Pcinja - Gradiste site - Gradiski and Duenicki caves

See https://mymacedoniablog.wordpress.com/ for more info about sightseeing and hiking in Macedonia.

WARNING: the northern part of this hike was completely overgrown with thorny bushes and I strongly advise not to do this part of the hike. The southern part, near the village Pcinja, is a lot better and includes an interesting archeological site including at least two caves.

The current hike is 14 km with almost 700 m ascent. But I really advise you not to do this version. A good alternative for this hike, the part closest to the village Pcinja, can be found here: https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/pcinja-bislimska-klisura-pcinja-97461552#

I had found two trails in this area, both of about 10 km, that I thought to combine into a bit longer hike. Especially because it was an one hour drive from our base in Skopje it seemed like a good idea to do a bit longer hike. Well, that turned out to be a bad idea.

The second hike (https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/bislimska-klisura-61800670#) was completely overgrown with thorny bushes and very difficult to follow. No fun at all and it drove us nuts. There were several moments were we thought about turning around, but then the trail seemed to get better only to become overgrown again a few hundred meters later. Etcetera. There are no good views during most of this part of the hike. You don’t even get close to the river.

On the other hand, the best part was saved for last. The archeological site Gradiste with the ruins of an old church and the Gradiski Cave were nice, although the cave was not spectacular. According to an information panel there should be several other caves nearby (Studen Cave, Liskov Cave) as well as the ruins of Bislim Castle. Unfortunately we did not have the energy anymore to search for these locations.

A bit further there was another cave, the Duenicki Cave, also not spectacular, but still a cave. A broken info panel inside the cave also indicates the Golubarnik Cave and the locations of two other unnamed caves in the vicinity. We also did not look for those.

Along the river are also the ruins of an old watermill, which must have been an impressive building in its heydays.

At the end there is also a place for sport climbing, Bislimska Ravenous.

The part of the hike near Pcinja (https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/pcinja-bislimska-klisura-pcinja-97461552#) would get 3 stars as it is quite a good trail with interesting localities. The other part of the trail (https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/bislimska-klisura-61800670#) gets an 1 rating. Overall, my version of this trail gets a 2 out of 5 stars rating. Be warned!