Transition days are the connective tissue of long-term travel — not glamorous, not postcard-worthy, but essential. You wake up in one city and go to sleep in another. Between those two points: a mini-bus, a pizza joint with robots on the wall, a bottle of Berat olive oil, a €70 massage, and a forensic investigation into why every fry in Albania tastes terrible.

🧭 Wander — The Mini-Bus and the Robot Pizza

Took a mini-bus from Shkoder to Tirana at 8:30 am. Arrived around 11 am — a smooth two and a half hours, which after the Montenegro six-hour highway purgatory felt like teleportation. The apartment wasn’t ready yet, so I did what any reasonable person does: found lunch.

Proper Pizza caught my eye. They have a motif on their wall of robots eating pizza — which raises the question: is that what makes the pizza “proper”? A robot seal of approval? The pizza was edible but not as good as authentic Italian pizza. I think the key problem with pizzas here is the oven. As far as I can tell, they’re all gas-powered. No firewood. No char. No soul. A pizza without a wood-fired oven is like a kebab without a vertical spit — it might technically be the same food, but something essential has been lost in the translation.

✋ Unwind — Unpack, Stock Up, Knead Out

Got a ping that the apartment was ready after finishing lunch. Headed over, unpacked, and set up my tech kit — the ritual of making a new place functional. Chargers find their outlets. The laptop claims its corner of the table. Home, for now.

Then to the grocery store to load up on breakfast items. And I scored: a bottle of olive oil from Berat. If you read the Shkoder Day 3 post, you’ll recall I promised myself this would be the first thing I bought in Tirana. Mission accomplished. The oil is golden-green, fragrant, and waiting for its debut.

Next up: a well-earned massage. €70. After a month of continuous travel — buses, benches, bad mattresses, and a neck that has been craning toward church ceilings and museum plaques — this was not a luxury. This was maintenance. The kind of expense that doesn’t make for great storytelling but makes all the other stories possible.

👅 Palate — The Albanian Fry Investigation

I finally decided to get to the bottom of something that has been bothering me since I arrived in Albania: fries. I have yet to eat fries at any restaurant — any — that don’t taste terrible. Not local restaurants. Not fast food. Not Burger King in Shkoder. And now, for the sake of science, not KFC in Tirana.

I ordered a Minion combo: chicken tenders, fries, and a drink. The tenders were fine — KFC consistency is KFC consistency, a kind of global diplomatic agreement on what fried chicken should be. But the fries. The fries. Terrible. Again. Same industrial aftertaste. Same bland oil. Same potato quality that tastes like it was grown in a laboratory rather than a field.

Neither local restaurants nor fast food restaurants have good fries. I don’t know why.

I have theories. The oil. The potato varietals. The frying temperature. The absence of double-frying. But the truth is, I may leave Albania without solving this mystery. Some travel questions don’t get answered — they just get added to the list of things you now know to appreciate about home.

By the Numbers

Item	Amount (EUR)
Mini-bus Shkoder → Tirana	€15.00
Proper Pizza lunch (1,000 ALL)	€9.57
Groceries incl. Berat olive oil (1,495 ALL)	€14.31
Massage	€70.00
KFC Minion combo (870 ALL)	€8.33
Day Total	€117.21

I am now in Tirana for about three weeks — the longest stay of the trip. Shkoder gave me 26 dishes and 26 cells, a magic bench and a smoking vendetta. Tirana is a capital city with real infrastructure, a food scene I’ve barely scratched, and — I hope — at least one restaurant that knows how to fry a potato. The investigation continues.