Novi Sad to Belgrade

Europe » Serbia
July 18th 2009

Published: July 19th 2009

17 July 2009, Friday

Woke up very early this morning and showered and did some uni work. Packed my bag and hung around until 9am but when the hostel guy didn't show up I just left him a note to say I still had the key and my bags were there even though I had 'officially' checked out.

As I hadn't had a whole lot of a chance yesterday to look around beyond the pedestrianised area downtown, my first stop was supposed to be Petrovaradin Citadel. As per the instructions in the guide book, I got the number three bus but as I didn't know where to get off, I managed to go past it. Since I was already past it, I just decided to get the bus all the way to the end of the line and then return. Except I didn't want to look like I was lost, so I had to wait for the next bus. In the usual Amanda fashion when I got back onto the bus I missed my stop again. So I ended up back where I started, grabbed a cold drink, and then successfully found my way there. There was a small museum there which I went into, but basically I just went up to get some views of the town. Apparently the citadel was built between 1699 and 1780. The clock tower was probably the interesting part. What I did find interesting is that this piece of serbia's history is actually used to 'house' the Exit music festival which was held last week - and which from all accounts is fantastic and quite massive.

After the Citadel I wandered back to town and after grabbing a quick bite to eat I headed back to the hostel. I had planned on getting a 6pm bus out but ended up getting the 2pm. Like the bus from Subotica to Novi Sad, the Novi Sad to Belgrade was again painfully slow. What was supposed to be less than 2 hours took about 3. Again, the train was very old and in disrepair, slow and kept stopping for no apparent reason - all without air conditioning too!! Pleasant.

On arrival into Belgrade it was a nice easy stroll across the road to Downtown Belgrade - my home for the next three nights. The main common area was air conditioned which was the big bonus!! Although the rooms aren't which is a definte disadvantage. So I checked into a very messy room full of English people and then hung out for the next two hours or so just chilling. After that I headed out to grab food with one of the girls from the hostel and we went to a restaurant called ?. Yep - that's right, it's name was ? It is opposite Belgrade Cathedral and apparently the place used to be called Cathedral Tavern or something... at any rate, the church wasn't happy, asked for the name to be changed, and the owner changed it to ? to express his puzzlement. anyway it was a traditional Serbian restaurant and I ended up with what I thought was a Hungarian dish - beef goulash. Was quite nice though.

After that we went back to the hostel and chilled for the remainder of the evening.

18 JULY 2009, SATURDAY

Woke up incredibly early this morning because of the traffic outside. Had been disturbed at 4:30am initially when some people arrived home - and when I got woken up at around 6:30am, after trying to go back to sleep in a stinking hot room, I decided just to get up. So I showered and grabbed some food and eventually headed out a bit after 8:30am. Quite a few people had started to arrive early to check in and leave their bags (presumably on overnight trains) but basically no one else was actually awake.

First stop was the bus station across the road to buy my ticket to Sarajevo for Monday. After that it was a stroll uphill though Belgrade. The first 'sight' I saw were the two buildings that were bombed in 1999 by NATO and are still standing. Not sure why - and no one seems to know. Guess they like it as a reminder? It could be that because of the size of the buildings and the surrounding ones it is just too big a job to bother with, especially with the of the restoration that it happening around town. From there it was onto Nikola Pasic Square. The parliamant building was quite big and impressive, as was the telephone building which was surprising more than anything. While waiting for the tourist bus I sat in a nearby park called Piornirski Park for a while and did some people watching. When I was standing near the bus stop this man and woman started speaking to me in Serbian. Turned out the women (about 70 I would estimated) is from New York but of Serbian descent. It was the first time she had been back in 20 years, that's a long time to be away. She had spent the previous 10 days seeing 17 Serbian monastries - I am surprised she wasn't monastried out completely!!! She was out for the day in Belgrade with her nephew (by marriage) who spoke broken English and kept calling me Australian woman!! lovely. The tour went for about an hour and a half and took in most of the main sights which was very useful for me as it helped me get an idea of where everything was and how far apart everything was from each other.

After the tour I walked up through Republic Square and up the main pedestrian strip heading up to Kalemegdan fortress/ citadel. It was absolutely massive. Another good view of the Belgrade although it was very hot - nice breeze which did help. I spent a few hours up there wandering through the area and in the adjourning park before walking back past the Belgrade Cathedral where there appeared to be a Serbian wedding taking place. Funnily enough though it looked as if the bride was outside chatting to the guests - so I thought at first it mjst have been finished. But then all the guests walked into the cathedral and I didn't see what happened to her (despite the fact I was loitering outside looking suspicious). The Orthodox Church was right opposite so had a look there before getting incredibly lost on the way home (what a suprise!!). Ended up back at the hostel at around 5pm and had a shower.

The common room at the hostel is quite small as technically there are only 20 beds. The problem with this hostel (Downtown Belgrade) is primarily that because it is right across from the main international bus and train stations, that at any one time, there can be almost double the amount of people trying to squish into the common room as there should be. The common room comfortably holds 10 to 12, the kitchen another few and the balcony some more. When I was hanging around in the morning, between 7am and 8am about 6 or 7 people arrived. At 5pm that night, there were at least 6 people who had technically checked out making themself at home in the common area until their bus at 9pm. Was just mostly an inconvenience. So after a shower I found a spot for myself on the floor as they put Men in Black on and chilled in the air con for a while, watching some random 'Russia's got talent' (in Russian) after that finished as the acts were amusing by themselves even if none of us could understand a word of what was going on.

At about 8:30pm I headed out for dinner with a girl from the hostel. Headed up the main drag again and found a nice Italian-style restauarant where we ended up having pizza and a few drinks before it started pouring with rain at a bit before midnight. By that stage the buses/ trolley cars had stopped running so we had to walk back, but thankfully it was still relatively warm and the rain let up slightly, only to downpour again after we made it back to the hostel. There were quite a few people up and drinking and playing cards and chess in the common room and generally making a bit of noise, but after a while I just ended up going to bed and sleeping through it.

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