To Tirana

Seem to be developing a pattern here. Up well before the sun was even thinking about it (3:45am) we were packed and hit the road at 4:30 precisely. Good thing we'd traversed the winding road out if town two days earlier as it was quite hairy and exhausting for Nick who was in control of the jalopy. Potentially missed some fabulous scenery as the skies slowly brightened on the 90 minute trip back to Porto Airport via the motorways this time. Traffic was certainly not an issue. Interesting to see glimpses of the real Portugal,  extensive well made roads, lots of industry and modern (and some not so) houses.

We've been mostly confined to cobblestone streets, centuries old businesses and old buildings in various states of disrepair, it's now obvious that the country is progressive and thriving.

Nick and Sarah dropped us off at departures, we hope they managed to feed the beast before stabling and winging their way back to the UK, whilst we flipped over to Geneva for a long weight (similar to what we used to send the apprentices to the store for). Almost missed the flight due to classical lollygagging but it worked out ok. The plane wasn't entirely full so we had spare seat.
Geneva AP is right next to the large hadron collider (run by CERN). This where they spin up really small things to really high speeds and bang them together in order to inflate prices of items to astronomical levels. e.g. two small cups of coffee costs $24 AUD. There have been so many scientists and really clever people working on this machine over the last 70 years that it's now working perfectly. An upgrade is due to be completed in 2026 which should ensure the whole country is priced to the point that only really important people will be able to afford to go there e.g. Casino Operators.
A six hour stopover in the airport was enough for us. Not coming back unless they shut that machine down.

Throwing in a pic of all the destinations one could travel to just today - it really does seem to be the centre of Europe.

And so we hung around whiling away the hours playing with Hotspot internet connections because the Swiss have consistently voted to stay out of the EU whilst pandering to their trade rules. At least they have always done it this way otherwise the world would need to deal with Swexit as a common vernacular...not sure we (as a race) are up to that.
Finally we got onto the next bird only to sit on the tarmac for 45 more minutes waiting for a clear slot in the sky before shooting up over the majestic Alps (Swalps?) whilst trying to understand French accents of the crew. Racing away from the sun, the clouds built up and we decended through them to finally land in the twilight gloom to the sound of applause when safely on the tarmac. Can only assume Albanians are nervous flyers.

The airport is small and chaotic yet they all seem to be in very good spirits. Taxi to the hotel in dark revealed nothing of the culture except house music being played by the driver. He gave up after a while and reverted to local talky stuff.
Dinner on the roof bar if the hotel was pretty funky as all the young glamorous set was out to have a good time. Seems like this was their starting point for the nights revelries.

We crashed after 18 hours getting here.