Another option if flight prices allow it would maybe having Corfu - Sarandë - Ohrid - Shkallnur - Tirana or something if I can fly out of there with a good deal.
Fly into Skopje - for a few days
Day trip to Prizen via SAS (www.sas.com.mk)
(using SAS again I hope, or Galeb if they are operating there in May)
I would consider actually staying over night in Prizen and then taking a bus to Ohrid as well if it's possible
Getting a taxi from the hotel to Struga (since it's easier to get the hotel to order a taxi so I don't get ripped off)
Saranda - 4 or more nights - Ferry to Corfu for the day - Bus or Furgon to Ksamil for the day - Maybe Gjirokaster for the day
Back to Tirana - Probably using the Ioannina to Tirana bus (or the same one I came on)
So does that look like a doable trip then with transit.
That's my biggest thing is getting the right buses as Galeb contacted me saying they didn't operate any buses to a lot of places until the summer. Just wanted to avoid using furgons for the longer trips.
The other issue is that the buses from Skopje to Prizen (all 2 of them) both get there in the afternoon or evening, so that really doesn't make it possible for a day trip and I would end up having to spend the night. Prizen to Tirana looks like they have direct buses though, but that would mean skipping Ohrid for Prizen. The only other option would be to just take a day trip to Pristina as they have many buses throughout the day or do the thing I hate the most and take an organized tour which does both cities from Skopje.
Would be nice to get flights out near Sarande, but looking like Skopje & Tirana are the only cheap options that I'm seeing.
I just looked this all over again and found maybe this trip might be a little jammed with trying to do Kosovo as well. Flights into Pristina are good and maybe it might be better to just do my 2 weeks in Kosovo (Pristina, Prizen), Macedonia (Skopje so I can do some hiking and any other day trips, Ohrid, Bitol maybe or somewhere else in the country) and then flying out of Thessaloniki, Greece instead (found a great airfare)?
Any other suggestions in Macedonia for towns/cities I should stay or see if I do that?
This way if said buses aren't running or don't have enough people, I still will have my hotel there and can just do other trips as I see when I'm there or whatever. Seems a lot less stressful with these Albanian buses.
Then I can just go back to Corfu, stay a night or two and then either fly or take a bus to Thessaloniki via Green Buses or fly back to Athens. Both options are in my price range and flights are only about 50€-65€ and the Green Buses is only around 40€.
Just seems a lot less stress free and less chances of being stranded with hotel bookings if a bus doesn't run, etc, plus is more straight forward that I'm not dealing with many connections transiting and spending a night here or there just to take another bus the next day for a connection.
So I think I'll take your suggestion and just stick to Greece and Albania then this time. You're a great help as usual (7 years in a row, minus the one year I went to Korea and China and wasn't on here)...