Albania
Not very long ago Albania was strictly off limits for independent travel. The only way to visit was through a costly organized tour. Sailors from nearby Corfu were terrified of being forced to land along the Albanian coast, in case they were arrested as foreign spies and carted off to some kind of Gulag. It was considered to be the last great bastion of European hard line communism. That’s all over now. Westerners no longer need a visa and hostels and budget accommodation are starting to sprout up all over the place. Albania is still of great value and offers everything from elegant Ottoman mansions in snow capped mountains, to ancient Greek ruins and near deserted Mediterranean beaches. The last couple of years have seen dramatic improvements in Tirana, the capital city, as the once notoriously pot-holed streets and pavements have been seriously upgraded (although the famous concrete bunkers still pop up in some very odd places as they’re so difficult to demolish). Albania still retains a strong flavour of its own and remains several steps removed from even most of Eastern Europe. It might be a while until Albania becomes really Westernised, and gets their first official McDonalds, but they do have a MacDonalds (with the same ‘golden arches’ logo). They also have a fake version of KFC but it only serves kebabs. There might be a few legal issues to sort out before they’re asked to join the EU.
Algeria
During the ten year long civil war – in which something like 100,000 Algerians were killed – Algeria was strictly off limits for tourism and even until very recently you could only visit if you went on an expensive tour and were escorted by an official guide. It might be an exaggeration to say that everything has now changed and that all of Algeria is completely safe but independent travel is now possible. You need to have a booking with a hotel and provide plenty of support evidence to get a tourist visa but it can be done (the easiest and cheapest option is probably to get a cheap flight into Tunisia and then cross over from there – the border with Morocco is closed). Algeria is a vast country with everything from ancient Roman ruins and undeveloped Mediterranean beaches, to grand colonial architecture and great swathes of the Saharan desert. Sooner or later, the people in power are going to realise that tourism could earn them a lot of money and greatly contribute to solving their chronic unemployment problems. If they started to promote Algeria’s attractions and made it easier to get a visa then Algeria could truly explode (bad choice of words).
Macedonia
Macedonia boasts medieval walled cities, great lakes and vast numbers of architecturally distinctive churches and monasteries. The people are friendly and even popular tourist destinations such as Lake Ohrid are incredibly cheap for Europe (ten euros a night for a pleasant double room with cable TV). It’s easy enough to travel overland into Macedonia from Kosovo or Albania but the lack of cheap international flights mean that it can only practically be visited as part of a larger trip through the less popular parts of Eastern Europe. If Easy Jet or Ryan Air start flying into Macedonia’s capital, Skopje, then everything would change overnight.