Advertisement
Published: September 25th 2007
The Cathedral
Photo From Zagreb, CroatiaYugoslavia, Croatia, Serbia, Kosovo…these are all words that evoke, at least in the mind of the common American, the thought of war and ethnic cleansing. When mentioned in common speech, people tend to look at you like you are slightly crazy. To say, “Yeah, I’m going to Croatia for vacation next week,” people tend to think you’ve gone off your rocker.
There is pretty simple reasoning behind this concern from friends and family: people know very little about this part of the world other than the conflict that occurred here in the nineties. After the fall of communism in the region, Yugoslavia found itself in an odd position. As a loose grouping of six different republics with multiple ethnic groups and multiple languages, it was tough to see what the future would hold. Some, namely the Serbs, wanted to remain united, while others like the Slovenians and Croatians wanted independence. As is often our way as human beings, resolution was only found after much blood shed. After Slovenia and Croatia declared independence, Serbia sent the (then) Yugoslavian Army in to restore order and quell rebellion. Not a successful approach. After more
Bay of Kotor
Photo From Montenegro than five years of fighting and atrocities, namely mass killings, committed on both sides, Croatia became its own country.
Now, years later, countries are still breaking away from the pack to declare independence. While Slovenia, Croatia and Albania all became independent during the 1990’s, little Montenegro, southern cousin and the only sea port of Serbia became independent from its big brother near the end of last year. The only disputed area/country left as part of another is Kosovo which is still presently part of Serbia.
A Brief Stop for Sight Seeing I was interested in this part of the world from very early on in our journey. Montenegro, Europe’s newest country, has done a fabulous job of advertising itself on the European stage. Throughout Europe, Germany in particular, Montenegro has launched a huge TV campaign to drum up business. After seeing a few of these ads, I started jumping up and down to get here. Kel, being the kind person she is, gave in to my whims and found a way for us to have two weeks to drive around what used to be Yugoslavia.
Despite its proximity to Greece, it seems that Croatia
Josip Jelacic
Photo From Zagreb, Croatia is actually pretty difficult to get to, at least on short notice. Trains are out because, to get to Croatia you must travel through Albania which has a miserable train system and is really not worth traveling through, at least it’s not worth it given the time we have. Thus, we were left with planes, none of which go directly from Athens to Dubrovnik, Croatia, where we really wanted to start our journey. Instead, we found ourselves taking a flight over Croatia to Munich and then back to Croatia’s capital city of Zagreb.
We spent exactly one night in Zagreb which turned out to be just about enough time. We took about an hour and half walking through Zagreb’s old town which gave us ample time to see “The Cathedral” and many of the other old buildings and squares. As we finished our exploration, we stopped and had pizza in a nearby restaurant.
As yet another cultural sidebar, we had a lot of fun watching the local football (soccer for us Americans) fans battle it out with the visiting Estonians. More than the game itself, the ability to watch the fans face off in the main downtown square
Bay of Kotor
Photo From Montenegro was the interesting part. We arrived in town, just as tons of fans tried to catch the trams from the square to the game. Fully decked out in their national team’s garb, each group of fans whistled and yelled as they gave each other wide berth while trying to catch a ride to the game. We don’t really have any fan spectacles like it in the US, my best guess to closeness is an NFL tailgate or Division 1 college clash prior to a big game.
Back on the Road The next morning we got ourselves out of bed as early as we could for the long drive to Dubrovnik in the far south west of Croatia. While much of the country is covered by a brand new and beautiful superhighway, which goes from Zagreb to Split, the rest of the trip sticks to old country roads. Thus, we covered the distance from Zagreb to Split at a pretty good pace. Unfortunately, the trip from Split to Dubrovnik is a much slower going stretch with small, twisty roads with max speeds around 50kph. Needless to say, when we arrived in Dubrovnik late that afternoon, Kel and
The Cathedral
Photo From Zagreb, Croatia I were both exhausted.
We checked into our hotel, the only one we could get reservations at on short notice. This area, while starting to slow down a bit, is still teeming with tourists and tour groups in particular. Seems that older Americans have really found a love affair with Eastern European tours which start or end in this part of the world. As we entered our hotel, there were Americans in their sixties/seventies as far as the eye could see. Fun!!
Since we were so tired the first night we pretty much just caught some dinner and went to bed. Our plan was to wake up early on Monday for a drive to Montenegro to see the rugged Bay of Kotor.
The Bay of Kotor and Back If you are already getting used to driving long distances, you might as well continue the trend. Thus, after a decent breakfast in the hotel, we set off in our little Peugeot 207 hatchback and drove for Montenegro.
Dubrovnik is only about an hour away from the border, but that hour of driving is pretty hairy on a Monday morning. With people commuting to work
Bay of Kotor
Photo From Montenegro and tour groups heading for day trips in the hills, you have to be on your toes as you drive through some of the twistiest Cliffside roads in the world (not as bad as the Road to Hana in Hawaii but pretty close).
We’ve certainly noticed a disturbing trend at immigration checkpoints during our year abroad. It seems that anyone who isn’t from the big five or so Western countries gets a serious grilling at the borders while we, from the big boy countries, get barely looked at twice. We practically skated through immigration like it was no big deal while others had to get out of their cars, have their cars searched amongst other embarrassing practices. I’m happy that we get off so easy but it does seem a bit unfair that its so easy for us while others have to suffer.
After our cursory check at the border it took maybe 45 minutes to get to the absolutely stunning bay/fjord. With Tuscan style villages bordering clear azure water surrounded by huge, beautiful mountains, the Bay of Kotor is a stunning natural masterpiece. The only thing that has the least negative effect on the beauty are the
Zagreb From Above
Photo From Zagreb, Croatia incredibly narrow roads and scary cliff side, death defying driving moments. More than once I was sure our car was going to be destroyed by on coming traffic. Thankfully my worrying was undeserved.
We drove around the Bay for most of the morning and early afternoon before heading back to whence we came. We would have loved to spend more time in the actual town of Kotor but were unable to find parking and had to fight serious traffic to even get out of town. After about twenty-five minutes of negotiating through bumper to bumper traffic we continued around the bay to the ferry terminal for a quick trip back to our starting point.
All in all, the day was a good one and definitely a trip I would recommend to anyone who has some time in the area. From what I understand there are definitely more places in Montenegro that are beautiful but we just don’t have the time for more exploration. From here we are off to see Mostar in Bosnia before heading to Split for a few days of relaxation. Hope everyone is doing fabulously at home!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.104s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 7; qc: 36; dbt: 0.0561s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Schiller
non-member comment
Hola!
Just a quick hello. Glad that all appears to be going well in Eastern Europe (or wherever you have landed by now). The pics of the mountains made me jealous - they appear cool and refreshing at a time when I have about maxed out on heat and humidity. Take care.