Photo: Arianit (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Culture and heritage · Albania
Berat, the castle and the Mangalem quarter
A day in the town of a thousand windows: up to the inhabited castle, down to Mangalem and its mosques, and a sunset walk along the Osum.
Berat · Albania
The experience
The tour begins with a drive up to Berat Castle, where you walk lanes between houses still lived in and small Byzantine churches, visit the Onufri icon museum and look out from the walls over the river and mountain.
You then walk down to the white Ottoman houses of Mangalem, visit the Bachelors' Mosque and the Lead Mosque, and cross the stone Gorica bridge to see the whole facade of a thousand windows from the other bank.
Berat shares its UNESCO listing with Gjirokastër and is about two hours from Tirana. We suggest a full day from Tirana, or a stop on the way to the Riviera, with lunch in a traditional guesthouse.
The castle sits on a steep hill, so we drive you to its gate and plan the walk down at an easy pace.
Albania
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