Technically possible, just not very practical

Looking at a map, it is hard to tell a few things- are there places where the river is too shallow or too deep? Are there natural or un-natural barriers? Is the river slow or fast moving? Looking at the map and even getting in the river, we found that it is technically possible to go from near Peshkopi to Kukes (about 60km) but just not in less than about three days. This was a problem only because we thought that we might be able to get there a lot faster and we wanted to bring as little stuff with us as possible (one backpack for four people).

The beginning was pretty great. It was Dylan, Leslie and this German guy Johan that's doing forestry research here and me. The river was really perfect for tubing- not too deep, but deep
enough that you didn't get stuck too often. And our packing system was pretty ingenious- we put a tarp on the bottom of an extra tube and tied Dylan's backpack into it, then one of us held on to the "raft." It took a while to get used to it and we capsized twice (and got ourselves stuck in a few trees), but by the end of the day we had all pretty much gotten the whole steering and paddling to stay in the middle of the river down. We found some villagers that told us the bad news- we were not nearly as far along as we wanted to be- only about 20km away from where we had started.

We made camp on the side of the river and it was a great spot. Sandy, but with a grassy area nearby and lots of trees (so lots of firewood) and close to the road. It would have been perfect if we had a tent (or sleeping bags) but we had tried to pack so light that we were really not ready. We also didn't really have enough food. We got a fire going and were fine until we tried to sleep- then we found how cold and uncomfortable it really was. There was a hay pile nearby and in the middle of the night we got the idea to bring over some hay to sleep on- that made it a little bit better, but not really. Basically we were freezing, even with the fire going all night (which meant we got no sleep).

In the morning we were cold and tired and decided that the last thing we wanted to do was get back in the water, so (for better or worse, who knows) we deflated the tubes and started to walk, hoping that we might find a car going our way (which really was either way, cause we were less than half-way and I would've gone back to Peshk if there had been a car). I think we walked nearly 20km overall, on almost no food. We stopped twice to get water at people's houses and Leslie and I got a short ride from two guys going to a wedding. After the guys caught up, we kept walking . . . Finally around 4 we got picked up by another car from the wedding and they took us the rest of the way into Kukes (about another 20km). This was lucky, because I think that we were all basically at a breaking point- we had had almost no food all day (the fact that it was berry season really saved us) and it was still a ways into town. We were lucky to find a ride, although we would have gotten there eventually- at this point we had already asked the Kukes PCVs to look for someone to come pick us up. But anyway, after a few bumps on the road (including a flat tire!) we got into town ate two dinners (to make up for all the berry eating) and spent the night there, exhausted, but happy in our attempt (at least I was). Things I learned- it is possible to get to Kukes by river, but it will take you three days and you really need to pack well because there is NOTHING out there (we saw more donkey carts than cars, no surprise).

The best thing about this trip, even though it didn't end up exactly as expected, was that we did it! Most of the Albanians that we told about the trip told us that we were crazy. Maybe we were, but we saw something that no one had ever tried before and decided to try it. We had to walk a lot, slept on a hay pile, got bitten by ants and were really hungry, but we survived and actually had a really great time. It was kind of like going to Antarctica or the Moon- people tell you that you're crazy and it's not possible, but you will never know that it's impossilbe until you try . . .