Truth be told, Gjakova was not on my radar when I made my initial plans to visit Kosovo. I did hear of it, and I read some articles saying that it was a must visit. I was not impressed with what I heard or read. However, when I came across a pizzeria in Gjakova on Google Maps, which supposedly made the best pizza in the whole region, I knew that I had to go give it a try myself. I am glad that I did as that pizzeria turned out to be nothing short of amazing, and I was also pretty satisfied with what I have seen in Gjakova. Let us now go through the things you can do (and eat) in this obscure little town to see if it is worth a day trip or not for you.
Gjakova is, perhaps, best known for its old bazaar and the beautiful Hadum Mosque. This is the courtyard of the said mosque, which is found in the very heart of the city’s old bazaar. This peaceful courtyard not only has a small cemetery, but also a few shaded areas for us travellers to get a small respite.
A true gem is hidden inside this mosque. While the courtyard is decent and the architecture on the exterior is not bad, the actual reason to visit this mosque (and not one of the millions of others) is the figures that decorate its interior. It is not very common for mosques to have intricate details that were hand drawn on the inside, and yet Balkans seem to have a few very good examples of that.
I am no art historian, so I will not go into the details of anything you can see on this photograph. However, compare it with the images of massive mosques you may have seen in Turkey, the Middle East, or elsewhere. While mosaics and the like are in fact used by Persians and Central Asians for interior decoration, and some wood craving and similar techniques may be employed in Turkey and the Middle East, I do not remember many examples of actual drawings inside (or outside for that matter) of mosques that I visited so far. I think, for some, Hadum Mosque may be reason enough to visit Gjakova.
The Hadum Mosque itself is part of a much bigger touristic area, that I refer to as the old bazaar. This whole place is very peaceful, a bit too peaceful if you ask me. That is likely because, as is the case with Gjakova in general, it seems to be experiencing a slow death caused by depopulation and disinterest by the authorities.
While wondering around the old bazaar, I came across this wonderful Yugoslav-era plaque. It adorned a solitary door frame, which did not have an actual door, nor did it have the house behind it. I am not sure why the rest of the building was seemingly destroyed but the plaque was left alone, though I sure am happy that it was!
If you slowly make your way to the end of the old bazaar, and then keep going a bit more in the direction of Pizzeria Mario Napoletano (it is the reason why I came here in the first place after all), you will eventually arrive at the Tanner’s Bridge. This Ottoman-era bridge, alongside a considerably newer one running parallel to it is well worth checking out, though I recommend coming here at springtime. During the height of summer, the beautiful greenery that normally surrounded the bridge was all dried, making it hard to get any of the beautiful pictures that I saw of the place before visiting the city. Nevertheless, it has a very unique architecture that must have made it very hard to traverse for those with a cart of any sort. Such a bizarre bridge is well worth seeing no matter the time of the year.
Finally, it was time! After being satisfied of wondering around Gjakova, I made my way to Pizzeria Mario Napoletano. Everything looked superb here, and the food smelled amazing. After a very short wait, we received our lovely bruschetta as a starter. The bread was fresh, and tomatoes tasted heavenly, while the olive oil kept everything together nicely. Though it was good, it would pale in comparison to what we would receive very soon.
The pizza in Pizzeria Mario Napoletano is, in one word, spectacular. Make no mistake about it, this is the best pizza you can get in Kosovo. The dough is amazing, it was so good that I would be fine just eating that crust with some olive oil and garlic and paying the full 5 Euro price that I paid for the whole pizza. Of course, no pizza would be complete without its tomato sauce, and in this case, we are talking about a sauce that is so good even my mother praised it a couple of times as someone who does not have the highest of opinion about pizzas. While these basics were superb, the fresh mozzarella on top was as good as it can get as well, being quite bouncy in just the right way.
When I visit these highly praised pizzerias for the first time, I try to stick to the two classic options: margherita and marinara. I think it is the best way to assess the quality of the pizzeria in question. If they can get these “simple” pizzas right, it must mean that their technique is on point, and ingredients are top notch. Nothing proves that better than a marinara pizza. While it would not be my go-to pizza at any other time, after all I do like my protein, it was an excellent choice here in this fine pizzeria. You could really appreciate their excellent tomato sauce here, and that added garlic only made it taste a tad bit better, which I did not think was even possible. In short, with these extremely good pizzas starting at just 5 Euros, you cannot go wrong with a visit to Pizzeria Mario Napoletano if you are a true pizza enthusiast. In fact, an entire day trip to Gjakova is justified thanks to this establishment rooting themselves in this otherwise sleepy town.
Being satisfied after that feast, I slowly made my way towards the bus station, to catch a bus back to Pristina. On the way, I took a different route through the old bazaar, a better one. There were plenty of cute little shops on the way, shops that either did not have any souls in them, or were long closed. Unfortunately, while Gjakova could be a bigger dot on many travellers’ maps, it seems to have been abandoned, either by the locals, by the authorities, or by both.
The time I spent in Gjakova was spent looking at barred doors, shut down stores, and just a few (mostly old) locals. There were no tourists in sight, no foreigners, and certainly no tour operators. While there are better Ottoman era bazaars out there, with enough work, I do think that tourist money can start flowing into Gjakova. Given the precarious situation in the region, I am sure that the authorities have other priorities in mind. However, in due time, I would love to see this city prosper again.
In short, while I would not necessarily recommend staying an extra night in Kosovo to see Gjakova in its current state, if you love your pizza as much as I do, a two-hour bus ride in that direction (and back) may be justified thanks to the excellent Pizzeria Mario Napoletano that made Gjakova its home. This may not be the conclusion you were looking for, but it is the one you will get. If I blindly recommended every single city I visited without much to back it up, well, to put it lightly, I would simply be insincere.