Kosovo's most beautiful corners, in order

This isn’t a list of Kosovo monuments; for those, see places to visit in Kosovo. Here I rank the spots I find most beautiful for their scenery, their view or their water. It’s a mix of mountains, a town and a couple of protected corners, and I’ve left out anything that means heading into areas where gov.uk tells you to stay on the path.

The mountainous west takes most of the prizes

Kosovo is small, 10,905 km², yet it has proper mountains. In the west, along the Albanian and Montenegrin borders, rises the Bjeshkët e Nemuna range, which Serbs call Prokletije. Law 04/L-086 turned it into a national park in 2012, and its 62,488 ha reach into five western municipalities. Up there stands Gjeravica, which Madrid’s foreign ministry puts at 2,656 metres.

The easiest way in is the Rugova Canyon from Peja. It’s my favourite place in Kosovo, because it starts at the edge of town and drops you straight into Kosovo’s highest range. If you want to go higher, the mountains of Kosovo guide covers the peaks and the routes up.

A town best seen from above

Second place goes to a view. Prizren lies beneath a fortress of Roman origin, according to the DTK, and up there the Ottoman old town, the river and the minarets spread out below you. It’s the only spot here you can walk to from your hotel. I’d go up late in the afternoon, when the light softens over the roofs and the stone.

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The Sharr range in the south

The Sharr Mountains are the oldest national park, declared by the Assembly in 1986. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the law gives it 39,000 ha, half in Prizren municipality and the rest in Shtërpcë, Suharekë and Kaçanik. It’s the range on your doorstep if you stay in Prizren, and Brezovica is up there too, although nothing official is published about its ski area.

Water and rock in the middle

The agency looks after just two nature monuments of special importance, the Mirusha Waterfalls, by the village of Mirushë in Malishevë, and Gadime Cave in Lipjan. At Mirusha I’d keep in mind gov.uk’s note that Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever is endemic, mostly around Malishevë in summer. I cover both in caves and waterfalls in Kosovo.

If you are short on time, see the best tours in Peja and pick one that fits your day.

What about the lakes?

The largest lakes listed by the statistics agency are Gazivoda (9.1 km²), Radoniq (5.96), Batllava (3.27) and Badoc (2.57). Batllava, in Podujeva according to OpenStreetMap, is the easiest from Pristina. Gazivoda lies in the north, in Zubin Potok on the same map, where gov.uk flags a risk of protests, so I’d leave it off a first itinerary. All of them, with their municipalities, are in Kosovo lakes.

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