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Balkan Route

August 2017
  • annalovestraveling
A 21-day adventure by annalovestraveling Read more
  • annalovestraveling

List of countries

  • Italy Italy
  • Slovenia Slovenia
  • Croatia Croatia
  • Bosnia and Herzegovina Bosnia and Herzegovina
  • Hungary Hungary
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  • 1.4kkilometers traveled
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  • 24footprints
  • 21days
  • 130photos
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  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Another hell off a journey

    August 5, 2017 in Hungary ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    Yeah, a new trip!!! And another example that you are capable of a lot more thanyou think.
    Before I caught my flight to Budapest this morning at 8 a.m., I went to the goodbye party of a friend who will spend the next semester in China. That means that I had to take my luggage to the party and hope I wouldn't miss out on the right moment to leave in order to catch the train to the airport (which at night runs only once an hour). It also means that I would arrive in Budapest without having slept a minute to meet a friend who had already arrived the day before and thus was rather well rested.
    I will spare you the details about the number of transportation means I had to take that night, cancelled trains, Schienenersatzverkehr and a 1h queue at the baggage drop-off, but in sum it was quite a pain in the ass. Probably it was only because Pauline and I would have no more than two days I Budapest that I would manage to walk the whole town and even go out the same evening - but I made it 💪    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Budapest here we come

    August 6, 2017 in Hungary ⋅ ⛅ 30 °C

    Finally in Budapest, there was no slowing down. We were only going to have two days, so we started our sightseeing right away, walking around the touristy center and to Danube river. For lunch, we went to the central market hall, where we shared a huge Langós (a kind of deep-fried bread), then we continued to the other riverside. Despite the 38°C we managed to climb our way up to a view point. Afterwards, we went to the millennial monument, just to relax a bit in the Napozórét park it belongs to, and that has a beautiful Disney-like castle.
    Although tired, we didn't have much time for a power nap before we went to dinner in a stylish restaurant, trying some real Hungarian goulash soup and Chicken Paprikash. On our way to find a nice place to have a beer before going home, we found a pretty cool hostel in the pub area, where we met some people at the bar and ended up at a fun karaoke place.    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    War Stories

    August 7, 2017 in Bosnia and Herzegovina ⋅ ⛅ 21 °C

    I've now arrived to Sarajevo, which has quiet a unique charme. Although the historic center is well restored and bustling with restaurants, cafes, handicrafts and baklava stores, the second you turn into a side street you can't deny the presence of war reminders on every corner.
    During a walking tour, I was explained some details of the war (which however are still a bit confusing). In principle, after Bosnia and Herzegovina had sought independence from Yugoslavia, the Bosnian Serbs tried to split from the rest of the country (i.e. the Muslim Bosniaks and the orthodox Croats), which resulted in 44 months of war. The Serbs now have their own administrative level, and together with the national, regional and cantonwise administration levels Bosnia now has a lot more politicians than necessary for a country of 4 million people. Maybe that's why after more than 20 years the economy still is vastly affected by the war aftermath: there is just no way to efficiently organize a country on so many levels and in the presence of corruption.
    On the pictures I posted, there are some remainders of the war period: a Sarajevo Rose (in places where people have been killed by shell explosions, the impact point is filled with red paint), shell holes in a house wall and a memorial to the 160 children killed in the war.    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Olympic memories

    August 8, 2017 in Bosnia and Herzegovina ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    I didn't have very specific plans as to what to do today, so I joined Majo and Carla to the old bob sled that has been used for the Olympic winter games in 1984. It doesn't really look impressive at first sight, but imagining that it was actually used for Olympia is pretty weird, especially looking at it now.
    Also walking back the 6 km back to the hostel through the steep hills of Sarajevo was worth the trip, allowing for great views over the city. However, we were happy that we didn't also walk up there, because in addition to a hard ascent on a hot day we would probably have gotten lost.    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Sarajevo Historic Center

    August 9, 2017 in Bosnia and Herzegovina ⋅ ☀️ 36 °C

    On my last day in Sarajevo, I did another walking tour, this time trough the historic center and covering what happened before the war. From the ottoman founders over the communist Jugoslawien regime and the short Austrian-Hungarian period till the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, in between the orthodox and roman-catholic churches as well as countless mosques, Neno gave us a really good overview.
    You can still see many of the original influences: the whole town is full of baklava and Turkish silverware, not to start about all the covered-up women in the streets. Even the name of Sarajevo comes from the Turkish word for palace. After the war, Turkey and Greece donated money for the reconstruction of the mosques and orthodox churches, respectively.
    Although I'm slowly getting used to it, it keeps striking me not to understand a word of what is spoken. I tried to learn the most basic words in Serbian, but except for Hello and Thanks I wouldn't even know when to apply them... You kind of want to know what you say yes or no to.    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Mostar Impressions

    August 11, 2017 in Bosnia and Herzegovina ⋅ 🌬 36 °C

    The pictures here are a bit of a collection of different days in this micro town.
    The night shots are from my first evening, when I went up the “sniper tower“ with a couple of people. In reality it's an abandoned bank building that was used by snipers during the war. Nowadays, some tourists climb up the naked stairs to have a view from the rooftop. Entering this building that is covered in broken glass and fallen rocks at night by climbing over the walls, and especially imagining what happened here 20 years ago, was one of the creepiest experiences of my life, but definitely worth doing.
    The sandwich on the next picture is only one example for the delicious and creative breakfasts we got every morning at the hostel, individually prepared for each guest once they woke up.
    The rest are some images of the town on my last day, including the old bridge, where people jump 24 meters deep into the 7° cold Neretva river and a fountain at one of the mosques. I didn't really do much more this day, it was just way too hot. The 45° in combination with the tour the day before made me incredibly sleepy, such that I only walked around a bit and had some ice cream. Later, I met with the English guys for refreshing beer and dinner. It turned out that I should probably spend my whole life with only a few marks left in my pocket - I didn't spend a cent the whole day but lived in luxury, being paid more things than I'd even wanted.
    Then it was time to say goodbye to Bosnia. It may not be the country with most places to visit or the easiest accessibility, but it's absolutely worth going. Especially it's multi-ethnic character makes it very different from most countries I've seen so far - and I'll really miss the chanting prayers from the minarets at every corner.    Read more

  • annalovestravelingannalovestravelingBalkan Route

    Zagreb part I

    August 12, 2017 in Croatia ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    Due to a few problems with the length of her passport validity, Julia hadn't been able to meet me in Bosnia, so we changed our plans, skipped the anyways too touristy and expensive south of Croatia and met this morning in the capital Zagreb.
    We walked a bit around ourselves, then joined a free walking tour to the most important sights and ended the day with a Štrukli (reminds of a lasagne, but with much more cheese and not a lot of pastry) for dinner.    Read more

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