Warning: parts of this hike are pretty overgrown and without a clear trail.
With 22 km in length and 1800 m ascent this is a long and very demanding hike to the famous Magaro peak in Galicica National Park. Note that this is not the standard and official trail to peak Magaro, that one starts at the Lipova Livada (Linden Tree Valley) pass and is just 8 km in length with 700 m climbing!
Mount Magaro is the second highest peak of Galicica National Park and probably the most visited peak near Ohrid or even in Macedonia. It is so popular that it apparently is lucrative for the national park to make you pay to climb it. At the entrance to Galicica National Park near Trpejca there is a toll booth were you have to pay to enter Galicica National Park by car (50 denars/1 euro for the car and 30 denars/0.5 euro per person). And at the start of the trail to Mount Magaro there is another toll booth where you have to pay 200 denars (3.30 euro) to climb the peak (See here how this ridiculous fee is disputed by the UIAA (international climbing and mountaineering foundation: https://www.theuiaa.org/access/access-restrictions-in-the-galicica-national-park/).
The hike described here does not pass the toll booths and is therefore a free alternative! However, you pay the price with your stamina, because it is a very tough hike! The ascent to Magaro has about 2 kilometers long climbing with a grade of 35% and some parts are through rather dense vegetation.
Usually people want to visit the highest peak of a mountain range. It is funny that the highest peak of Galicica National Park, peak Kota F10 (2265 m), is less well known and less visited than the Magaro peak (2255 m), although they are just 3 km apart. The Kota F10 peak is on the border with Albania. This hike visits both peaks!
On a clear day you’ll have excellent views of both Lake Ohrid and Lake Prespa during this hike. You can even see the island Golem Grad in Lake Prespa.
I had found two trails that described this alternative descent of the Magaro peak (https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/trpejca-pavlov-trip-19493869 and https://www.wikiloc.com/mountaineering-trails/magaro-galicica-3914094). It was mentioned that the trail was overgrown and I was curious if this approach of Magaro was still possible. I used the two GPS tracks for the general directions and made my own track where I saw fit.
The hike begins in the village Ljubanishta. I started here at 06:30 in the morning in July 2021.
You almost immediately leave the asphalt road in Ljubanistha for a steep forest trail.
After 2 km you reach some ruins and soon after you end up on a dirt-road where you go left and that you follow to a Y-junction where you make a sharp run to the right to follow another dirt-road.
Near the end of this dirt-road you have to do the inevitable: Climb your way up through the forest area, without a clear trail available. This is where the GPS comes in handy!
A bit over 4 km into the hike there are some more ruins. After this point I became a bit desperate because both my reference GPS tracks converged here so there should be a clear trail. However, there was no trail or I could not find it due to the dense vegetation everywhere. I did several attempts to pass through the vegetation but without luck (this has been removed from my GPS track). I almost gave up but then found a way around the vegetation.
After this difficult part you are above the tree-line, with great views and a steep way ahead of you towards Magaro Peak.
After peak Magaro (2255 m) I descended via the official trail in the preferred (east) direction.
Once you’re reached the signpost pointing towards the Lipova Livada pass (the start of the official Magaro trial), you make a right turn and start walking though the valley towards the Kota F10 peak. Now you have to basically slowly ascend the same 250 m again that you just came down from Magaro. If you want to avoid this extra climbing (at this point you have already climbed 1500 m), you can decide to walk directly from Magaro peak to Kota F10 peak via the ridge. However, I had done that ridge trail a few days earlier so I took the valley. You can check here for an overview of the possibilities for shortcuts and alternative routes.
The Kota F10 peak is marked with a concrete marker saying F10 and there are ruins of an old stone shelter. Just below the peak there are the ruins of an old military building, probably from the first Word War, just like the many trenches that can be found scattered all over the mountains.
The descent back to Ljubanistha is based on the 66 km trail from the Galicica Ultra Trail run from St Naum to Ohrid (https://ohridultratrail.com/). Here and there I found forgotten little orange flags marking the trail. I had used this trail a few days earlier to climb to the Kota F10 peak.
At a certain moment there are some remains of stone walls, I don’t know what their purpose was. Maybe dating back to the first Word War, from which time also the trenches on the top of the mountain date?
You also pass an area with a spring, where you join the dirt-road again that brings you back to the trail towards Ljubanistha.
Despite that this 22 km hike was shorter than the 30 km hike to Magaro and Kota F10 from Trpejca that I had done a few days earlier, this version was more demanding, maybe because of the 200 m extra climbing or the fact that this hike was somewhat steeper. It was a nice and definitely off-the-beaten track adventure, because of the dense vegetation.
Overall the hike gets 4 or of 5 stars, but know what you start when you embark on this difficult hike! This hike feels more like a heavy exercise than a relaxed walk in the mountains!
You can view and download the GPS track of this hike here: https://www.wikiloc.com/hiking-trails/magaro-and-kota-f10-peaks-in-galicica-national-park-from-ljubanishta-84577423
I digitally combined my three hikes to peak Magaro and think I’ve come up with the route that takes the best part of each trail: Peaks Magaro and Kota F10 from Lipova Livada in Galicica National Park (14 km / 800 m). This would be a 5 star walk, just as the official Magaro trail itself!
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