Shkodra one day city visit

Shkodra one day city visit

Shkodra is an old town with a spectacular view between the lake and mountains. The capital city of Illyria holds so many cultural pieces and makes your stop so worth it.

Highlights: Rozafa Castle, Marubi Museum, bird-watching, Mesi Bridge

City Visit and Rozafa Castle

Your tour will start with Shkodra city visit. The city center is surrounded with beautiful buildings. Some of them are so colorful that light up the whole atmosphere. Small bars with different kinds of designs make you fall in love with the place.

After, you drive to Rozafa Castle. It represents the main sightseeing in Shkoder. It raises on a rocky hill 130 meters above sea level. The castle was built during antiquity and endures the Roman and Ottoman Empires. It has three main courtyards. There you can see the Illyrian Wall, Sultan Mehmet Fatih Mosque which was the Church of St. Stephen once and some medieval ruins. Rivers Kir, Buna and Drin join in the third courtyard.

Your next destination will be Shiroka. While walking beside the lake you can do some birdwatching. Shiroka has a lot of bird species like pelicans, whistles and many more. Also, there you will have lunch enjoying the lake view.

Marubi Museum and Mesi Bridge

After lunch, you continue to Marubi Museum. This museum has the first picture taken in Albania and nearly 500 thousand photographs from the Marubi’s dynasty, photography objects and cameras that were used for three generations.

After the visit in the museum you can choose whether you like visit the factory where the Venetian carnival masks are made or a small artisan factory that makes different traditional things from silk, cotton and wool for 5 generations.

The last destination is Mesi Bridge. It is made of stones above the Kir river. This bridge is one of the largest dating since the Ottoman Empire and below it there is a crystal-clear running water. When in spring and summer, people of Shkodra and tourists often do some cycling tours in the area of bridge and once they complete the tour they bathe in the river.

Itinerary for the day: 

8:30 – Shkodra City tour
9:30 – Drive to Rozafa Castle
11:30 – Drive to Shiroka – lunch by the lake
14:00 – Drive back to Shkodra, visit the Marubi Museum
15:30 – Visit the factory of Venetian carnival masks or the small artisanal factory
17:00 – Visit the Mesi Bridge