roots; its scholarly legacy (the first Slavic university was established here by the ninth-century Sts. Kliment and Naum); and the hundreds of other churches that once dotted the hillsides, supposedly one for every day of the year. We visited several of these ubiquitous and elegant multidomed churches, each with a covetable collection of frescoes, icons and mosaics. My favorite was the Church of St. Kliment and St. Pantelejmon, which had a fourth-century mosaic mysteriously signed “Made by those whose names are only known to God.”

These, of course, were the soaring buildings of their day, structures that involved immense expenditures and likely cost overruns that would dwarf those in Skopje. But these churches, this landscape, had stood the test of time. As Macedonia’s capital remakes itself, their permanence is a reassuring reminder that while this country has changed hands more times than one can count, its beauty and its culture endure.

SOURCE: NY TIMES