Elbasan to hotel ballkan. 26 kms

Not much to report after another long walk. My hopes were raised this morning when i saw my first brown tourist sign, pointing the way i had to go. And it listed four things on it! Alas, the sign was as close to any of them as i got. No idea where they were, but i passed none of them.
At least my disappointment in the lack of things to see has been somewhat compensated for by the food I've  been eating. Both nights in Elbasan i ate at a little place just inside the walls specialising in local cuisine. First night i experimented and  had lamb cooked in yoghurt. Veey good. And last night i tried the albanian version of kofta, qofta. An enormous serve of food. And wine. They fill your glass to the brim here. Two glasses of wine and you're  2/3 way through a bottle. Most decorated walls I've  ever seen. First night i was thre i kept knocking things off everytime i moved. I was the only guest both nights. I don't  think there were any other tourists in elbasan overnight. I certainly saw none.
Anyway, back to today. First 8 kms were sooo boring. Along a bitumen road through suburbia basically. Virtually nothing of interest until i came to a stand of enormous and very old oaks at the site of a spring. Apparently it has been a stopping place for animal herders and traders for centuries. The walk guide book relates the story that the oaks grew from the sticks herders used to tether their animals.
Finally the road gave way to a dirt track that led up into the hills. The walk became more pleasant as views began to open up and the air became fresher. Walked almost entirely uphill for the next 14 kms, reaching 597 metres. I started at 50. Saw a group of teenage boys riding their bikes and an old couple walking and that was it. Very quiet except for all the birdsong.
Then it was a steep drop to the river valley again and a dodgy walk along the shoulder of the motorway to get to the only accommodation available at hotel ballkan. Probably the most expensive place i will stay all trip at 30 euros. Had to bargain them down from 50.
Along the way today i saw three indications that there has been some effort to promote the walk. Just before the oak trees there was a sign letting me know this was the via egnatia, then, high in the hills there was suddenly a red and white route marker on a rock. Just the one in all the kms I've  walked. Odd. Finally, there was a sign at the end of the path i came off to get onto the motorway. It would have been interesting since it seemed to describe the next leg of the walk. Unfortunately it has been almost entirely destroyed. At least one person seems uninterested in encouraging walkers...
To be brutally honest, after three days walking across 75 kms, this is never going to be a popular walk. It lacks things to see, variety in walking, too much walking on bitumen roads and almost no infrastructure. It was a worthy effort to try promoting the route by the via egnatia foundation, but i feel this walk is not worth doing. Certainly not the first five legs, remembering i skipped two. Perhaps the next few days will improve... life is too short to be doing crap walks when there are so many good ones.
I went down to dinner only to see one other solitary diner. With a copy of the via egnatia guidebook in front of him. Turned out to be someone i hade briefly communicated with about the walk, tim redmond, who turns out to be a catholic priest. He was previoulsy a doctor and is a teacher of biblical languages. He also happens to have walked all the way from canterbury to here over the course of a few years. As well as much other long distance walking. I enjoyed an evening of eady conversation with this most unpriestly seeming priest.