Teil Zwei: Deutschland!: Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro

Every summer, Hannah and I get together for a trip. This year, we explored Bosnia and Montenegro. We flew into Sarajevo, a city I’ve heard little about since I was in middle school; Bosnia was locked in civil war, and journalists were bunkered down at the Holiday Inn in Sarajevo, reporting on the constant shelling. I remembered so little of the politics behind the war, learning about the history was one of my interests in visiting the city.

Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro. To the west of Bosnia and Herzegovina is Croatia. To the south of Montenegro is Albania. The strip of land across the water is the boot heel of Italy.

**Bosnia and Herzegovina**

This is the main square in Sarajevo; intimate walking streets radiate out from here, lined with people drinking Turkish coffees in cafes and eating burek and cevapcici. There were a lot of tourists here, but we heard almost not English spoken.

We visited an old Orthodox Church, the Catholic Cathedral, and the outside of the Gazi-Husrevbey mosque, all within a 5 minute walk of each other – so many people with so many different beliefs living so close together. Bosnia is, historically, along the line of east-meets-west and you can see it in the architectural mix of the buildings and on the faces of the people. But isn’t that New York City, in a nutshell? And most big American cities, for that matter?

Gazi-Husrevbey mosque in Sarajevo

Who knew that Bosnian was so easy to read!

…Shades of grey and scars from different days.

The Serbian forces had the Bosnian forces (and everyone else living in Sarajevo) surrounded in Sarajevo from 1992-1995. They hid in the mountains surrounding the city and shelled them continuously. The small open corridor between Sarajevo and “free Bosnia” included the airport, which the UN controlled. Since they were remaining “neutral”, the UN did not allow the Bosnians to pass over the airport. Instead, the Bosnians dug an 800m tunnel below the airport, 1m wide and 1.6m tall, and they ferried all of their food, medical supplies, injured people, weapons– everything – secretly through the tunnel. The tunnel ended in an old woman’s house on the Free Bosnian side. She is still living, but has turned the house into a museum and we went to see the tunnel there.

The tunnel. You can see that it is so low I had to bend over while walking through. This was the Bosnian’s only means of support for the whole city of Sarajevo. Out of 300,000 people in the city, only 60,000 left during the war!

The uniforms of the soldiers really struck me – Levi’s jeans and converse shoes. The soldiers were paid in cigarettes and they became the most used currency in Sarajevo.

The UN supplied rations to the Bosnians, but only 150g/person/day including canned meat from WWII! Note the tiny bottle of Tabasco sauce.

Here is one of the tunnel guides, she's about my age and looks a lot like me, telling stories about the war. Only, she wasn’t just relaying a tale of peril of the soldiers fallen in battle, she lived in Sarajevo during the war. She ran down to the river to collect water, dodging sniper fire every day. She burned her clothes to boil the dirty water so it was drinkable. She drank the silly Tabasco sauce. Out of such atrocities, how do people manage to stay alive...and thrive?

After the war many cities donated old trams to Sarajevo since theirs were destroyed. So many funky ones to choose from!

Overlooking Sarajevo

A view of Sarajevo from the hills – a beautiful countryside!

…and just a couple miles outside of town, nature take over and only handfuls of houses dot the landscape. We headed south towards Montenegro.

Hay the Bosnian way – love the piles in front of so many houses.

Navigational tool of choice: CityMapsToGo on Hannah’s ipad.

Stopped at a secret sandy beach along the Drina river for a swim. A handful of local boys were there as well, but the water was so cold they mostly stood around in their swim trunks and smoked cigarettes. The guy at the general store sold us a hot loaf of spongy, delicious bread and some very tangy fresh, local cheese. He did NOT like Obama and called him some very nasty names. But besides this, the people we met were exceptionally friendly, warm, and loving life.

**Montenegro**

The border crossing from Bosnia into Montenegro included this one lane bridge over the Piva river– and this rowdy welcoming committee cheering us on!

We drove on switchbacking one-laned roads for most of the day, stopping for people hurtling at us from the opposite direction around blind corners. Here is the Piva River gorge along our way.

Classic example of roads in Montenegro – one lane, disappearing into an unlit tunnel with a hairpin turn and no guardrails.

We picked up two hitchhiking Danes along the way and ended up camping at the same campground against our better judgment (or, Hannah’s better judgment) in Durmitor National Park. Here was lunch!

Hiked into Black Lake in Durmitor National Park, Montenegro. Here, the little fishies come and nibble on your toes as you are swimming.

Dormitor National Park

The spaceship has landed! Dormitor National Park, Montenegro. Note that the one lane rode the blue car is driving on is not the driveway to the spaceship, but the main road through the park.

Dormitor National Park

The beach at Murici, on Lake Skadar

The main road along Lake Skadar. The drive took us from shrubby highlands down to low stands of olive trees.

We drove down to Ulcinj, which is the very southern town in Montenegro, along the boarder with Albania. The guidebook said, “if you want to get a feel for Albania without actually going there, go to Ulcinj” and some guys at the campground recommended this 12 km long stretch of beach because it had “a couple hippy bars and you can camp there”. We got the feeling for Albania pretty quickly…

Awesome fish soup!

We drove north to the Bay of Kotor which is actually a double bay surrounded by huge mountains dropping off into the warm, Mediterranean waters. We slept the first night in Stolvi under a canopy of grape leaves next to the Sea. It did smell like horses, but it was a great view.

Morning swim in Stolvi, the Auto Kamping under the grape vines behind the girl on the beach.

Bay of Kotor

Kayaking the Bay of Kotor

We stayed in the most amazing house in Lipsi – “apartments Biga”. The owners are two wonderful Montenegrins. The red buoys in the water are the mussel farm which their son tends to. We watched him free diving in the morning to tend to his crop.

"Apartments Biga". Stay there.

The sun rises on the Bay of Kotor.

Sunrise swim.

The summer wouldn’t be complete without jumping off stuff into water.

The thing I love about the Bay of Kotor is that everyone comes there and just hangs out in the water. The bay is lined with rock and concrete docks, sprinkled with cozy beach bars and a smattering of boats. Boys play water polo, girls sun themselves on beach chairs, old ladies gossip while swimming in the crystal clear water. Many people come here on vacation, but you don't get a crowded sense of hyper tourism and most people seem to be from Montenegro, Bosnia, and Serbia. The water is the perfect temperature where you can stay in all day and salty enough that your legs float!

Hanging out at the beach in Herzceg Novi. Love it!

Hannah has mastered the art of multitasking - 1) driving a manual 2) through a city 3) while eating delicious bread dipped in some chocolate cream stuff.

Bosnian/Montenegran/Serbian/Croatian - which language is that?

***Back to BiH***

On our drive back through Bosnia, we marveled at Sutjeska National Park - beautiful mountains and rivers, a tumultuous past. We passed a little restautrant/hotel perched on the side of our favorite swimming river (the Drina) and couldn't help but stop there. It's called "Hotel Bavaria"and is owned by a really friendly Serbian guy and his wife from Bad Homburg - no kidding! We camped there for the night and had good conversations with them about the area, the wildlife, mushroom hunting, and the war.

Hiking through Sutjeska National Park proved to be challenging. I've seen maps marked with signs for swamps and mountain peaks and elk, but never land mines (marked here with skull and crossbones)! They are clearing the areas slowly, but we were advised to not step off the path.