We were up around 06:00.  It was gray and lightly raining, but Justin went out for a walk anyway around 06:30.  He went across the river into the Old Town.  He meandered east along the river, then headed north and entered the area around the Bazaar.  The area was full of lots of smells, both savory and sweet, but not many people were out on the streets at all.  There was a very colorful area around the Bushi hotel, where every restaurant or cafe was trying to one-up each other in terms of color and/or design (including Café Mon Frére, My Way Caffe, Café Cunda, and more).

Justin was walking around the Turkish quarter taking photos when a stranger came up and started chatting, then offered a business card for taxi services.  His name is Zeko, and his number is +389 70 616 717, if you’re ever in Skopje and need a ride.  A couple minutes later, Zeko came over again and invited Justin to join him and his friend for Turkish tea.  He was Macedonian and spoke only a little English (but more German), and his friend was a Ukrainian refugee.  The Ukrainian guy did a lot of the talking.  He has family members all over the globe, including one who has a doctorate in something and lives in Canada.  He told a story about getting into trouble on his flight leaving Ukraine, as he started smoking in the lavatory on the plane.  Zeko probably only understood a portion of what the Ukrainian guy was saying, and then an even smaller portion of that could be translated into English and told to Justin.

After the first cup was finished, Justin politely excused himself and headed back across the river.  It was quite the experience, but he needed to get back over towards the hotel.  He briefly went in the Orthodox Church near the hotel, St Clement of Ohrid.  It was very large, probably the second largest Orthodox Church behind the one in Belgrade.  It also had been built recently, in 1990.  Thereafter he tried to find Bar Speakeasy, as it was theoretically right across the street, but he couldn’t find it, and he needed to pee from the tea, so he came back to the hotel.  After using the facilities in the room, he went downstairs to get envelopes for the tips for Drago and Martin, since today was our last day seeing them.  In the time it took to go down to get two envelopes, two strangers told Justin they liked his jacket (“jumper”) and offered condolences on Arsenal not winning the league (thanks for nothing, Tottenham).  It started to rain a lot harder, so it was good Justin came back from his walk early.  Crystal was listening to a Smartless podcast with James Cameron.

We met the group, and our local guide Susanna, at 09:00.  We started our walking tour at the main square, near the Monument to Alexander the Great.  Susanna told us that the square will be 100 years old next year.  Macedonia has only 1.8 million people, and about a quarter of them live in Skopje.  Around 2010 there was a big overhaul for the area around the square, with new facades and new statues to modernize the buildings and less resemble the communist era.  Susanna mentioned there are over 200 statues around town.  She told us that when the ruling party changed a few years back, the overhaul stopped, as that party thought the money should be spent on other things, but now the ruling party has changed back again, so the overhaul may continue in the near future.

We next went to the Mother Teresa house.  This was a re-built home/museum, as her actual house – like much of Skopje – was destroyed in a large earthquake in 1963.  Outside we saw a statue of her, and it was conspicuous that she had crossed toes – either that or the artist made an odd choice in doing the design.  Inside we saw a lot of information about her life.  She was born in 1910 to a Kosavar Albanian family in Skopje, when Skopje was still part of the Ottoman Empire.  Her family was one of the very few (less than 1%) of ethnic Albanians that stayed Catholic during the Ottoman period.  She left Skopje at age 18 to head to Ireland, and returned to Skopje on only 4 occasions thereafter.  Inside the museum there was a small church upstairs, and various keepsakes around the museum, including one items that very much looked like a Nobel Peace Prize. 

We continued south on Macedonia Street until it ended right in front of the Skopje Museum, which used to be the train station.  At the end of the 19th century, there was a train from Thessolaniki to Skopje to Belgrade, but the technology was never updated, and the train line wasted away.  The trains that remain today can’t go over 60km/hour, and new tracks are necessary.  Susanna was dubious that there would ever be an international train line during our lifetimes.  In the 1963 earthquake, 2/3 of the train station was destroyed, and the remainder was turned into a museum.  Also during the earthquake, over 1000 people died and 180,000 lost their homes.

We walked around the museum for a bit, after Susanna got the employees to turn on the lights.  Near the front there was an aerial photo of Skopje from before the earthquake, and red Xs were placed over buildings that were destroyed – over half of the buildings had Xs, including Mother Teresa’s original home.  We saw things in the museum in roughly chronological order, with the oldest stuff being 7500 years old.  Skopje, like many of the places we’d visited on this trip, had Hellenistic, Illyrian, and Roman periods.  During Roman times, the town was known as Skupi.  It was later ruled by the Ottomans for over 500 years, right up until WW1.  Outside the museum there was a phrase inscribed on the wall from Former President Tito about how the country would rally around Skopje after the earthquake.

From the museum we walked through the rain – hugging the walls of buildings to avoid getting even more soaked – to a monument to women, which ironically had no statues of women.  Then we walked through the mall built in 1970s (the same one we’d walked through 2 days prior trying to find some bars), and came out right by the St Patrick’s Pub on the riverside.  Susanna showed us some more of the buildings constructed for the 2014 Project, and those buildings immediately adjacent that were never updated from the communist architecture.

We went across the river into the Bazaar area.  The Bazaar was founded in 1200, well before the Ottomans arrived, but everything still around today was from the Ottoman period.  Susanna pointed out some of the buildings where the 2014 Project re-facing had not been completed, and you could easily see unfinished facades and exposed cinder blocks on a couple of the buildings.  The rain was unrelenting, and eventually she had enough, so she (and Alan and Cheryl) went back to the hotel to dry off, literally drying her socks and shoes with the hair dryer.  She also checked out some of the restaurants we’d identified, trying to pick one for dinner tonight. 

Justin continued with the group to the Ascension of Jesus Orthodox Church.  It was literally built underground, as the Ottomans permitted it but did not want any conspicuous religious buildings besides the mosques.  The church was completed in the mid-1800s, and had more of the 3D carving we’d seen in Albania and elsewhere in Macedonia.  Susanna told us that the wood dried for 5 years prior to any carving.  Modern woodworkers have stated they couldn’t reproduce the woodwork now, even with new technological advances.  There is fumigation every few years, and careful inspection thereafter, to ensure no woodworms enter.

After leaving the church, our walking tour was over, and Justin booked it back to the hotel as fast as possible.  He repeated what Crystal had done, using the hairdryer for his socks and shoes.  We went downstairs together at 11:50, and Drago picked us up at 12:00.  On the bus we discussed our flights tomorrow, and Martin told us stories of Air Serbia being a shitshow.  Somehow Seinfeld came up, and we told Alan and Cheryl they remind us of Marty and Helen Seinfeld with “more than a passing resemblance.”  Joyce and Andy heartily agreed.

We originally went to the wrong restaurant, but the correct one, Dukat, was just around the corner.  As we’d come to expect, any time we were hoping to have a group conversation, the location was way too loud, so Martin told us we could give our candid feedback about the trip on the drive after lunch from the restaurant to the winery.  We got about 6 different appetizers, and literally every appetizer had cheese, so we couldn’t help but laugh with Peter.  They quickly brought out a couple other appetizers that he could eat - fried zucchini, a garden salad, and breadsticks.  We were chatting with Peter at the end of the table, and he and Justin were apparently separated at birth, from their OCD to their Hawaiian shirts to their musical tastes, and of course supporting Arsenal.  The main course was steak and pork, and for once people could just choose whichever they wanted.  There were also several good desserts, and again they brought out a platter and we just took whatever.

We got in the car and everyone aired their grievances (oh, that was likely how Seinfeld came up).  Everyone was pretty respectful about what they liked and didn’t like, and thankfully there were no hard feelings.  It seems like everyone had a very good time overall.  We got to the Kamnik winery just before 14:30.  Discussing plane travel again, we found out that 6 of the 8 of us were using carry-ons only, which we thought was pretty impressive.  Our guide at the winery was a bit of a comedian.  He showed us around, and we noticed in the barrel room that some of the barrels were signed, including one by John Malkovich.  We tried 2 whites (Fume Blanc and Pinot Grigio) and 3 reds (Montepulciano, Winemaker Selection 2021 (Vranec, Merlot, Carmenere), and Syrah).  We were a big fan of the last two, and the next-to-last was by far the best value for the money.  Getting stuff to Spain wouldn’t be easy, but the guide mentioned that shipping from Croatia might be doable (maybe because it’s part of the EU).  Cheryl had been giving us the wine she wasn’t drinking, and told Crystal she wanted to see what Crystal was like drunk.  Crystal thought about saying - but eventually kept to herself - “you’ll be waiting here a while.”

Back at the van, everyone said their goodbyes, and gave their thanks, to Drago.  He was going to have a long drive tomorrow, all the way back to Dubrovnik – it was likely going to take him all day.  Martin announced everyone’s pick-up times for their flights tomorrow, and we “won”, as ours was at 10am instead of 2am, 3am, or 5am.  We got back to the hotel around 16:15.  We checked in for our flight to Vienna, then went on our way.  Thankfully it had stopped raining.  We tried our luck with Speakeasy, but again couldn’t find it.  A guy in a barbershop upstairs noticed us, and motioned to go around the corner.  We still couldn’t find it.  But then a guy working at a nearby pub saw us and took pity, walking us over personally. 

We were the first patrons of the day, and chatted with Sara, the bartender.  The first round was a Belegzija for Justin (Lozova Zolta rakija, green fig syrup, vanilla syrup, clear apple juice), and an El Presidente for Crystal (aged rum, bianco vermouth, orange liqueur, grenadine, angostura bitters).  The second round was a Royal Bramble for Justin (Tanqueray Royal, raspberry syrup, lemon juice, sparkling wine) and a Dark Chocolate Old Fashioned for Crystal (aged rum, amaro, salted caramel syrup, Angostura bitters, Cocoa bitters).  These were excellent as well, but we had to drink and run.  We hurried back to meet Peter at the hotel at 17:30.  He was getting a weird error when he attempted to batch download photos that he uploaded to the cloud from his phone, and he'd asked for our help.  We exhausted everything we could think of, and at least managed to help him be able to download them 1 by 1, which wasn’t by batch but at least was something. 

Crystal came upstairs at 18:00 for a Hungarian lesson.  Justin spoke a bit more with Peter and Drago, and then bid adieu to both of them.  We hope we can meet up with them again, and with Peter in may in fact be feasible.  Whether that’s in Berlin or in Chad or some other far flung location, we don’t know.  Justin filled out registration forms for our stay in Vienna whilst Crystal finished her class.  Afterwards we walked across the Stone Bridge to the Turkish quarter to eat at a Turkish restaurant, Kaçamaku.  We split Greek Salad, Pide Kaçamaku, Cevapi, and a big water.  It came out to about 13-14 Euros total.  Everything was really good, but we couldn’t come close to finishing it.

We walked back across the river and went to a small store near the hotel.  Crystal picked out a bottle of wine, and after paying, she told the woman thank you (Hvala) and good night (Dobra vecer).  The woman smiled vociferously and then told us how to say goodbye, which we sadly promptly forgot (perhaps because of the wine).  We were back at the hotel about 20:30, and pretty tired from a long trip.  We opened the wine and did our respective Duolingo lessons.  We went to sleep fairly early, just after 22:00.