Day 48 Dubrovnik to Hvar

We were woken up a few times during the night to the sound of torrential rain but when we got up at 5.30am the sky was blue and it appeared as if it was going to be a beautiful day. We caught an Uber to the port to catch the 7am ferry to Hvar, an early start but the only other choice we had was 4.30pm.

We had originally thought we would island hop from Korcula to Hvar but when we did some research it sounded like Korcula was quite similar to other islands and as we have already seem quite a few in Greece we decided to go straight to Hvar.

The ferry was very nice and comfortable with huge windows but not long into the trip the rain started and when we stopped at Korcula en route it was very steady.

By the time we arrived in Hvar the rain had stopped, but not for long as it set in for the afternoon and was the coolest we had felt for a while.

Day 47 Dubrovnik

A search on the internet listed only one free walking tour and as it didn't have any reviews we doubted it existed, but we headed to the meeting place just in case. 

Once inside the walls the difference from last night was immediately noticeable, there were hordes of people, and it was already very hot. We joined a paid one hour walking tour that gave us some history, including the bombing in 1991. The guide said that even though the entire country lives and relies on the tourist income that comes in over summer even the locals believe there are too many cruise ships permitted and they would like the mayor to impose a limit. The tour was great and very interesting but the crowds were crushing so we headed back to our apartment with the idea of going back after 4pm as the guide said that's when the people from the cruise ships return to their boats. Dubrovnik has always been a popular tourist destination but Game of Thrones seems to have tipped it over the edge. 

While K relaxed in air-conditioned comfort, M went for a walk up the hill behind the town to see the views over the city.

We bought tickets to walk the wall which included admittance to Lovrijenic Fortress, which is known as the Red Keep on Game of Thrones. The amount of GOT tours with guides with photos pointing out all the filming places was huge, it's as if Dubrovnik wasn't important before GOT. 

We walked around the top of the walls and even after 5pm it was still warm and busy but at least it wasn't shoulder to shoulder traffic jams as during the day. Considering it cost €20 each just to walk the wall and that thousands must do it every day you have to wonder where that massive amount of money goes?

As has often been the case, we struggled to find anywhere smoke-free to stop for a drink or dinner as smoking is permitted inside as well as outside, and it seems that the majority of tourists smoke, very annoying for non-smokers like us!

Day 46 Sarajevo Bosnia & Herzegovina to Dubrovnik Croatia

We took the bus from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik and even though it is only a 4 hour drive by car it is over 6 hours by bus. We certainly took the long way around, doing the border crossing into Croatia at Metkovic and then going back into Bosnia and out again at the coastal strip near Neum.

Once we left Croatia and entered the narrow strip of Bosnian coastline we expected the bus would be on some type of Transit visa, where we would just travel through and back into Croatia on the other side but this was not the case. Although we didn't have to leave the bus we still had to formally enter Bosnia, and do the same thing at the Croatian border, all this took time with the police coming on the bus and checking, which seemed a little silly when no one had left or got on the bus and it was only 20 km from one border crossing to the other. We were later told that it isn't unusual for it to take hours as the traffic banks up along the entire 20 km strip.

Our accommodation in Dubrovnik was right outside the city walls and only a minute's walk to the Ploca Gate. As soon as we entered the old town around 6pm we were struck by the cleanliness and pristine condition of everything, it was like Kotor on steroids. There are many large beautiful churches and ornate doorways and arches, the number of people at this time seemed quite manageable and the lighting was very sympathetic giving it a beautiful atmosphere.

Day 45 Sarajevo

Our first visit for the day was to the Children's War Museum which showcased 50 items that children had kept from that period, including basic things like chocolate wrappers. There was a video of people now in their 30's telling their stories of what it was like living through such a long siege.

We then caught the newly reopened cable car up to one of the nearby mountains, from here you can walk down to the bobsled run that was built for the 1984 Winter Olympics. It was interesting walking around the curves of the now graffiti plastered concrete run, especially with its history of being used by the snipers during the war.

Sarajevo is a good example of Muslims, Catholics and Orthodox Christians living harmoniously together. Mostar however is a small city divided in half, neither the Bosnians or the Serbs are ready to forget and forgive yet so even the schools have staggered shifts so they don't have to mix with each other.

Day 44 Mostar to Sarajevo

The train ride from Mostar to Sarajevo is considered a highlight with beautiful scenery, the only downside being that it leaves at 6.45am. We arrived at the station at 6.15 surprised at how chilly it was, at 6.55 some type of announcement was made, not that we could understand it. Luckily there was another tourist who understood the local language and she explained to us that the train was delayed for about an hour. We all left the platform and went to the foyer area, we found a cafe and waited for an announcement. About an hour later we noticed that a lot of the people from the platform were standing out the front of the station facing the road looking like they were waiting for something. K tracked down the bilingual girl and asked her what was happening, she said the train wasn't coming as it had run over a person and they were arranging a bus for us, lucky we had noticed what was going on as we had been expecting an announcement. Not long after we followed others to a bus stop and an hour and a quarter after we were meant to have left we were on a bus to Sarajevo. We had been very close to being left behind, at least it wasn't as long as the 33 hours we waited for a delayed train in Africa.

The bus route followed the train line at some places so we still got to see the beautiful scenery. When we arrived in Sarajevo we had planned to take a taxi to our Airbnb, normally taxi drivers are hassling for your business but Sarajevo bus station must be one of the few bus stations in the world without taxis. Instead we hopped on a tram that stopped very close to where we were meant to be staying, the only problem was we couldn't find the apartment. After dragging our cases up and down the street while staring at the maps on our phones we gave up and went into a cafe for help. Not speaking Bosnian definitely made things tricky but the waiter and a customer managed to make a phone call for us and our host came and collected us. We weren't anywhere near the apartment, it was in the opposite direction!

To get to the old town from our apartment all we needed to do was walk across the bridge over the river, we wandered around for a couple of hours and then joined the afternoon walking tour. We had planned on joining the morning tour but missed it because of the train, the afternoon was based on the war and the siege of Sarajevo between 1992 and 1996.

Our guide was 7 when the siege  started and 10 when it finished so her recollections as a child living through it were very interesting and her lack of hatred for the Serbians that bombed  the city with shells and killed with sniper guns daily for three and a half years were insightful. She spoke about the appalling food that was supplied by the UN, tins of rotten spam type meat that were so putrid and full of worms they suspected they were left from WWII. They had worked out that there was rarely bombings in the mornings before 10am so the children would meet for school in an old pub from 7-9 and then be back in the basements of their homes by 10. Life had to continue and people still went to work even though there was no pay. She pointed out the footpaths we were walking on that were shell damaged that we hadn't even noticed along with the buildings. It was one of the better walking tours we have been on and for the rest of our time in Sarajevo we took more notice of the signs of war.

Day 43 Mostar

We went to pick up a hire car for the day and the girl in the office said she sees lots of young Australians visiting because of the comedy duo of Hamish and Andy. Apparently they jumped from the bridge on their TV show and as it was on YouTube that encouraged others to visit.

Our first stop was the Dervish monastery at Blagaj on the banks of a mini horseshoe waterfall which is a very pretty spot full of restaurants. 

We then drove onto Medugorje which is a Catholic pilgrimage spot complete with a statue of Jesus that weeps from the right knee. We did witness the weeping and the lines of people with folded paper soaking it up and kissing it.

We went via the Kravica waterfalls for lunch right on the edge of the lake and although it was very hot we didn't swim as we had read that even on hot days the water is freezing, we had braced ourselves for crowds and having to compete with tourist buses wherever we went but there weren't really crowds anywhere, it was all easy and manageable.

As we still had the car for the rest of the afternoon we decided to make use of it and drive to Neum which is the tiny strip of coastal land on the Dalmatian Coast that Croatia gave to Bosnia many years ago so it had access to the sea. What we hadn't banked on was the long windy drive through the mountains on a narrow, poorly maintained road with a few hard to follow detours as well. We finally arrived at Neum where you can see both borders, north and south to Croatia. We decided to find a better alternative route to go back, but as the only better route went through Croatia and we didn't have our passports with us we had no option but to take the mountain route back to Mostar.

When we arrived back into the old town the difference in tourist numbers was notable, where had everyone gone? When we asked we were told that today was an unusual day, it's not normal for Mostar to be this quiet at this time of year.

Day 42 Kotor Montenegro Kotor to Mostar Bosnia & Herzegovina

The direct route to Mostar didn't seem that far on Google Maps but our bus went the long way, stopping off at lots of small villages where no one got on or off. We finally arrived into the famous town of Mostar and were hit by the heat as we walked to the old town. There were very few locals around they were keeping out of the heat on a Sunday afternoon but the same couldn't be said for tourists. There were swarms of them, travelling in large groups clogging up all the small alleyways, all there to see the iconic stone bridge. There were locals on the bridge offering to jump if you paid them, unfortunately we didn't see anyone jumping.

Later in the evening the crowds thinned out as the day trippers headed back to Dubrovnik while we did a little more sightseeing.

Day 41 Kotor

M rose early to beat the heat, the crowds and the entrance fee to walk to the castle of San Giovanni above the town, K declined preferring to catch up on some sleep.

M returned with the sad news that today there were two huge cruise liners is town and we could already hear the difference in the crowd noise from inside our apartment. We decided to escape the crowds again and went to the bus station to get the bus to Budva about half an hour away. We arrived at the bus station to be told the road was closed and probably would be for another hour. It was only then we noticed that there wasn't the normal bumper to bumper traffic, in fact there was no traffic, The normally busy port street had become a pedestrian mall, we did wonder why there wasn't a sign at the entrance to the bus station informing everyone rather than only finding out when it was your turn at the ticket window. We walked back around the outside of the old town and crossed the river to the other side, here we saw that there were police manning the roads and all local drivers were being stopped and told to park their cars. Then we saw motorbikes and lead cars coming down the hill past us followed by men on bikes going incredibly fast, a bit later there were more police motorbikes and the  a large group of riders followed by some stragglers. The fact that this bike race would have been organised well in advance to close roads made it even more strange there wasn't any signage here or anywhere. The drivers on the side roads had given up and left their cars parked in the middle of the road, we decided to grab some lunch at a cute beach spot and wait until the road returned to normal.

After a nice lunch we finally caught the bus to Budva where we had considered staying at one stage instead of Kotor. Budva is very different to Kotor, a larger marina for pleasure boats but no cruise ships. The buildings were more highrise and the old town not nearly  as nice as Kotor so we were happy with our choice. They did have a strip of a rock beach and then another slightly better beach strip which was more popular, but that was about it, it wasn't as charming as Kotor.

Day 40 Kotor

Apparently Kotor was largely off the tourist hub until it was featured as a place of the year a few years ago. This morning we were out and about before the passengers arrived from the new cruise ship that had arrived into port over night. We went to the bakery to try and get some coffee and breakfast but were met with a lack of interest once again. 

We went to the bus stop with the idea of catching the first bus that was leaving in either coastal direction (north or south) and the first choice was to Herceg Novi so we hopped on. It was a lovely coastal trip for an hour passing small islands in the middle of the bay, they seemed to be in pairs, The one with more height and trees would be a church and the flatter more barren island would have a mosque. How did they make the decision on which religion would have which island?

The bus dropped us off at the top of a hill in Herceg Novi and we followed the cobbled path down past the obligatory fortress and stone wall to the promenade. The beaches were narrow strips of pebbles and as we walked along we heard another tourist incredulously question a cafe waiter, no food?! We smiled as we knew how he felt, how can it be that place after place that look like they are cafes and restaurants only serve drinks, do locals not eat, or is that they don't eat out?

There was one restaurant with a menu that we would consider more for dinner than lunch and then we did find the one and only cafe on the stretch that sold food. Herceg Novi was so quiet, there was barely a tourist around, maybe the harbour isn't deep enough for the cruise ships.

By the time arrived back into Kotor at 5pm the crowds were thinning for the evening and we did some grocery shopping for a home cooked meal, our first real cooked meal, excluding noodles (I don't think they count).

Day 39 Tirana Albania to Kotor Montenegro

The bus to Kotor was leaving at 8am but luckily it was only a five minute walk from our accommodation. The bus backtracked via Shkoder where we had been yesterday, and collected an English couple we had met on the ferry a couple of days before. The border crossings were taken care of by the driver and the police coming onto the bus, it was very easy for us, they were only interested in the Albanians, questioning them on how much money they had. Our bus driver spent a lot of time on his mobile even though there was a sign on his window of a mobile with a red cross through it.

When we eventually reached Kotor it was an easy walk from the bus station through the arched gate into the walled old town, then up a few stone steps to our cute Airbnb apartment. The apartment was on two levels and very authentic with the old stone work right down to the musty smell, we are happy that we have a washing machine, which was an important filter for us.

Kotor is amazing, its all old stone, cobbled roads, walls, shops, accommodation and no motorised traffic inside the city walls. We turned a corner and found ourselves in a square with hordes of tour groups, and a cruise ship could be seen out the gate. Just as we were despairing at the crowds there was a mass exodus and by about 4pm there was only a sprinkling of people left. 

We found a bar on one of the many squares but once again experienced the total lack of interest in us or serving us that has dogged us throughout most of this trip, don't think we will ever complain about service in Melbourne again. We moved on pretty fast and purely by accident came across a tiny little hole in the wall, we were served cheap drinks by an old man on a cute street, this was more our style.