August 2017 Sarajevo
Unfortunately now being in Eastern Europe, we had no internet connection as this area of the world is not part of the free data in Europe deal for SIM cards. Due to this, we didn't realise our host for the night had tried to contact us to let us know her place had been flooded! Luckily upon arrival she was able to arrange for us to stay at her friend's accomodation instead, which was even closer to the old town - lucky us!
Much of the old town had of course been destroyed during the Bosnian war in the 1990s, when it had lain under siege for four years and came under heavy fire including artillery shells - thousands of civilians were killed. It's one thing to hear that, but another to know there were sniper alleys, where civilians were in extreme danger of being picked off by enemy snipers, and to see buildings still in destroyed states, and bullet holes in buildings.
In saying this, the Turkish quarter is still intact. The city was far more chic and bustling than I expected, and was really fun to wander.
We dined on delicious Turkish food for dinner at the originally named 'Falafel Restaurant', eating far too much hummus (but it was so delicious). I also tried fattet hummus (involving fried pita bread and hummus) for the first time and was very happy.
For the ridiculous amount of food we consumed it came to something ridiculous like 6 euro each, so I certainly wasn't complaining!
Unfortunately now being in Eastern Europe, we had no internet connection as this area of the world is not part of the free data in Europe deal for SIM cards. Due to this, we didn't realise our host for the night had tried to contact us to let us know her place had been flooded! Luckily upon arrival she was able to arrange for us to stay at her friend's accomodation instead, which was even closer to the old town - lucky us!
Much of the old town had of course been destroyed during the Bosnian war in the 1990s, when it had lain under siege for four years and came under heavy fire including artillery shells - thousands of civilians were killed. It's one thing to hear that, but another to know there were sniper alleys, where civilians were in extreme danger of being picked off by enemy snipers, and to see buildings still in destroyed states, and bullet holes in buildings.
In saying this, the Turkish quarter is still intact. The city was far more chic and bustling than I expected, and was really fun to wander.
We dined on delicious Turkish food for dinner at the originally named 'Falafel Restaurant', eating far too much hummus (but it was so delicious). I also tried fattet hummus (involving fried pita bread and hummus) for the first time and was very happy.
For the ridiculous amount of food we consumed it came to something ridiculous like 6 euro each, so I certainly wasn't complaining!
The next morning we headed for Serbia, but not before cheekily picking up a stuffed falafel pita from the restaurant we had dinned in the night before! We had planned to stop in a traditional Serbian village we had read about, but the roads were so bad it took us far longer to drive anywhere than we expected, so we had to give up on this plan and drive the whole day to eventually make it to our accommodation.
I was looking forward to this immensely, and not simply because we had been driving all day. I had found log cabins in the mountains on booking.com, and was excited to see if they were as amazing as they sounded (spoiler, they were!)
Our host didn't really speak any English but kindly offered to make us dinner, to which we happily agreed. Always fun to try the local food! Think meat, meat, stew, and some more meat (in that order). Pea and bacon soup, pork skewers, spicy sausage, cold lamb stew with bread, and a little macaron for dessert with cream inside. Rather intense, but enjoyable!
Feeling slightly like we had been pumped full of concrete, we declined her kind offer to make us a cheese and meat breakfast and staggered back to our cabin, happy in the thought that dinner had not only cost us only 5 euro each, but we had sampled the local cuisine! (something one would only want to do occasionally, I think).
20th August
We were starting to speed up now, wanting to make our way to Greece before we ran out of time, so we sped through the Serbian countryside, not really stopping (speed being the keyword, as we accidentally went slightly over the speed limit and were instantly pulled over by the Serbian police, who then had to use another car load of people they had pulled over to translate for us. It was sort of funny in a frustrating way).
Driving more carefully from then on, we stopped at a small bakery in a random village for lunch, enjoying the local hospitality as the owners kindly tried to explain to us what desserts were what - their English was certainly better than our Serbian!
We walked away with Burek (of course) as well as a jam pastry and a chocolate pastry. One thing I loved about the Serbian countryside was that it is the only place in the world I have ever seen the old fashioned haystacks, the pointy ones with the ladder on the side, like from the impressionist paintings.
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Upon arriving in Nis, we realized it was a Sunday, and thus everything was closed. This was pretty disappointing as we had planned to visit the Crveni Krst Concentration Camp as well as the cheerily named 'skull tower', built by the Ottomans in the early 1800s. Alas, we would be seeing neither. Then, it turned out we hadn't been given the right accomodation, and had 3 hotel rooms instead of an apartment. Unable to change it for anything else, and having already bought dinner ingredients, we sneaked the camping stove into one of the rooms and crouched over it wondering if the air conditioning unit would suck gas fumes in and blow up. Shockingly, the answer to this is no.
21st August
We made one last ditch attempt to visit the Skull tower on Monday, but most sites are closed on Mondays and this one was no different - attempting a drive by to see it from the outside didn't work either.
Giving up we began to head out of town, stopping suddenly when we spied a steam train rusting on some tracks and had to have a closer look! Funny how sometimes it is the moment you stop looking that you find something.
Driving more carefully from then on, we stopped at a small bakery in a random village for lunch, enjoying the local hospitality as the owners kindly tried to explain to us what desserts were what - their English was certainly better than our Serbian!
We walked away with Burek (of course) as well as a jam pastry and a chocolate pastry. One thing I loved about the Serbian countryside was that it is the only place in the world I have ever seen the old fashioned haystacks, the pointy ones with the ladder on the side, like from the impressionist paintings.
Upon arriving in Nis, we realized it was a Sunday, and thus everything was closed. This was pretty disappointing as we had planned to visit the Crveni Krst Concentration Camp as well as the cheerily named 'skull tower', built by the Ottomans in the early 1800s. Alas, we would be seeing neither. Then, it turned out we hadn't been given the right accomodation, and had 3 hotel rooms instead of an apartment. Unable to change it for anything else, and having already bought dinner ingredients, we sneaked the camping stove into one of the rooms and crouched over it wondering if the air conditioning unit would suck gas fumes in and blow up. Shockingly, the answer to this is no.
21st August
We made one last ditch attempt to visit the Skull tower on Monday, but most sites are closed on Mondays and this one was no different - attempting a drive by to see it from the outside didn't work either.
Giving up we began to head out of town, stopping suddenly when we spied a steam train rusting on some tracks and had to have a closer look! Funny how sometimes it is the moment you stop looking that you find something.
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