Judeţul Timiş

The trip from Bucharest, Romania to Belgrade, Serbia was supposed to be one day, but ended up as 2 because of train delays. It managed to be both tedious and interesting at the same time. Tedious, because of the long days and the hot train car that ran over 2 hours late. Interesting because there were no trains or buses going from our part of Romania to Serbia, and we didn't have a solid plan to cross the border.

We decided to get as close to the Serbian border as we could by train, (we have Eurail passes, so train is always the first option), then figure out some way to cross the border (we literally considered walking) and get to the nearest Serbian train station that would take us to Belgrade. I suppose we could have just swam across the Danube River, but we weren't too keen on that option.

As usual, our journey was made more enjoyable by our travelmates, in this case a Serbian guy who chatted us up about our trip and about life in Romania, and made a few phone calls from the train to see if he could help us find a way to reach our destination. No luck though.

We arrived at our final Romania train station at Stamora Moravita (see pic). Now to cross the border.

There was no real town there, and hardly a station. Certainly no ubers or buses or taxis. There we stood, wondering what to do, when a local old guy with a limp approached us about giving us a ride across the border. He spoke no English (we speak no Romanian), but somehow he & Craig (without using the translation app) came to agreement on services and pricing, and we loaded our stuff and climbed into his dirty, banged up old Audi. The first thing I noticed was that the engine light and the oil light were lit up on his dashboard, along with a third light I couldn't identify. Well, we don't have a lot of options, so, off we went on a wing and a prayer!

As they say, all's well that ends well. Our driver spoke to both the Romanian and Serbian border guards on our behalf, (something tells me he's an old pro at this), and we cruised through to the Serbian train station unscathed.

We spent only a day in Belgrade, and my short experience there left me unimpressed, and somewhat ambivalent about the city. Maybe we didn't see the best parts? Maybe we just went through it too quickly. Anyway, a few pix attached.Read more