Village Bitushe – Peak Velivar + Lake Lokuv & Gashovo Lake

Velivar – the highest peak of Mount Deshat, Western Macedonia. It is located on the ridge of the mountain, and its altitude is 2,373 meters. At the very top of Velivar, the border line between Macedonia and Albania passes, due to which there is a half-destroyed border stone in the form of a pyramid. The peak Velivar is a high rocky and stony ridge covered with lush and tall grass, which rises above the ridge and sub-basin of Deshat in the valley of Radika on the Macedonian side and its foothills in the valley of the Black Drim on the Albanian side. The peak Velivar can be reached on foot from about 3 and a half to 4 hours from the villages Bituse or Trebishte or from the village Zhirovnica, along a fully marked hiking trail that has pillars with winter markings and passes by the North and South Gashovo Lake right at its foot and Lake Lokuv in the forest belt. From the top of Velivar there is a beautiful view to the valley of the river Radika with the monastery “St. Jovan ”- Bigorski and the mountain Bistra, the adjacent rocky peaks Golem and Mal Krcin with the town of Debar and Debar Lake in the background and the mountain Korab from the opposite, as well as to the valley of the Black Drim and the town of Peshkopi in Albania.

Lokuv is a glacial lake and is one of the five lakes on Mount Deshat. It is the lowest glacial lake in Macedonia. It is located at 1,565 meters above sea level near the village of Trebishte. Lake Lokuv is located in a dense beech deciduous forest, which surrounds it on all sides in the foothills of Mount Deshat. Specifically, the lake is located at the bottom of a depression in the foothills of the mountain above the villages Bitushe and Trebishte.

South and North Gashovo Lake are small glacial lakes located on the eastern slopes of Mount Deshat just below its highest peak Velivar (2373 m). They are located in a small valley and a depression at the beginning of the grass itself on the mountain Deshat just above the end of the mountain belt, in the locality of Argach. The southern Gashovo Lake is located in the source part of the river Lopushnik, at an altitude of 1770 meters. It covers an area of ​​423 m2, and the maximum measured depth is 2.85 meters. The largest length of the lake measured along the axis of extension is 65 meters, while the largest width is 11.8 meters. Immediately next to it, at a distance of only 1.5 meters, is the North Gashovo Lake, from which it is separated by a small hill covered with grass. The lake has an elongated shape in the east-west direction and has a constant water level which does not dry out or shrink throughout the year. There is a small outflow from it that supplies water to the neighboring slightly larger North Gashovo Lake. The waters of the lake are clear and clean, and due to the small area and depth, they heat up quickly and are transparent to the very bottom. The greater depth that this lake has from the neighboring northern Gashovo lake, gives its waters a beautiful darker blue (turquoise) color. Flocks of sheep are often drunk from its waters and before shearing, flocks of sheep are grazed on Deshat’s body. The lake can be reached through an unmarked path that leads to the right of Lake Lokuv, through the forest and pasture where the sign on the border belt stands and the steep stone valley through which one comes out on the ridge of Deshat. These two lakes, which are popularly known as Trebishki whirlpools, ponds or ponds, were originally marked as North and South Trebisko Lakes because they are located in the area and near the village of Trebishte, but at the suggestion of the Macedonian hydrographic researcher Dragan Vasileski presented in In 1996 they were named with the current names in honor of the Macedonian researcher – hydrograph prof. dr. Milivoj Gashevski.

Source: Wikipedia

Tour

(under construct.)