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JUNE-JULY 2012
WIZZ MAGAZINE
63
FROM CIT Y
TO SHORE
Make tracks from Skopje’s historic
centre to the magnificent Lake Ohrid
Words James Parry
T
HE YEAR IS 1612, AND A PARTY OF
merchants rides into the Macedonian
town of Üsküp. Their horses laden with
bulging sacks and baskets, they have travelled
several weeks to reach this important trading
centre. Entering the bustling bazaar, which is
thronged with people from all over the Balkans,
the traders unpack their exotic cargo of spices,
silks and tobacco and start doing business.
Four centuries later and the same city – now
known as Skopje and the capital of independent
Macedonia – is welcoming a new wave of
visitors. Emerging from the disintegration of
Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, landlocked
Macedonia – or the Former Yugoslav Republic
of Macedonia, to give it its official title – has
been surprisingly off-radar to overseas tourists.
Now more people are discovering its pristine
landscapes and diverse cultural heritage, using
Skopje as a base from which to explore.
Strategically located on the Vardar River and
home to roughly a third of all Macedonians,
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