2 October Kotor Bay

The good thing about hostels is that you can prepare your own breakfast at your own time. I am taking it easy today and walk up the fortress with the two Brazilians. 

This town is old and the fortress is from around 1400. The walls run up 400 meters the steep solid rock mountains to protect the town.

After an afternoon relaxing and planning the next stages of my trip and working on the blog, we celebrate good-bye with a dinner together. Have a nice trip to Tirana and back my friends. it was very pleasant to exchange ideas.

30 September Sarajevo – Mostar

A rainy day in Sarajevo and I take the 11.00 hrs bus back to Mostar. This is the only connection that will bring me back to Lepetane tomorrow, with a night over in Mostar.

I walk around the city, find out where the European Commission has it’s ‘embassy’, a nice location in a park, with across the pedestrian street a house for girls of easy virtue.

The street, which was the unofficial border and front line during the war, shows still some buildings from that era, but also a eye-catching private highschool.


The park also has a 'lost statue' of Bruce Lee, but no explanation. What the hell did he do here? Just a peculiar visitor maybe, who left his mark?

Dinner in a traditional Bosnian restaurant with dressed up waitresses and waiters. I have a nice conversation with two Americans, both working in health.The man is a first aid doctor and the women a nurse.

They are both not the typical American,

They know both much about the last civil war in former Yugoslavia. They are considering what to do after they retire. The man would like to use his health knowledge where it can really make a difference. They both have learned Spanish. When you want to work with all possible patients, it is no luxury to know Spanish.

I go to my B&B after it dries up. It’s cold circa 8 degrees and I sleep early, because my bus tomorrow leaves at 7 a.m.

29 September Mostar – Jablanca – Konjic - Sarajevo

Just out of Mostar, following the river Neretva, the bus passes through beautiful scenery. It’s Sunday and whole families go out for dinner. The restaurants we pass have goats and piglets on the spit. The valleys are small and steep hills up to more than 2000 meter enfold in an Alpine landscape, if it wasn’t for the Mosques. At 13.00 hours you can hear the call for prayer.

The more we move inland the more the colors become autumn-like. I find this over a distance of less than 180 kilometer from the coast quite remarkable.

Closer to the Sarajevo, a city surrounded by hills, we pass through ugly high-rise ‘plattenbau’, concrete ugliness. The siege lasted long and the killing of civilians by snipers from the hills was a scandal and another sore spot on the blot on the escutcheon of the national community.

Since 20 couchsurfers have not even reacted, I decide to check into The Grand Hotel. Good choice, clean, friendly and just a 300 meter walk to bus and train station. Some luxury is allowed, because I know it will start and keep raining the whole day tomorrow.

 

The first sight is the Latin bridge where Franz Ferdinand and his pregnant wife Sofia in 1914 were assassinated, which triggered WW1 (right). The Museum is unfortunately closed and it’s not easy to see the resemblance today (photo left) of what happened back then.

 

The old town with the souk is nice and the smells of fresh spices and restaurants give me a strong flash back of my Gedaref visits. The receptionist has given me the address of ‘the best’ traditional food restaurant. I find it and can’t resist eating one piece of local bread with sausages, yoghurt and a salad. We ‘ll see what tomorrow brings.

Sarajevo does not make me happy. It’s not so vibrant as I expected and the atmosphere is literally a lot greyer than Mostar’s. I have no idea why, but maybe the tourism brings Mostar more per capita than it brings Sarajevo. Also life seems easier and more relaxed in the smaller town of Mostar.

I have now also discovered that connections are far from seamless. For my SYNAPTIC friends and colleagues, this is a transport jungle! Just the information is already hard to get and can never be fully trusted. So let’s not even think about co-operation between modes. My careful planning goes up in flames, because the planned bus Sarajevo – Herceg Novi only appears to run on Fridays. No way, I will wait 5 days for it. But following the way back isn’t attractive either, because the time-tables do not connect and I am fed up with border crossings. I long for my private transport my bicycle!!

28 September Dubrovnik (C) - Neum (Bosnia) - Metkovic (C) – Mostar (B)

At 8 a.m. I catch the bus to Mostar. First it goes north along the coast. Beautiful islands, some boats and fishing in the bays for clamps and mussels.

We get another treat of border crossings. The borders are crazy and land-locked Bosnia-Herzegovina has a tiny slice of coastline. But there is neither harbor nor a decent road into the hinterland. This led after Dayton to several agreements between Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina about free freight passage to Bosnia Herzegovina thru one of the Croatian ports in a trade off for free transport of tourists that follow the coastal route North – South and vice versa.

After several ‘uniforms’ have inspected our faces and photos, more and less serious we drive through a surprising delta of the Neretva river. Water is kept in small ponds to use for irrigating the crops. The wine, citrus fruits and vegetables grow abundantly. After the steep coastal range this delta running inland along the river is a real surprise. The farming seems quite modern and the houses are rather new. Here is obviously work, income and economic development.

In the early afternoon I arrive in Mostar. A room is easily found and I wonder off into town. Many tourists visit the ‘old bridge’, now completely repaired with UNESCO funding after being shot to pieces during the 1991 battle. 

 

The sad history of a small city where all ethnic groups lived together is explained in a movie about the destroying of the bridge in the nearby bookshop. Here can one find many books about the reasons behind the civil war. I page through a book about the tribunal hearings on the Dutch UN troops in Srebrenica. One of our ugly recent pain points in political peace keeping missions. The many tourists seem to be more interested in the local souk. Overhearing many conversations very few people have an idea what tragedy took place some 20 years ago.

Not that the war scars can be unnoticed. Still many buildings show the machine gun bullet wholes and bigger shells.

highest tower from Orthodox church

I let it all simmer a bit. There is much to understand, and also so much ungraspable for my Dutch mind.

one of the many mosques

27 September Lepetane – Hercog Novi – Dubrovnik (C)

The ferry is free for passengers.  

It is easy to find a lift to Hercog Novi, where I can take the bus to Dubrovnik. At 9.30 we leave. The 2-hour trip takes as much time at the all border crossings as it takes for driving! From Montenegro we enter Bosnia and then than Croatia. This is today’s reality after the civil war. For me this is a long forgotten situation with the current EU borderless between the Schengen countries. 

Not to speak of all different currencies. Serbian Dinars, and Croatian Krona plus Bosnian Marks. Montenegro certainly does not accept Serbian Dinars, but uses the Euro, since it does not have it’s own currency. The EU has silently agreed. In Bosnia they are the most relaxed. They take Krona, Euro and Marks. You have to be a math magician to keep track. Thank got for credit cards this time.

In the harbor there is a swarm of yachts and day trip boats, as well as a giant driving hotel. One of those cruise-ships, which bark out thousands of tourists that get mouse-trapped in the streets of beautifully repaired Dubrovnik.

The fortress and town wall are now a world heritage site. It’s beautiful, but just not my type of tourism. I wouldn’t go for “you must have seen Dubrovnik and then you can die”!

My simple ‘sobe’ (room) is in one of the back alleys. The smell of the flowers and citrus trees lure me up the steps. 

 

The friendly and talkative lady offers me her price, but I bargain it down and we both seem content with it. She shows me her family roots that her 95 year old father has put together in a booklet Her family comes somewhere from Belgium, where her maiden name ‘Dender’ originates from. She also tells me about the siege in the winter of 1991, when Dubrovnik was encircled and shot to pieces. The people trapped without water and electricity.Then it’s time to go into the city.

Because the weather is so nice, I look for a beach and find it. Only locals and a lost tourist swim here. Life is beautiful and the Adriatic blue and with a pleasant temperature.

I dine out and retire early. Blog work to be done.

26 September Bar – Lepetane ferry

After a healthy breakfast with gluten-free bread – bought by the kind B&B Villa Jadran, I carefully plan my trip and look for the smallest roads possible. However in Montenegro along the coast there is not much of an option than follow the road that all thru traffic takes.

The weather is fine, around 25 degrees and the roads are smooth. But this is not like following the Danube! There are climbs up till 8% and more than once I have to climb more than 200 meters. After a full day this can add up to about 800 meters height gained. By now my cycle condition is good enough to do so. But the disadvantage of this route is all the traffic, some very dark tunnels and the constant diesel exhaust. At the end of the day I feel my throat and I have a headache.

But the scenery is beautiful. The dark pink and purple Bougainville is still blossoming. There are also lemon, tangerine and fig trees. The palms and other statue conifers make the scenery really Mediterranean, in contrast with the abundance of plums, walnuts and apples and peers along the Danube in Serbia.

Montenegro has certainly grasped the approach to a consistent tourism policy along the coast. The branding looks professional, with posters along the road expressing pride and beauty.

Still in many smaller towns it seems to me that the ‘pig cyclus’ of too much of the same and the vulnerability on depending on its current attraction of low prices, is already touchable. Haven’t we seen this before in Spain, Greece and other coastal areas? What is Montenegro adding that others did not have?

In 5 hours I ride the 75 km to Lepetane – Kamenary ferry crossing and check in. It overlooks the bay of Kotor and the busy ferry traffic. I take my first swim in the Adriatic and decide I will cook my own meal. Five kilometers back there is a small town, where I do the shopping. The earlier bought gluten-free package of spaghetti comes in handy. One bottle of local red wine some veggies and spicy sausage and I am all set.

On my way I passed the ‘ Montenegro port’, a gated community, where the filthy rich come to harbor their vessels. Or better to say, tie down their over-sized ‘cruise-ships’. Handsome body builder types in smart looking outfits – obviously the crew – hang around on the ships and quay. Owners are just the hosts of their guests. They do not interfere with sailing their ships, nor serving, cooking or any kind of household duties.

I am just an ordinary bicyclist and after washing some clothes and cooking, I enjoy the harbor and ferry traffic on my balcony, as one big cruise-ship leaves for open sea.

Tomorrow I will travel by bus to Dubrovnik and in the days thereafter by bus to Mostar, Sarajevo and back to Lepetane. I will leave my luggage and bicycle in the B&B.