The Canyon of Gjipe ( sq, Kanioni i Gjipesë) is a bay and

calcareous Calcareous () is an adjective meaning "mostly or partly composed of calcium carbonate", in other words, containing lime or being chalky. The term is used in a wide variety of scientific disciplines. In zoology ''Calcareous'' is used as an ad ...

canyon located between

Dhërmi Dhërmi ( sq-definite, Dhërmiu; el, Δρυμάδες, ''Drymádes'') is a village in Vlorë County, Albania. It is part of the municipality of Himarë. The village lies 42 kilometers south of the city of Vlorë and about the same distance north ...

and

Vuno Vuno is a village in Himara municipality, Vlorë County, Albania. It is located along the road between the municipal centre of Himarë and the village of Dhërmi in the Albanian Riviera. Name It is said that because of the village's situation ...

carved by the Ionian Sea in

Vlorë County Vlorë County (; sq, Qarku i Vlorës) is one of the 12 counties of the Republic of Albania with the capital in Vlorë. The county spans and has a total population of 187,675 people as of 2021. It borders the counties of Fier and Gjirokastë ...

Albania Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...

. The canyon occupies a length of and a width that can varies between and . It represents a narrow strait, created by the activity of the brook flowing through its narrow pass. There are numerous rock formations along the canyon, including a number of

cave A cave or cavern is a natural void in the ground, specifically a space large enough for a human to enter. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. The word ''cave'' can refer to smaller openings such as sea ...

s. Located at the transition zone of the

Adriatic Sea The Adriatic Sea () is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan Peninsula. The Adriatic is the northernmost arm of the Mediterranean Sea, extending from the Strait of Otranto (where it connects to the Ionian Sea) to t ...

and Ionian Sea, the scenery is among the mosts visited attractions along the

Albanian Riviera The Albanian Riviera ( sq, Riviera shqiptare, ), also popularly known as Bregu, is a coastline along the Northeastern Ionian Sea in the Mediterranean Sea encompassing the districts of Sarandë and Vlorë in Southwestern Albania. It forms an impo ...

. Nonetheless, the canyon has been further recognised as an

Important Plant Area Important Plant Areas (IPA) is a programme set up in the UK, by the organisation Plantlife, to provide a framework for identifying and maintaining the richest sites for plant life, possibly within existing protected areas; though the protection of ...

of international importance by

Plantlife Plantlife is the international conservation membership charity working to secure a world rich in wild plants and fungi. It is the only UK membership charity dedicated to conserving wild plants and fungi in their natural habitats and helping peo ...

, because it supports a number of rare and

endemic species Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

. In terms of

phytogeography Phytogeography (from Greek φυτόν, ''phytón'' = "plant" and γεωγραφία, ''geographía'' = "geography" meaning also distribution) or botanical geography is the branch of biogeography that is concerned with the geographic distribution ...

, the canyon belongs to the Illyrian province of the

circumboreal region The Circumboreal Region in phytogeography is a floristic region within the Holarctic Kingdom in Eurasia and North America, as delineated by such geobotanists as Josias Braun-Blanquet and Armen Takhtajan. It is the largest floristic region i ...

within the

boreal Kingdom The Boreal Kingdom or Holarctic Kingdom (Holarctis) is a floristic kingdom identified by botanist Ronald Good (and later by Armen Takhtajan), which includes the temperate to Arctic portions of North America and Eurasia. Its flora is inherit ...

. It falls completely within the

Illyrian deciduous forests The Illyrian deciduous forests is a terrestrial ecoregion in southern Europe, which extends along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It belongs to the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome, and is in the Palearctic realm. Geogra ...

terrestrial

ecoregion An ecoregion (ecological region) or ecozone (ecological zone) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of ...

of the Palearctic Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub

biome A biome () is a biogeographical unit consisting of a biological community that has formed in response to the physical environment in which they are found and a shared regional climate. Biomes may span more than one continent. Biome is a broader ...

. Among

vegetation Vegetation is an assemblage of plant species and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic characte ...

elements, the presence is extremely significant of the

carob The carob ( ; ''Ceratonia siliqua'') is a flowering evergreen tree or shrub in the Caesalpinioideae sub-family of the legume family, Fabaceae. It is widely cultivated for its edible fruit pods, and as an ornamental tree in gardens and lands ...

and olive, which has been produced since antiquity throughout the country. The specific landscape right beside the sea and the particular climate have favored the development of a vast array of

fauna Fauna is all of the animal life present in a particular region or time. The corresponding term for plants is ''flora'', and for fungi, it is ''funga''. Flora, fauna, funga and other forms of life are collectively referred to as ''Biota (ecology ...

l species that demonstrates an eminent quality. The canyon contains shallow coastal waters which provide sufficient habitat for the

loggerhead sea turtle The loggerhead sea turtle (''Caretta caretta'') is a species of oceanic turtle distributed throughout the world. It is a marine reptile, belonging to the family Cheloniidae. The average loggerhead measures around in carapace length when fully ...

, the most familiar turtle in the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...

Dolphin A dolphin is an aquatic mammal within the infraorder Cetacea. Dolphin species belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontoporiidae (the ...

s are not really that uncommon in the region. Three species of dolphins have been identified within its waters amongst them the

cuvier's beaked whale The Cuvier's beaked whale, goose-beaked whale, or ziphius (''Ziphius cavirostris'') is the most widely distributed of all beaked whales in the family Ziphiidae. It is smaller than most baleen whales yet large among beaked whales. Cuvier's beaked ...

common bottlenose dolphin The common bottlenose dolphin or Atlantic bottlenose dolphin (''Tursiops truncatus'') is a wide-ranging marine mammal of the family Delphinidae. The common bottlenose dolphin is a very familiar dolphin due to the wide exposure it gets in captiv ...

and

short-beaked common dolphin The common dolphin (''Delphinus delphis'') is the most abundant cetacean in the world, with a global population of about six million. Despite this fact and its vernacular name, the common dolphin is not thought of as the archetypal dolphin, with ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Canyon of Gjipe Canyons and gorges of Albania Bays of Albania Tourist attractions in Albania Tourist attractions in Vlorë County Albanian Ionian Sea Coast

See also

References