Aug 9, 2018 - Sunday, Monday 5&6 Aug

Dear all, Well it seems that I have been lost. In the last blog I referred to Sarajevo as the capital of Serbia. It is the capital of Bosnia Herzegovina. Not only that but I am lost in time, we have moved into August. I have updated the date so I am now up with everything. We visited a church where the entire wall is civet end in ceramics but the are not as we know ceramic tiles. These tiles were almost paper thin . The craftsmanship in the work and the designs were amazing. They were done 1 or 2 centuries ago., can't remember now. The...

May 27, 2018 - Peje

We took a longer route to Peje to allow us to visit the country's capital, Prishtina, and also to see more of the countryside. As expected, the capital did not have a lot to offer other than a couple of items referring to the country's recent history. One was a statue of Bill Clinton memorialising his contribution to Kosovo's existence and the other relating to it's 'New Borne' status. A river flowing through the town plus plenty of green spaces and a lively centre were its main features. The Kosovo Force (KFOR) was very noticeable in...

Sep 19, 2017 - Belgrade, Serbia

Georgi, my Blabla car driver picked me up at the Timisoara house at about 13:45. He had two Brazilians in the back seat, they didn't know each other, they just happened to both be from Brazil. We drove about 1 1/2 hours and hit the border to Serbia. First you have to go through the Romania check point. Then you go through the Serbia one. We went through with no questions although the Serbia inspector asked to look in the hatch where the backpacks of the two Brazilians were. All ok and we proceeded. We made a pit stop and proceeded through...

Sep 2, 2017 - Skopje, Macedonia to Pristine, Kosovo

We left Ohrid behind this a.m. and took the northern mountainous route to Skopje. We drove through narrow forested valleys. Some widened a little to allow small farms to flourish along with little villages. We could see a freeway being constructed across the valley in the center. On hills there were passing lanes on the up side. On one as we came down the hill a car going up jumped tne gun and pulled out just before the passing lane started. He came so close to hitting us! Gord turned for the ditch and slammed on brakes...another life...

Aug 17, 2017 - Belgrade 2

Well I lied! We are spending a 2nd night here. This a.m. we waited for a tram that never came then took another and changed to another. We walked up the hill to the fort entrance and were dismayed to find it had been built in the late 1800's, early 1900's so not that old. The Military Museum is closed for renovations but tanks and missles are displayed outside the fort...and all late 1900's. There was a great view out over the confluence of the Sava and Danube Rivers. Lots of green space too. The Roman well was built in the 17th century and...

Aug 16, 2017 - Belgrade, Serbia

Although traffic was heavy, we had little problem getting pn the autoroute and heading southeast. Slowly the outside temperature climbed to 30 deg Celsius. We drove past all the big box stores...Ikea included...as we left the Old City and City Center behind. Once the city was truly behind us we found ourselves passing through corn fieds, some dry, some not and some being harvested. Some farms grew veggies and others sunflowers. Some fields had been plowed under awaiting another planting. At one point we were startled to see fields of...

Aug 16, 2017 - Belgrade, Serbia, and the Iron Gates (Danube Gorge)

During the night we berthed at Belgrave, where the Sava River joins the Danube. Geograhically, everything south of the Sava River is considered the Balkan Peninsula, whereas the land north of the Sava is in Eastern Europe. Our day started on board ship with an 8 am lecture on “Serbia Today,” which consisted mostly of Balkan history, Tito, and the war of 1991-98. It was so dense with information it made my head spin, and I can’t add any more except to say that it was the Serbian fighting and genocide in Kosovo that instigated the UN to bomb...

Jun 11, 2017 - Prizren, Kosova

After getting checked in to my room it is off tot he bus station to check on tickets to Skopje, my next stop, They sell the tickets on the bus so have to wait until tomorrow the bus leaves at 9:00 AM so will head down to the station a bit after 8 it is a 3 1/2 hour ride, maybe a bit longer depending on the border crossing, then it exploring the city of prizren, lots of mosque here, then a walk across the old stone bridge and on to the hill for the Castle of Prizren (Kalaja) wow it is quite a climb but I made it LOL nice view of the city...

May 23, 2017 - Belgrade

After breakfast at the hotel we meet as a group at 9:00 am for a walk through the main walking street to the Kalemegdan part and then on Kalemegdan Fortress was a great fort over looking two rivers, the Sava and the Dunav, Robert and I spend about 3 hours hiking around the ruins of the fort a great day. The we head back to the hotel for a bit of lunch (we had leftovers from dinner last night) Then I head out to get post cards and stamps to mail out a couple cards, and to walk to the big Greek church being built near the Trg Slavija traffic...

May 22, 2017 - on to Belgrade, Serbia

This morning after breakfast we meet our tour leader for a walk to the Petrovaradin Fortress on the banks of the Danube river, this is the largest French fort still standing, Constructed in late 1600's and is in the shape of a star, this fort was one of the few the was never taken over by enemy forces. We have a guided tour of the museum then had time to explore more of the fort on our own, a very huge fort. We head back into town on our own I stop for a great pastry and a cup of coffee, back at the hotel I meet with rest of the group then...

May 21, 2017 - on to Novi Sad, Serbia

after breakfast we take our bags down to the lobby for a short walk to the local bus stop for our bus to the train station. we Have a 8:00 train to Novi Sad in Serbia on a slow train it takes 7 hours to complete. A stop for a passport check and stamp leaving Hungary at Kelebia then on to the checkpoint for the Serbia side at Subotic, here we also change the engine and we are off in Serbia making this my 86 country. get into Novi Sad and take taxis to our hotel in the center part of the city, a bit of time to get in our rooms then off of a...

Sep 25, 2016 - Through Romania Into Serbia

After only a couple of hours in Romania we were back at a border again, this time the one with Serbia. It didn’t take too long to get through first the Romanian & then the Serbian check points & head off to Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. Again the countryside was flat & featureless, no trees or hills just fields of maize with a lot of harvesting taking place. There does seem to be plenty of churches along the way. We ended up in the only camp site we could find listed in this northern part of Serbia. It was well outside the centre of...