After many promptings we thought it best to set up a blog to help many of our friends and family to follow us as we journey through the Balkans. Some of you will know that we have been travelling firstly to Albania and now later to Macedonia and Kosova. We will try to keep this up to date but not every town has an internet cafe, and in this part of the world even they can have their power supply cut off. This year we will not fly to Albania until Thursday 23rd April when we go direct with BA to Rinas, the village that gives it's name to Albania's airport.

We fly out with Mira, wife to Robert (photo) who lead a church in Lezhe some 30 miles north of Tirana the capital. We were invited to Robert and Mira's wedding in Vlora last August. It was our first experience of an Albanaian wedding which was absolutely wonderful. It is at least a 2 if not 3 day affair with meals and dancing first at the brides parents house and then at the bridegrooms. Only after everyone is exhausted and had their fill of food and dancing does the groom take his bride away. It is at this point, when the groom formally collects his wife from her parents' home, that they are married! Can you imagine the setting overlooking the deep blue Aegean Sea and a temp of 37C, dancing until you wanted to drop, and food continuously being provided? Well it is to their new home that we will go and spend 4 or 5 days with Robert and Mira and people in their church.