It feels great to be the newest member of the Friendship Arabia Tour team. Although I live and work in the UK, as a Macedonian, I do know my way around here.

I met Ali around noon and showed him a bit of Bitola. We took a walk through the Shirok Sokak, or Broad Street, and had lunch at a traditional Macedonian restaurant.

After that, we visited Haider Mosque in the heart of the old city. The mosque was built in 1506 and is the oldest religious structure still in use in the city. We also visited St. Dimitrious Church, built in 1863, which has one of the remaining intact wooden carved iconostases (wall of icons) in North Macedonia.

We also walked through the old bazaar and market. 

After that we visited Heraklea Linkestis, a town founded by Philip II of Macedon, then taken by the Romans and Busantioum.

From Heraklea Linkestis we took a short ride (10km from the city centre) to Mountain Baba and the National Park Pelister where we stopped to take pictures  of the mountain and the panoramic view of Pelagonia Plain.

Valentina Miskovska-Petrovich