Bosnia i Hercegovina

We arrived in Sarajevo on our private minibus. From the moment you arrive in Sarajevo it’s pretty apparent where you are – there’s still so much war damage. They have done an amazing job of cleaning up and reconstructing the town, but there are still so many buildings with bullet damage. At street level everything looks lovely and tidy, and then you look further up. I think the fact that they build everything with brick and stone probably saved a lot of lives.

 

Our hotel was just off the main street in the old part of the city. Sarajevo’s another place with a huge Turkish influence, and most of the old town is full of souvenir shops and Turkish cafes. It was really weird because the old town and the new town are right next to each other on the same street, and it changes really abruptly and on both sides of the road at once. It was also the most obviously religious place we’ve been (aside from the monastery). There were churches and mosques everywhere. Just down the road from the hotel, there were two mosques directly across the road from each other. They have very strongly divided religious affiliations amongst the population, to the extent that they have three Prime Ministers and three separate groups in parliament, one for each of the main faiths (Muslim, Orthodox, and Christian) and they can’t decide anything in parliament without all three agreeing to it. Which of course makes for a very slow decision-making process. Apparently they have a state school system as well as three individual religious school systems, which don’t follow the same syllabus. From what I heard, the country used to be very unified, and everybody got along with their neighbours without any concern about differing religions, but it’s not the case anymore.

What really took me aback about the place was that the people are just like me. That sounds terrible, but I clearly remember a lot of talk in the news about Sarajevo, and about Bosnia and Serbia, and I don’t know about anybody else but I just assumed that the people in such war torn places would be like famine victims, and look and act totally differently to me and the people that I know. But that’s not true at all. They’re just people, and what I really enjoyed about the place is how much they’re now getting on with their lives. There were a few people who looked like they had probably been injured in the war, like a young woman who was missing most of one leg, but not very many in relation to the overall number of people who are in the streets. They go to cafes and go shopping and hang out with their friends, and it feels like a safe and relaxed place to be.

We had two optional excursions in Sarajevo. One was a guided city walk and the other was a tunnel tour. We did both in one day, the city walk first and then the tunnel tour.

The city walk was pretty good. The guide was this gorgeous young woman, which meant half the group was very interested before she even said anything. She was also interesting to listen to, very knowledgeable, and very happy to tell us about the politics of the country when we found somewhere quiet, which a lot of times people don’t really want to discuss. The walk was meant to be two hours, but I think we finished in just under that time. We all had sore feet and were finding it hard to concentrate by the end. Except for Cameron, he could’ve listened all day!

We visited some of the many many mosques, churches and synagogues in the city, as well as the old merchant’s quarters and markets, the river and the bridges, and the spot where Franz Ferdinand was assassinated.

The Town Hall, still under reconstruction since the war.

  

The entrance to the old merchants' rooms; the washing pavillion at the mosque;

the spot where Franz Ferdinand was assassinated.

The tunnel tour was out next to the airport. I hadn’t heard about it before I got to BiH.  During the war the Serbs had the whole of Sarajevo surrounded. The UN made a deal with them about the airport, which I understand to be that the UN controlled the airport but the Serbs were allowed to use it, not the Bosnians, which effectively cut Sarajevo off from any supplies they might have been able to get in. So, there was a group who dug a tunnel under the airport. The end we visited opened out right next to a house. The same old lady still lives there, and she and her family helped a lot with feeding and watering and nursing people who used the tunnel. It was all very undercover when it was being built, but I believe the Army had a lot to do with it, and that when the Prime Minister at the time heard about it, and he actually endorsed it and helped provide tools. The Serbs did of course find out, but there wasn’t a lot they could do without bombing the airport, which of course they didn’t want to do – cutting off your nose to spite your face.

The tunnel is only about 1.6m at its highest points, and something like a kilometre and a half long, and goes right underneath the runway. They used it to get supplies of food and weaponry into Sarajevo, and to move people back and forth, and generally people going through the tunnel had 80kg of supplies on their backs. We had a guide for that as well, a young man who was only a couple of years older than me, so about 28. He was 11 when the war began, and he seemed to still be deeply affected by it, and by the loss of many of his friends during the war. He also took us to where the front line was, right outside some people’s houses on the edge of town, so that we could see for ourselves how close the Serbs got, and up to the fort (of course there’s a fort).

Map of Serbian front line; shell casing embedded in the floor by the tunnel entrance.

The tunnel entrance; inside the tunnel.

From Sarajevo, we went to Mostar. It’s famous for its very pretty stone arch bridge, which was the first of its kind when it was built. It was bombed and destroyed during the war, but they’ve rebuilt it to look exactly the same. If somewhat… newer.

When we arrived, we came in on the local bus. That journey was a bit of an experience. Quite a similar one to Moscow, actually. When we went on the tunnel tour, the guide told us that there hadn’t been any rain in Sarajevo for 43 days, and they were starting to get pretty keen for some. When we went to get on the bus to Mostar, we noticed that the wind was picking up and there were some interesting looking clouds around, and by the time we got onto the motorway it was absolutely pouring, and there was thunder and lightning right over us. The bus had to slow down because the driver couldn’t see far enough ahead. When we arrived in Mostar it had stopped raining, but the road was wet and the bus clearly needed a couple of new tyres. Thank god for ABS braking systems. As we were standing waiting for taxis it started raining again. Of course. I was in the third of our five taxis, and by the time we got to the hotel the streets were awash and it was absolutely pouring, and the driver refused to get out and help with our bags. We ended up with a chain gang, me with my head in the boot pulling all the bags out as fast as I could and throwing them at the others. At, not to – I saw mine hit the pavement but it was raining so hard I didn’t bother stopping, I just assumed someone else was going to grab it. Which they did. As soon as I got inside it started with the massive thunder and lightning storm again. It was pretty dramatic, we were all loving it.

There wasn’t too much to do in Mostar, other than wander the old town and take photos of the bridge, which suited me. We only had one night there I think… Once the rain stopped, we literally did just wander around the old town and take photos of the bridge. It was so nice and relaxed. Mostar is in a worse state of repair than Sarajevo, there are a lot more buildings that were damaged that need to be torn down, but there wasn’t a lot of money to go around at the end of the war, and private buildings were up to the owner to fix or abandon. Even just on the road we were staying on, there was a lot of this sort of thing. One caught my attention because you could see from the street, through the windows, to the bullet holes on the interior walls. I found that quite upsetting. There were also a lot of buildings that had bullet damage concentrated around the windows, more noticeably so than in Sarajevo.

This post is now so huge that it won't do anything if I try to add any more photos, so I think I'll end it here!

Montenegro

I got sick when we got to Montenegro.  We arrived late afternoon into Budva, so Sara walked us down to the beach and restaurant area, then took those who wanted to go over to the old town.  We had dinner and I believe that Kat may have gone for a swim, and then we went back to the hotel.

The next day we had an included excursion to Kotor.  The plan was to be ready early, so I got up with everyone else and went for breakfast, but by the time I ate half my meal I'd decided I was going back to bed.  Which was a shame, Kotor is meant to be beautiful.  So that was what happened.  I went and got back into my bed and nursed my horrible cold and even worse mood, and everyone else went on the local bus to Kotor and climbed 1300 stairs up to look out over the town.  It was pretty smoggy, so I was less concerned about missing out than I normally would have been.  I believe it was still a lovely view.

I did intend to take photos in Budva, but apparently I never did.  Hmm.  It was a very gross cold, one of those ones that make you cough like crazy before anything will move, even though your chest rattles with every breath.  Thank god it passed quickly, I came completely right again in five days.

Kylie and Kat came and collected me when they got back from Kotor at about 2pm.  They'd been for a walk over to the old town in Budva as well, which they said was better than most, and they'd tried to bring back some of their calamari for me but it had gone a bit manky in the meantime and been thrown out.  I didn't mind, it was such a nice thought.  And Kat had bought me some stamps when she got hers.  I felt very well cared for.  We went to the beach for the rest of the afternoon and dinner, but I didn't even go swimming because by the time we walked down there I had to have a sleep. 

The setup at Budva was quite cool.  You have beach, then promenade running parallel, then restaurants, then another bigger promenade with a whole lot of souvenir and food stalls.  We had quite a shop there, things were cheap.  I got a watch (the battery on mine went flat, I'll get it fixed when I get to Canada), a bracelet, and presents for Kim's and Sarah's birthdays.  Which are still in my bag.  Must post.

The following day we crowded back into our minivan.  Part of the problem was that we had four people who were six foot or over, and not enough "tall" seats to go around.  Some of the shortest people made a habit of getting on the bus first and taking all the single seats, where you could at least stick your legs in the aisle, which meant that those of us who were tall had to sit in seats that we literally didn't fit into.  Coming off one of those rides with bruises on your knees wasn't unheard of.  But we made it to Ostrog Monastery without too many bruises.

It was one of the places that I'd particularly wanted to see on this tour.  The upper monastery was built into the rock right up the top of a mountain, hundreds of years ago.  Even when we went up there by road, it seemed so inaccessable, and we couldn't figure out how they would have done it or where they would have found the resources.  The lower monastery is I think a bit newer, but still a very pretty church.

The lower monastery on the left; and the upper monastery.

We took the minibus to the upper monastery, wandered round there for 45minutes, took the minibus to the lower monastery, wandered round there, took the minibus back to the hotel, and spent the rest of the day lying around, which was good by me.  I was still sick and grumpy so sleeping and reading and lying around our cabin were about what I needed.

So really, the extent of our activites in Montenegro was sleeping, eating, and lying around.  Sweeeeeeeet times.

The water pipes coming down the side of the mountains, near Ostrog Monastery.

Albania

I know there were people in our group that disliked Albania quite intensely, but I was the total opposite – I loved it. From the moment we came across the border it was weird and fascinating and completely unlike anywhere else that we’d been.

We had a minibus to travel to Tirana from Lake Orhid. To those of you under five foot six this will sound like an excellent turn of events; those who are over (or who were there) will understand my pain.  I don't do grinning and bearing things very well.  I do do passive-agressive very well.  I feel that it's important to know and recognise my strengths.

Border crossings on this trip have been incredibly painless, in comparison to the Middle East, and this one was just the same.  It was amazing how completely different the landscape was, as soon as we entered the country.  I was vaguely aware we were high up when we were at Lake Orhid, and we only drove around the corner to get to the border (well, it was an hour or less).  When we crossed the border, we drove along the flat for a few minutes, then turned another corner and found ourselves at the top of what looked like a cliff.  We spent ages going up and down mountains, around these hairy corners and with really sheer drops off to the side.  I should also mention that Albanians are bloody terrible drivers.  They drive where they want, when they want, and I have no idea whether they even have many road rules, but if they do, people just ignore them anyway.  They even had a police officer directing traffic at a set of working traffic lights.  It was absolutely hair-raising.  Also, the landscape was very dry and yellow, where almost everywhere else we'd been had looked quite lush and green, even Sarajevo which was desperate for rain.  And the final, most wierd thing of all - they have these little bunkers absolutely everywhere, which were built by a past leader who was totally terrified of... something.  Nobody's quite sure what.  Invasion?  War?  These bunkers hold four people each, and enough were built to house the entire population of Albania at the time.  We heard a few very different estimates  of how many there are - anywhere between 60,000 and 700,000 could be right as far as I know.  They're made of solid concrete, and are half underground, and they're round with straight walls and dome roofs, so they look a bit like mushrooms.  And they are EVERYWHERE.  I saw them all through fields in the country, in people's yards, even on fence lines, with fences built over the top of them, and in the middle of the city, just randomly by the roadside.  They're apparently so solid that they're almost impossible to remove.  The story goes that the chief engineer was made to stand inside one while it was subjected to a full tank attack, so that they could make sure they would stand up to anything.  It did.

So weird.

We somehow made it to our hotel in Albania.  The driving really is pretty catastrophic.  It was pretty bad up around Russia and that area as well, but not as congested and uncontrolled in the cities.  Getting across any intersection, whether you're in a car or a pedestrian, is taking your life in your hands.  Part of that is probably to do with no Albanian being allowed to own a car until 20 years ago, when the communist government collapsed and the borders were opened.  There were only 400 cars in the country until then, and they were only for use by government officials.  So the roads they have were definitely not built to deal with the amount of traffic that they are dealing with, and there are traffic jams in every direction at any and all times of the day.

I quite liked the hotel we stayed in.  It was old and big and cool.  Our room had beds in two seperate rooms, with a door between, and a bathroom.  It was quite nice to not go sleep facing someone across the room.  They also still have problems with their electricity supply, and the power cut out twice before 1030pm that night.  Only for a few seconds each time, but it was also only the hotel that lost power, the street lights and all the buildings around us still had power.

We didn't do an awful lot in Tirana either.  There definitely weren't many tourists there, by the looks we were getting from the locals.  They weren't hostile, just curious.  We obviously stuck out for whatever reason.  The English there was still relatively good, everybody managed to make themselves understood.  The city was very hot and dirty and so smoggy.  That was a real shame in Macedonia too, it was quite smoggy, even at the lake.  Tirana was full of ongoing construction work too, like Scopje. 

Sara isn't allowed to guide in a lot of these places, so we all walked into town together and she pointed us in the direction of the sights, and then we took off by ourselves pretty quick.  Kylie, Kat and I left the group behind after the first mosque, which we walked past and said oh that's interesting, and the rest of the group then spent close to fifteen minutes inside of.  I lost patience pretty quick there.

There were only one or two things to see, so we walked down the main street and saw them.  The first was a big triangular building, which had originally been intended as I think a museum, but it didn't really work, so it is being used as something else but I've unfortunately forgotten what.

The only other thing we felt particularly inspired to go and see was the Mother Theresa roundabout, which, as we discovered, is literally a roundabout.  One of the buildings around it may have contained more information, but we didn't discover it.  I didn't even bother to take a photo, I'm sure most people have seen a roundabout before.

However, Tirana does have some very pretty parts, around the centre of the city.  These seem to mainly be the parts that were closed to the citizens for years, and only used by the government officials.  It's over an area of maybe nine blocks, and it's now the main restaurant area.

We went for a drink at the Sky Bar, a rotating bar at the top of one of the hotels.  It moves pretty slowly, it goes around only about once every hour.  There were nice views from up there though.

The town is completely surrounded by mountains, and it's hard to get a feel for how high the mountains are from a photo.  The city is almost completely flat, but it's growing up the hills.  You feel like the rest of the world might not exist outside of those mountains...  which probably wasn't a good feeling for the people who lived there twenty years ago.

We only stayed one night in Albania.  On the way to the border the next day (back in our squishy, legs-in-the-aisle style minibus) we stopped at Kruje, a town that's built almost vertically up the side of the mountain.  It's also very pretty, as most of these places are, and again the roading and driving were terrible.  In Kruje, we visited the local ethnographic museum, which was in a 250yr old Turkish house, and was actually pretty interesting.  It still had a lot of original decor, furnishings, machinery, and tools, and you get a guide included in the ticket price, who was very good.

Then we wandered through the souvenir shop-filled alleyways, back to the bus.  There was another museum, which was about the local hero, but according to the people who went, we didn't miss much by not going.

When we stopped at the border, there was a bunker that we could go and visit, which I think was probably the highlight of our time in Albania for a few people!!

Me in the bunker!  You just can't really see me...

Macedonia

We only had one afternoon in Skopje, but I thought that was long enough. It’s very cute and pretty, but there is a hell of a lot of construction work going on. They seem particularly keen on building things that look like they’ve always been there – lots of classical architecture. To their credit, even the construction is beautifully lit at night.

Also, they’re building random statues like there’s no tomorrow. In some places there are two or three within a few metres of each other. In the main square there’s a great big fountain, which is beautiful, and which we all assumed had been there for ages. But actually it was brand new, it’d only been there a month or so, and it’d only started playing three days before we got there. We were kind of wondering why so many people were so interested in it, when there didn’t appear to be too many tourists. They even had recorded music to go with the fountain, the kind of thing you’d play at concert band. The funniest thing about it was that the music played for about two minutes and then cut out. The first time I heard it I thought something had gone wrong with the speakers. But no, that’s just what happens. Then the fountain plays the rest of its circuit to the sound of silence, and when it gets back to the start the music starts again. You’d want to get yourself committed to the psychiatric ward if you worked anywhere near that fountain. The music played every seven minutes, exactly the same music every time. We sat and had a drink and people watched for half an hour or so, and by then we knew the tune.

There are very few tourist attractions in Skopje. We walked down the main pedestrianized street, past Mother Theresa’s picture (the Macedonians claim she was born in Skopje, the Albanians claim she was born in Tirana), to the museum. The museum has a clock on it that stopped when the museum was bombed. And that was about it for tourist attractions. It did fill in a good fifteen minutes though.

Skopje was the first town with a Turkish area, which had heaps and heaps of Turkish cafes. We went across the river to there and had dinner, then walked back and took lots of night photos of the new fountain and the surrounding square and buildings.

The pretty fountain.

And my favourite, the spewing lions.

Next we had a day and a half at Lake Orhid.  That was fantastic.  We were all worn out from being on the go all the time, and we all really enjoyed having somewhere beautiful to blob out and look at the water and swim.  When we arrived, Marsha was in her togs and in the water before most of us had even put our bags down.  The lake was really big, maybe about the same as Lake Taupo for all my NZ friends, and surrounded by mountains.  I liked that a third of the lake was in Albania.  And it was really calm and we had beautiful hot sunny weather.  A few people got pretty sunburnt, namely Cameron who managed to roast his belly pretty good.  There was also a nice little town but it was really very touristy.  We spent most of our time at the beach, being shown off to by a group of Macedonian guys.

And that was about it in Macedonia.