Albania - About the Country


Albania is locally called Shqipëria, which means land of eagles. The Capital is Tirana, other big cities are Durrës, Elbasan, Shkodra, and Vlorë. It is a small country with less than 30,000 km² and about 3 million inhabitants. The country is located at the Mediterranean Sea, between Serbia, Macedonia and Greece.

The political situation in the Balkans and especially in Albania, make tourism and caving trips extremely difficult at present. It is reported to be difficult and dangerous to get there and to travel in the country. Caving expeditions report major problems with theft, clothes and equipment being stolen from sleepers, cars or caves. Visitors should travel in completely self-sufficient groups and guard their belongings very carefully.

Because of its political history, almost no cave exploration happened in Albania. That’s a shame, as the country is well supplied with underexplored limestone karst. It is a part of the mountainous limestone karst of the Dinarides. Unfortunately, the whole concept is alien to the locals, and thus treated with suspicion and disbelief.

Speleology started in 1936, with the exploration of Shpelles së Zyles (Zyles Cave) which is the first documented cave exploration in the country. Participants were the Albanian explorer and archaeologist, mountaineer and speleologist Myftar M. Uruçi, mnember of the Shkodra Association of Climbers, prof. Ethem Osmanin (Teacher of the People) and prof. Rrok Zojzin, an ethnographer. They made the very first speleological exploration. But then World War II came cave exploration ended again. It was revived in the early 1970s. Between 1970 and 1972 the Shpellës së Jubanit (Juban Cave) was explored, the cave of Shpellës së Majës së Harapit (Harap Peak Cave) was explored by the first international Albanian-Bulgarian speleological expedition, directed by Aleksej Zhalov and Gëzim Uruçi, the first president of the Albanian Speleology Association. Today the cave has about 270 caves in the cadastre, and since June 1993, the Albanian Speleology Association is a member of the UIS.