Beaches in Albania

The last coast in the northern Mediterranean to be opened to the outside world, and still the least developed: until 1991 it was a closed border, and the concrete pillboxes that stand on some of these beaches were built against an invasion that never came. The two halves are unalike. North of Vlorë the coast is Adriatic — shallow, sandy, long, with the lagoons and the port towns; south of it the Ionian Riviera runs under the Ceraunian mountains, where the water is clear, the shore is pebble, and the road climbs the Llogara pass before dropping to a string of coves. This is the fastest-changing coast in the register. A national tourism programme and heavy construction are remaking the Riviera, while a demolition campaign against unpermitted building has run since 2013 with visible results, so the same village can hold a cleared plot and a new frame on either side of a cove. The Karaburun-Sazan park off Vlorë is the country's only marine protected area. Ksamil in the far south sits opposite Corfu with small islands wadeable offshore, and Gjipe lies at the mouth of a canyon with no road to it at all. Practically: the season runs June to September and the coast is effectively closed outside it, infrastructure is thinner than in the neighbouring countries, cash is still widely expected away from the cities, and the Riviera road is winding enough that journey times bear little relation to distances. Several of the best beaches are still reached on foot or by boat from Himarë or Sarandë, and the ferry from Corfu puts the southern coast within a couple of hours of Greece.

The two are different kinds of shore. Both sit on sheltered water. Together they account for 1.6 km of shore. · computed from the 2 records below