Nature “as if painted”/ Pogradec, a tourist destination to be savoured in every season

TIRANA, 27 May /ATA/ In Pogradec you are welcomed not only by beautiful nature and family-run tourism, but also by a world full of adventure and history.

Pogradec and its surroundings offer tourists a year-round attraction, with the nature, culture and history that give it grandeur, while the lake gives it its charm.

Besides the lake, Pogradec has many other natural beauties on its outskirts and in the villages around it, as well as important cultural and historical monuments that invite you to visit them.

Pogradec offers many opportunities for lake, mountain and heritage tourism. Pogradec cuisine and cookery are also very distinctive and much enjoyed by Albanian and foreign visitors.

The Minister of Tourism and Environment, Blendi Klosi, published a video with footage of Pogradec to promote the town in the south-east of the country, which draws thousands of tourists in every season of the year.

"Pogradec, a tourist destination that must be savoured. There you will find hospitable, smiling people, fantastic landscapes and attractions to be enjoyed," said Klosi.

Beauty is everywhere in this town, such as Lin, a small peninsula on the western shore of Lake Ohrid with a lovely village of the same name.

The houses are built of stone and brick along narrow lanes covered with vine pergolas. South of Lin, near Buqeza, at a depth of 2–3 m in the lake, there are several pile dwellings. This is a lake-type settlement built over the surface of the lake, like the one at Maliq in the Korça district. Legend has it that the Lin peninsula was once a beautiful island with flourishing vegetation.

The springs of Drilon, at the foot of the hills near the villages of Tushemisht and Gurras, 4 km from Pogradec, offer an incomparable sight.

You can visit this natural monument by following the Pogradec–Customs–Saint Naum road. It is a large limestone spring that wells up vertically at the base of the limestone block and then flows on into Lake Ohrid. The water comes from Lake Prespa through Mount Galičica (Mali i Thatë). It emerges as a large, distinctive spring with a flow of 7 m3/sec. The area is surrounded by dense vegetation.

Pogradec also has a number of medieval churches, such as the church of Saint Bitri, as the locals are used to calling it, which lies a few hundred metres from the village of Potkozhan.
This small stone building, roofed with stone slabs, is of unique value for its two small domes on the eastern side and its very special wall painted with frescoes on the inside. Although the frescoes are damaged, visitors can still admire the mystery and beauty of the saints painted on its walls.

Another church is that of Saint Marina, north of the village of Llënga in the Pogradec area, with a commanding view from the top of the mountain above the River Shkumbin. The church is a small building, roughly 8–12 metres long. The altar is separated from the central part of the church by a wooden iconostasis 6 m wide and 4 m high. The iconostasis is carved with floral motifs. The whole interior of the church is covered with frescoes by the hand of the master of this region, Kostandin Shpataraku.

The Lake Town, Pogradec, is Albania's elite town, visited in all four seasons. /k.s/j.p/r.e/