For many travellers, Himarë is the best balance on the Albanian Riviera: it has life, good beaches and good food without the wild partying of Dhërmi or the crowds of Ksamil. It is a town with two faces: down by the sea, new Himarë with its promenade, fish restaurants and beaches; up on the mountain, Old Himarë, an old town of stone houses and Orthodox churches crowned by a castle with splendid views over the whole Ionian coast.
What also sets Himarë apart is its people: the local community keeps strong Greek roots, is bilingual and has a very distinct identity, shaped by centuries of autonomy from the Ottomans and central powers. That mix shows in the food —clearly Greek-influenced—, in the festivals and in the proud character of the Himariotes. Around the town lie some of the prettiest and quietest coves on the Riviera: Livadhi, Llamani, Filikuri, Jal.
This guide covers Himarë with a practical eye: which beaches to choose, how to get up to the old town and the castle, when to go to dodge the August crowds, how much everything costs and how to use Himarë as a base for exploring the Riviera, from the Llogara Pass to Porto Palermo and Borsh. A destination with soul, beyond the beach.
Himarë has its roots in Greek and Byzantine antiquity, and its Orthodox population of Greek origin kept remarkable autonomy from the Ottoman Empire for centuries, negotiating privileges and resisting by force of arms from its mountains. It was a land of sailors, mercenaries and communities proud of their independence. In the 20th century it became part of independent Albania and, under Enver Hoxha's dictatorship, its border coast facing Corfu was militarised and dotted with bunkers. After the fall of communism it went through exodus and emigration, and today it is reviving with the Riviera's tourism boom. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓Albania's Ionian coast: Greco-Roman ruins at Butrint, the ancient land of Epirus, Greek-speaking villages and coves that are now the country's top tourist destination.
Read the history of The Riviera and the south (Sarandë, Ksamil, Butrint) →A local guide tells you in half an hour what no sign at the site will ever explain. We look ours up on Civitatis: guided in Spanish and booked online with no fuss. There are not many in Gjirokastra, but the ones there are worth it. And there are free tours here: you book without paying and tip the guide whatever you think at the end, so trying one costs you nothing. Tap the cards below and have a look.
They depart from Gjirokastra, 34 km away. If you book from this link we earn a commission and you pay no more.
No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Himarë is one of those places whose history goes back much further than its size would suggest. The area was part of ancient Chaonia, the region of Epirus inhabited by tribes of Greek culture, and both its name and its community have roots in Antiquity. Perched between steep mountains and the Ionian Sea, opposite the island of Corfu, Himarë was from early on a settlement of fishermen and sailors, tied to the Ionian routes and to the Hellenic world.
Around the old town, on the hill, there were fortified settlements from Classical and Hellenistic times, taking advantage of a natural defensive position that overlooked the coast. With the Romanisation of Epirus and, later, the division of the Empire, Himarë became part of the Byzantine world and was Christianised early, adopting the Orthodox faith that has shaped its identity to this day. From that long Byzantine period come the first churches and the Greek and Orthodox imprint that sets the Himariot community apart.
That continuity is the key to understanding Himarë: unlike much of Albania, its people kept a Greek language and faith over the centuries, along with strong community cohesion and a memory of autonomy that make it unique within the country. Its geography — almost impregnable mountains looking out over the sea — was always its great ally.
When the Ottoman Empire took hold of the Balkans from the 15th century onwards and ruled Albania for almost five centuries, Himarë managed something exceptional: it kept a remarkable degree of autonomy. Protected by its rugged terrain and by the warlike character of its people, the community of Himarë — together with the neighbouring villages of the so-called Himara region — negotiated a special status with the Ottoman authorities that allowed it to keep its Orthodox faith, a measure of self-government and tax privileges, in exchange for a loyalty that was more nominal than real.
That autonomy was often defended by force of arms. The Himariots rebelled against Ottoman rule time and again and sought support from the Christian powers of the Mediterranean — Venice, Naples, Spain, the Papacy — offering them men and harbours in return for protection. Himarë was a land of mercenaries: its men enlisted in foreign armies, above all in Italian and Spanish forces, and came home with military experience and contacts that strengthened their local independence.
This long period of semi-autonomy forged the proud, close-knit character, wary of central power, that still defines the Himariots. In the early 19th century, however, the rise of Ali Pasha of Tepelena, the powerful semi-independent Ottoman governor of the south, harshly subdued much of the region and curtailed Himarë's old freedoms, leaving his mark on fortresses such as nearby Porto Palermo.
With the Ottoman decline and the Balkan Wars, Albania declared independence in 1912, and Himarë ended up inside the new Albanian state. But its population of Greek origin and its closeness to Greece made it a sensitive point in the border disputes that shook the south during the first decades of the 20th century, within the question of so-called 'Northern Epirus', which Greek circles laid claim to. Himarë went through episodes of tension, temporary occupations and diplomatic negotiations over where it belonged.
In the end, the international community confirmed Albanian sovereignty over the region, while recognising the particular character of its population. In the interwar years, under King Zog and amid Albania's political upheavals, Himarë remained a community somewhat apart, with its own language, faith and strong local identity, and with a tradition of emigration — mainly to Greece, Italy and overseas — that would continue throughout the century.
The Second World War brought the Italian invasion of 1939 and then the German occupation, and the whole Ionian coast, strategically valuable opposite Corfu and the Strait of Otranto, took on military importance. From the war and the partisan resistance emerged the communist regime that would rule Albania for almost half a century and profoundly change life in Himarë.
Between 1944 and 1991, Himarë lived under the Stalinist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, and its status as a community of Greek origin on a border coast facing 'capitalist' Corfu made it a target of particular surveillance and suspicion from the regime. The coast was militarised, the beaches were largely off-limits to the population, and the whole Riviera — Himarë included — was dotted with concrete bunkers, part of the hundreds of thousands with which Hoxha, obsessed with a foreign invasion, covered the country.
In nearby bays such as Porto Palermo, the regime built secret military installations, including a submarine base with tunnels dug into the rock. For the Himariots, those years meant repression, control over the Orthodox faith — the regime declared Albania the world's first officially atheist state and persecuted all religions — and the impossibility of freely keeping up ties with Greece and with the emigrant community. Swimming or rowing across to Corfu to flee the country was the dangerous dream of many.
That isolation did, however, have a side effect: it kept Himarë and its coastline almost free of development and construction for decades, preserving the stone old town, the unspoilt coves and the mountain villages that on other Mediterranean coasts would have been transformed by the mass tourism of the second half of the 20th century. When the regime fell, Himarë emerged impoverished but with its heritage and landscape almost intact.
The fall of communism in 1990-1991 opened Himarë to the world, but it also triggered a major exodus. In the 1990s, with extreme poverty and open borders, thousands of Himariots emigrated, mainly to Greece, drawing on their roots and their Greek language; the old mountain town gradually emptied and many stone houses were left abandoned. The 1997 crisis, after the collapse of the financial pyramid schemes, plunged the whole south into chaos and hit the community once again.
Since the 2000s, and with growing momentum since 2010, Himarë has enjoyed a revival driven by the tourism boom on the Albanian Riviera. The beauty of its beaches — Livadhi, Llamani, Filikuri — its old town, its castle and its Greek-rooted cuisine draw more visitors every summer, and tourism has brought life and money back to the area, with new hotels, restaurants and guesthouses, some in the old restored stone houses of the upper village. Part of the emigrant community returns in summer or has reinvested in the town.
This revival is not free of tension: tourism development and building projects have sparked conflicts over land ownership and over respect for the identity and rights of the local community, a delicate matter given its status as a minority of Greek origin. Today Himarë faces the challenge of growing as a destination without losing what makes it unique: its history of autonomy, its bilingual identity, its stone old town and coves that the long night of the dictatorship, without meaning to, kept safe. At the heart of the Riviera, it is one of the places with the most soul on the Albanian coast.
