The impossibly deep ice blue karst spring known as the Blue Hole is one of the best wild swimming spots in Albania. The water flows from an underground cave system and when you look down it’s like staring into an abyss, part eerie, part mesmerising.
It’s located a short distance from the ever popular town of Permet, yet it remains something of an unknown. Here you can swim in crystal clear blue water without the crowds, though as with all of Albania’s karst springs, the water is very cold. Not quite Theth Blue Eye cold, but not so very far off! It’s a truly special experience and it’s guaranteed to leave you feeling on a natural high for the rest of the day.
Here’s how to find it.
How to find the Blue Hole Resurgence Pool
The access road
The last 2km of the road to reach the spring is unsealed. It’s a good gravel road suitable for any vehicle in dry conditions, but it’s narrow, so turning would be difficult and there aren’t too many good passing places.
That said it’s an easy road to drive, so if you’re hiring a car which is allowed on unsealed roads you will probably want to drive it.
There is room for one car to park beside the final track down to the spring, alternatively there is a more spacious pull out 400m before the walking track at these coordinates: 40.304138, 20.178469.
Around 100m beyond the turn off for the pool (beside the cave which we detail in the second half of this post) the road becomes very difficult to drive with loose stones on a downward slope. Don’t drive this part of the road unless you have some good 4WD skills!
The walk to the Blue Hole karst spring
The stats
Distance: A few minutes each way if driving the road, if walking the road: 4.4km return
Elevation gain: 30m
Difficulty: Easy, with one minor scramble
Trailhead: Parking area near Hotel Restorant Vjosa River
Summary: If you need to walk the road, it’s still a very easy walk as the road is flat and in good condition. Only the final couple of hundred metres to the pool is on a walking track.
The turn off is not signposted but we have the directions for you in the notes below. This final stretch down to the pool is a little steep and on a rocky tree rooty path, though it’s not too difficult.
Walking the road
If you don’t need to walk the road skip over this first section! If you do need to walk the road, you should park by the Hotel Restorant Vjosa River, just over the clanky old suspension bridge. From here you walk up the road, past the restaurant and a couple of houses, it becomes a gravel road after 50m.
Roughly 100m further on you’ll pass through an open gate and you now follow this level gravel road for the next 2km.
It’s flat, easy and has some scenic mountain views so it’s not too much of a hardship. The first time we visited we didn’t see any cars at all and the second time, just one, so you don’t need to worry about dodging traffic!
Occasionally you get a glimpse down into the beautiful blue river below.
The dirt track down to the pool
Whether you’re walking or driving the road, a good reference marker for when you are getting very close to the innocuous track down to the pool is when you pass the big pylon you can see in the photo below.
You are roughly 400m from the turn off here and this is also a possible parking point as the lay-by is a bit wider than the one beside the final track down to the pool.
The turn off to the pool is very easy to miss, it’s located approximately 2.1km down the gravel road and can be found at these coordinates: 40.305785, 20.1824824
The path down to the pool
From the road to the pool it’s just a few minutes walk.
It’s a narrow dirt track for less than a minute and then you will come to the little scrambly section. It’s a bit steep but there are excellent sturdy tree roots to hold onto and it’s only a couple of steps down.
I went backwards like on a ladder, using the tree roots as handholds and it was easy - and I am not good at these kinds of things so I think for most people it will be nothing of note.
There are a few stairs after that and another similar scrambly section before you reach the rocky area beside the pool.
Swimming at the Blue Hole
Your first glimpse of the vivid blue water is guaranteed to wow you. It’s so incredibly blue even when in shadow as most of the pool was for us. It’s crystal clear and surrounded by pretty gorge walls which keep it feeling nicely secluded. You would never know it was there when passing by on the road above. Although as we discovered the following day you can actually see it from the SH75 highway if you know exactly where to look!
It’s beside the Vjosa River but the colour is completely different.
Entering the pool is easy as you can step off the stony beach and the water gets deeper quite quickly so you don’t have too much in the way of awkward rock shuffling to do - though if you’re very sensitive wearing water shoes will help!
Once you hit the deeper water you can look down and it appears to go on forever, it feels much like a cenote which was pretty amazing and not what I had been expecting. I have no idea how deep it is but it really does look like an abyss!
As mentioned, it’s very cold water year round, I would guess maybe 6C based on other pools in Albania I have swum in.
It will probably cause an immediate tingling sensation, but you do feel incredible afterwards! If you aren’t used to cold water go a bit carefully but most people will be fine taking a quick dip.
There’s plenty of room for a proper swim if you’re so inclined and you can jump from the cliffs but always depth check the water first.
A note on water conditions
One thing to note is that the water is only clear and blue if it hasn’t rained too recently. When we visited the first time it was perfection, but the second time, even after a relatively minor amount of rain, the river had come up and flooded the blue pool with milky water. It remained this way for around 5 days so you need to try and wait a while before it’s swimmable again.
The cave beyond - Shpella e Petranikut (Petranik Cave)
Petranik Cave lies 150m beyond the Blue Hole and how good the experience will be depends on the conditions. After the snow melt (usually May time and likely into June) the cave fills with turquoise glacial melt forming what must be one of the coolest (in every sense of the word!) swimming holes in the region.
However, outside of this time the cave is dry and less exciting. It may also fill up following heavy rain, but that’s a bit irrelevant anyway as you don’t want to visit the karst spring after heavy rain!
Whether you think it’s worth a visit even when dry depends on how much you like caves. I love caves but even so it was a little underwhelming, but perhaps my opinion was slightly marred by the fact I was expecting a blue swimming hole!
Anyway, if you do want to find it, from the turn off down to the Blue Hole you continue along the gravel road. After 100m you will reach a bridge and just before this is the point where I do not recommend vehicles going any further unless you have a 4WD and some skills!
It’s just too loose and stony. On foot it’s fine. Once over the bridge you head down into the dry (for us!) river bed which is littered with stones and boulders. From here it’s another 50m to the cave mouth.
All of it is over rocks and boulders. At first the rocks are small and quite easy to walk on, but then it does turn into a scramble up the larger boulders. You’re not climbing high, but at times a slip would be painful which is why I mention about whether or not you’ll find it worth it as it is harder to reach than the karst pool and a much lower reward if it’s dry.
Once you’ve scrambled up the boulders you then need to scramble down a couple more to get inside the cave.
It’s an impressive cave mouth but it doesn’t go very far back, you can see the full cave without even scrambling down to get inside.
After visiting the cave you return the way you came.
Getting to the Uji i Zi Resurgence Pool trailhead
I’ve covered off a lot of this in the section about the road, but incase you skimmed that bit, the place to park if you want to walk the gravel road is here on Google maps, and the coordinates for the closest parking place beside the trailhead for the pool is 40.305658, 20.183537 or the larger space 400m beforehand is 40.304138, 20.178469.
It’s around a 25 minute drive from Permet and 45 minutes from Gjirokaster.
Where to stay near the Uji i Zi Resurgence Pool
One of our favourite hotels (we’ve stayed there four times now!) in all of Albania is located a 20 minute drive from the pool.
Hotel Uji Ftohte
Hotel Uji Ftohte Tepelene is set above the stunning Drinos River with incredible views and lovely modern rooms. The beds are soft and comfy and the bathrooms have a proper shower that doesn’t flood the room!
Our pick is the junior suite which is very spacious and has sensational uninterrupted river views. However, we also love the deluxe rooms on the waterfall side of the hotel.
They are smaller but still great and you can fall asleep to the sound of the waterfall which is absolute bliss in a country as noisy at night as Albania often is! If the river is running high you would also hear the cascades in the junior suites.
The hotel has sunbeds down by the river which is a gorgeous spot for swimming until late summer when it dries up a lot.
You can still paddle but it’s not so inviting. On our visit in July it was blue and delightful but by September it had dried up considerably. That’s only a minor point really though as the rooms are some of the best you’ll find in the country regardless of the state of the river.
You can check out the reviews and prices on:
Porta E Gjelber
If you want to stay in Permet, we stayed in Porta E Gjelbër which is a great little family run hotel with comfy beds and good showers (no bathroom flooding here either!).
It’s very central (but not noisy) so you can walk to anywhere you want to go in Permet and the onsite restaurant has very good food.
The curtains don’t quite fit the windows though so you might want to bring an eye mask if you’re sensitive - though this is the case for most places in Albania so it’s by no means a unique thing to this hotel.
We stayed twice and the second time it was like seeing an old friend so you can expect a warm welcome!
Chri Chri Guest House
If you don’t mind a 10 minute drive out of the village up a steep mountain road Chri Chri Guest House is a delightful place to stay (the final part of the road is unpaved, but the host will pick you up from the end of the paved road). The old stone house has wonderful views and it’s so quiet at night. I thought we might be woken by the local roosters but we didn’t hear a peep!
This is a proper old school travel experience in the sense that people sit and talk to each other here, helped in part by dinner being served at a long table, but also by the comfy cushioned seating around the fire. If you’ve missed sitting and chatting to other guests on your travels, it’s the place to go.
The host, Gilberto, is also a fountain of knowledge about Albania and will happily sit and chat over a glass of evening raki.
It’s also near the most incredible church in the whole country which is a must visit.
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The impossibly deep ice blue karst spring known as Uji i Zi Blue Hole is one of the best wild swimming spots in Albania. The water flows from an underground cave system and when you look down it’s like staring into an abyss, part eerie, part mesmerising. We’re sharing how to find it and what to expect when you do.