Hi!!!

Thank you for your help with my first interrail!!! it was perfect!!! Now... I am planning a new trip, this time to the Balkans! we are planning to go on january for more or less 18/19 days. I am now living in Prague so this is going to be our starting point. Our plan by now is:

Zagreb - beograd - bucharest - sofia - pristina - skopje - tirana - Podgorica - Mostar - sarajevo (with a visit to Bjelasnica)

what do you think? we are special concerned with the order of the cities since we don't know what kind of connections we can expect... can you help us on that?

thanks!

Catia, Portugal and David, Spain

Looks like a fantastic trip! Be careful with the visa situation in Kosovo, once you have a kosovon stamp (eg if you enter through macedonia) you may not be able to get back in to Serbia. Also some of those journeys might be quicker by bus, and some (into and out of Albania, for example) have to be done by bus.

There's no rail connection between Niš and Priština, as well as between Skopje-Tirana, Shkodër-Podgorica and Podgorica-Mostar. I don't know about any regular buses from Niš to Priština, but there are private minibuses.
There are direct buses from Tirana to Podgorica, but if you want to travel on Albanian trains (rough but interesting experience, IR or Balkan Flexipass not valid, but tickets are very cheap), you can go with train to Shkodër, then take a minibus to border village Hani-i-Hotit, on foot or by taxi to Montenegrin village Tuzi and then by regular bus to Podgorica.
Or take a bus from Shkodër to Ulcinj at then go by numerous buses along Adriatic coast. Podgorica isn't so interesting, an ordinary Communist site with a lot of concrete I recommend rather Cetinje or Kotor.
There's probably no direct bus connection between Podgorica and Mostar, but you can get a bus along Adriatic coast to Ploče and then take a train from Ploče to Mostar and further to Zagreb (I recommend the railway section Mostar-Sarajevo, nice engineering work!)
For bus timetable you can try the Croatian site www.autobusni-kolodvor.com.
The private minibuses are often cheaper than ordinary buses, but they don't stop at official bus stations, have no timetable and you'll probably ask local people to get correct info.

I think that Global IR will be probably too expensive variant, because a lot of bus transfers and cheap ordinary tickets. There are cheap e-tickets from Prague to Budapest (cd.raildude.com, 19 €), cheap offer Beograd Special from Budapest to Beograd (15 €). In Beograd you can buy Balkan Flexipass, a network ticket for Serbia, Montenegro, Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Turkey and Greece (www.zeleznicesrbije.com/active/en/home/glavna_navigacija/putnicki_saobracaj/medjunarodni_saobracaj/cene_prevoza_v01.html, 50 € for youths, 5 days in one month).

Hi Guys,
i was wondering if you can help me to find out connections from Tirana to Podgorica.
I was looking at busses/minibusses and found some complicated connections via Shkoder and Ulcinj.

but you mentioned direct connection from Tirana to Podgorica, can you send me link for timetables or smth i can use as reference for planning my trip? i couldnt find this on croatioan bus link you posted...

that would be very helpful for me thanks in advance,
Lukasz