We caught a bus from Sofia this morning and set off through the Bulgarian countryside for the border with North Macedonia.
After a couple of hours we stopped for coffee and toilets in a little village with a beautiful tiny church and a storks nest on the top of a street light.
Then it was on to the border where it took about half an hour to get out of Bulgaria. Then 100 metres across no man's land and off the bus and through customs. We all made it through very quickly apart from one passenger who had a problem.
In the end we waited for about 90 minutes and then the bus set off again, and I think that they were left behind. We set off into North Macedonia which - interesting fact -only became North Macedonia in 2019.
Straight away you could tell that we were in a different country as the houses looked more modern and the gardens were full of flowers, which were definitely lacking in Bulgaria.
In another couple of hours we reached Skopje, and into a different world.
In 1963 there was a terrible earthquake and almost all of the 18th and 19th century buildings were destroyed. In 2010 a huge initiative was launched to build new, earthquake resistant central Skopje in the neoclassical style.
Some of the buildings wouldn't look out of place in Las Vegas, but it is amazing and great fun.
There are giant statues everywhere, and one of the comments on Google is that they have overdone it a bit and 'less is more', but why not?
It is also full of cafés and bars, this one with a giant desk lamp.
It was all so unexpected, and totally different to the rest of our trip - and I mean that in a good way.
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