Galičnik hangs on a mountain shoulder at around 1,400 metres, high above the Radika valley, and the road up to it is a winding, narrow affair that keeps you honest. The surface is tarmac but not always smooth, there are tight bends where two cars have to negotiate, and in places the drop is serious. Rostuša, in the valley below, is the nearest town to speak of, and once you commit to the climb there is no turning back for coffee. Most of the village is stone houses with wooden balconies and slate or stone roofs, cut into the steep slope and facing out over a big, wild view.
Few villages in the Balkans have as much to say as this one. It was famous for its stonemasons and builders, the Mijaks, men who left their homes for much of the year to work across the Balkans, building churches and houses in other people's towns, and sending money back to the families they had left. Most of Galičnik's year-round population is gone now, and many of the old houses are used as summer homes. Once a year in July the village fills up again for the Galičnik Wedding, a traditional festival in which a couple are married in the old village costume with music and dancing, and the whole place turns into a slow, happy crowd. It is worth planning around if you can.
The village also gives its name to a white sheep's cheese, brined and firm, which you can find in small shops and on restaurant tables across the country. Eat some with bread and a green pepper, and drink something cold with it. Cafés open and close with the tourist season, and that goes for the little restaurants too, so do not count on a hot meal in the shoulder months.
Fuel is not available in the village. Rostuša is five kilometres below, and Debar, the bigger town on the way to the Albanian border, is thirteen kilometres away. The road is a dead end, so you ride back down the way you came, which is no hardship: the descent shows you the valley in a way the climb never lets you look.