Duration
2 hours
Difficulty
Easy
Price
Ticketed — check current price
Hilltop fortress with a Cold-War aircraft on the ramparts and the eerie Bunk'Art-style tunnel below.
Best season
All year
Family-friendly
Yes
What it looks like
CastleEasyGjirokastër
Berat
Not a ruin and not a museum — people still live inside the walls, hang washing between Byzantine churches and sell figs from their doorways. That is the thing worth coming for. The cobbles are steep and uneven, so wear something with grip, or drive up and walk down. The Onufri icon museum inside charges separately.
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Shkodër
The ramparts sit above the point where the Buna, Drin and Kir rivers meet, which is the view everyone climbs for. The legend attached to it — a woman walled into the foundations so the castle would stand, permitted to leave one breast exposed to feed her son — is still told locally and is grimmer than the guidebooks suggest. Winter hours are shorter and it closes Mondays out of season.
Ticketed attraction
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