<![CDATA[SKI TOURING KOSOVO - Blog]]>Fri, 03 May 2024 17:08:36 +0200Weebly<![CDATA[Kosovo service providers with 5 real stars]]>Thu, 12 Mar 2020 15:23:29 GMThttp://skitouringkosovo.com/blog/kosovo-service-providers-with-5-real-starsThe hiking specialists and tourism service providers Balkan Natural Adventure are providing ski touring services for clients from all around the world. The chief of Operations Nol Krasniqi explains why the company has added Ski Touring in their palette of services to the world.

Question: Why adding another service

​Krasniqi: Why not! We have succeeded to offer real 5 star service to the hiking community. We have rightly and transparently managed expectations and reality. We have never over advertised or gave promises that we could not keep and it worked. So we said why should we do nothing in winter, we started and it is working.

Question: What is that you offer to clients?

Krasniqi: We offer them Kosovo Mountains, knowledge and good value for the Euro they spend. WE advertise with a lot of details we are fast in responding and we are straight forward. We are not price driven and we concentrate on quality and unique experience. For example we have very good activity substitution if the weather is bad. Foe example we have seen that skiers are not to much into ancient culture, they are more into having experiences with current history. So we organise wine tasting with small local vineries who are like Kosovo they do not have to much infrastructure but a lot of passion and a big heart.

Question: Do you ski track, do you go with clients?

Krasniqi: Yes and no! Yes, I go with clients but I am not able to follow them neither uphill nor downhill. So, no I do not ski track. I snowboard and I hike, but my level is not close to the one that our clients have. This is why we work with guides who know the mountains, are string physically and can ski, in piste and of piste.

Question: How about security how do you deal with this?

Krasniqi: As much as general safety is concerned, there are no such issues in Kosovo. It is safer than any western country, both from small thieves to general global threats such as terrorism. Concerning the safety on piste we do suggest everybody to bring their beepers, we have them for our team. We are in contact with all parties that can support a search and rescue mission,including FSK, Kosovo’s modern army trained in Western Europe, Turkey and US. We take these things very seriously. Until now guests of our company had no issues. However there is a case when clients had to sleep in the hut in the top of the mountain, but it all went well.

Questions: Why would someone choose Balkan Natural Adventure for Ski Touring?

Krasniqi: Its simple we offer what we promise, with good value for your Euro, Dollar or whatever currency you want to pay.   ]]><![CDATA[Snow kiting in Kosovo]]>Thu, 12 Mar 2020 14:29:32 GMThttp://skitouringkosovo.com/blog/snow-kiting-in-kosovoPicture
There is a fantastic video of you and your friends in the Kosovo/Albania/North Macedonia mountains, how did you hear about this place?​

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I wantet to go since 15 years to Albania for Kitesurfing. But years ago it was not possible to find information about the places and real conditions. Only windfinder said that it’s windy there. In Switzerland we ride up our Mountains since many years and try to find new spots. And so i searched also in Kosovo / Macedonia / Albania for new spots. I found the Sharr mountains which are simmilar to the swiss mountains a north / south barrier! This means always good snow and also wind!  We are only interested in new spots because the this is much more interesting! We landed in Skopje and checkt first the 2 big plateaus in the southwest of skopje, but there was no snow. So we tried the north side of the sharr mountains near the village Kuk. The wind was forecasted from N-NE what is perfect for all Sharr mountains spots. We search for not to steep mountains, because the wind can climb up the mountains and we climb up with the wind. Steeper mountains are not good for our spot and even the wind.

What were your thoughts before coming here, any fears, expectations?

I’m teacher for sport at a school in Switzerland and have since years also students from Kosovo / Macedonia and Albania and I asked them often about mountains, wind and people in their country and know that there is now problem with saftey. The only thing we didn’t knew exactly was this thing with the mines. But we spoke with the local people and they said that it’s absolutly no problem anymore. So we could enjoy the nice mountains, the friendly people and the good food!

What did you find out when you came here?
We were compleatly stoked about the mountains here! They are perfect for snowkiting and even the snowconditons are perfect! At the end it was better than we thought! We could kite every day and it was something of the best we did ever! I think more people will come in the future here for snowkiting!

Is there anything that would make this destination different from other places you have been?

Yes it is! You have the sea for kitesurfing (Albania) and the Mountains (Kosovo / North Macedonia / Albania) very close together! In the spring you can get very easily in the snow and the already warm water very close! What we liked also was that you can reach the spots quite easy. If there is no snow you can drive with the car untill you can ski or kite. If you would have here a skiidoo the possibilities would be awesome great! You could reach all the spots and the saftey would be much bigger. This could be very interesting for Snowkiters from all around Europe!

How popular is kite skiing, is this something that is good to be practised in the mountains you have just visited?

In Switzerland we have a spotguide for Kitesurfing and Snowkiting. There we have more people on this spotguide in winter than in summer! In Mars in Norway there ist he Red Bull Ragnarok Race with 400 Snowkiters on the starting line! Yes Snowkiting is very popular and the people search always for new spots as we found here in Kosovo! Kosovo has for shure a great potential for Snowkiting! The part around Kuk and also the part behind Restelica are perfect!

What can Kosovo/North Macedonia and Albania do yto atrackt more kite skiers? What information services you would need?

If you have somebody with a local knowledge about snow, wind, rules and and a Skidoo this destiantion would be very interesting for Snowkiters! You can live very cheap in the Kosovo and the flights to skopje or Pristina are not expensive from Switzerland or hole Europe. And the possibilities are much bigger than this 2 spots we did! If there is more snow also the higher plateaus in Mazedonia would be interesting. Some plateaus you can reach by car. And we also saw some other great spots near the boarderline to Greece or also in the north of Kosovo on the boarderline of Montenegro! We will come again! Thx again Kosovo for this awesome 4 days we had! 
]]><![CDATA[Ski tourin in Kosovo with a swiss guide]]>Thu, 12 Mar 2020 13:32:20 GMThttp://skitouringkosovo.com/blog/ski-tourin-in-kosovo-with-a-swiss-guideThe guide association helyum.ch has visited Kosovo for a ski touring trip, in 2020. The visit was a week long and the team was made from four clients and a high mountain guide. Xavier Carrad the leader of the group comes to Kosovo in order to return again.

The video of the group is already in their helyum.ch web site, with all the nice sports and places they have visited.

The group was based in Prevalac from where they have travelled shortly to Brezovica and Dragash region to get everything there is to visit in the region.

See the video to learn more, contact Xavier for a tour at the web site helyum.ch
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