I believe that no one can regard themselves
as ‘backpacking’ unless they have had to rough it in one way or another at some
point in their travels. For me, this was a true backpacking experience and one
that will stick with us for a long time. It’s not that it was bad, nor was
‘hectic’ and it definitely wasn’t the most enjoyable time. Lets just say it
was….unforgettable as not many people could have been bothered to do as we
did.
We had just disembarked from the Sail
Croatia and said farewell to the girls for a few days as they jet setted off to
Athens and onto the Greek Islands where we would meet them in a few days. You
see they flew to Athens but we didn’t quite have the 250 euro that the airlines
were asking and being on a budget decided to get the bus down to Athens, via
the wonderful country they call Bosnia.
We began this slow and scenic route with an
overnight stop off in Mostar, Bosnia. This place is beautiful and anyone who is
travelling in Croatia or surrounding countries should take the time to even do
a day trip here, as there is much beauty to such a war-torn area. Everything
about the place oozes with history, their struggles and most of all their
triumphs of the past. As you walk through this small town you can only imagine
what it would have been like during the fall of Yugoslavia and are reminded of
such struggle when you walk past the numerous half dilapidated buildings as
well as those which still remain, scarred with the bullet holes of the past.
The highlight to anyones trip to Mostar is
dominated by the visit to their bridge, Stari Most which is famous for two
specific reasons 1) the destruction and reconstruction of it in the 1990’s and
2) the crazy people who dare to dive off it. As we reached the bridge you
couldn’t help but feel a little sentimental. It’s hard to explain but it’s
almost as if you felt for them, for losing this bridge, as though you
understood how much it meant to them. We found a spot to have lunch and were
determined to witness someone jump, which was almost guaranteed as we were told
that at least one person jumps every day as plenty of the locals liked to show
off and many silly tourists attempt such a thing.
As we walked over the bridge, which is only
used by pedestrians, I even got nervous to look down. The 20m distance between
us and the water seemed much more as you popped your head over the edge and I
couldn’t even imagine how I would feel standing up their ready to jump. Whilst
the water below is rather deep, being so clear around the edges made it look so
shallow and scary. We headed over to the souvenir shop and admired the
photographs on display of the moments that the bridge was destroyed as well as
the reconstruction of it. They also have a video that showed footage of this
and even though you weren’t supposed to take photos I couldn’t help but record
it (will post video shortly as wifi is terrible to upload). This was so moving and made me want to learn so much more about
it but the free museum was shut so I had to opt for either a book, which was
too expensive and couldn’t lug around or Wikipedia, which I have to trust.
Either way I wanted to know more and promised myself to do so.
From what I gathered (much from Wikipedia)
this bridge, before being bombed apart, had stood for 427 years and was a key
transportation system for the town. In 1993, the Croatian Defence Council
attacked the bridge with tank fire. It is reported that more than 60 shells hit
the bridge before it collapsed. Why was it bombed? No one is really sure what
the true reason was. It was claimed to be a ‘strategic move’ and dubbed as an
example of deliberate cultural property destruction yet many refer to it as
“killing memory” and that is the sort of thing you feel when you visit this
bridge. After the war many countries provided aid to help with the
reconstruction of this bridge. Looking at photos it looks exactly the same as
before and this is because their intentions were to build a bridge as similar
as possible, using the same technology and materials. It took 3 years and in
July 2004 it was finally complete, a huge party was held and what better way
for them to celebrate than having someone dive off it.
We headed down to the river below and
Danielle braved the icy water whilst Toma and I watched and after seeing
Danielle’s reactions Nat decided to give it a miss. We were in luck as well as
a local was standing on the ledge ready to dive. He sure took his time too,
creating a show, sending a hat around for money and geeing us all up at times
but he eventually did it once the crowds grew strong and it was all over in a
matter of seconds (see video below). People have been diving off this bridge
since the 1600’s and there is a lot more to it than simply standing over the
ledge and diving. To do this you first need to become a member of the diving
club and then go through a whole training schedule of preparing for the cold
water, diving off the practice jump, perfecting that dive so as to not harm
yourself upon entry into the water and then finally completing the dive from
the bridge. This is a big deal to them; part of their history and heritage, a
tradition for any young Bosnian man as they come of age.
Our time in Mostar was up and even though I
could have stayed longer, Athens was calling and we were still so far from it.
We had been told various things about busing it down to Athens, many telling us
that it is quite complicated and involving numerous different buses etc. We
were also about to put use to our accessory for the final time before we left
the Yugoslavic countries and entered Greece, a world away from Natalie’s culture.
Getting tickets to our first destination wouldn’t have been so hard if we
didn’t have such a difficult lady behind the desk, shooing us out of the line 2
times and making us re-line up. We were about to cross two different countries
and had no local currencies so paying in euro made things the slightest more
difficult as they always wanted to give change in local currency and
conversions became a little confusing at times.
The first bus to Ulcinj, Montenegro was an
overnighter, not so bad but it was only about to get worse. From here we
progressed into Albania. Out intention was to get to Tirana and from here find
it easier to reach Athens but it wasn’t going to be that simple. We first had
to go to Shkoder then get in a mini bus to Tirana. We almost died a few times
as we narrowly missed other cars and vechiles in order to pick other
‘passengers’ up but we finally made it to Tirana. Our journey thus far had been
pretty smooth, each different bus/car arriving and leaving in succession
meaning there was minimal waiting times but it all felt a bit dodgy up to here
and we couldn’t help but ring home on our 5 hour stop over in Albania…. you
know just incase we do like the movie and get TAKEN. All was fine and we
overstayed our welcome in the café, forcing us to move to the bus station for
our final, 15-hour ride to Athens. This was horrible, we tried to sleep as much
as we could but were constantly woken up for border control and passport
showings, even having to get off and enter Greece once we finally made it.
After almost 30 hours we finally arrived in
Athens at 5:30am, quickly sought our hostel and fell asleep in the common room
as check in wasn’t until 2pm. Almost two days in the same clothes, furry teeth,
smelly underarms and very very tired eyes (yes my Asian eyes were in full prime
here) we finally made it! Was it all worth it? HELL YES! Definitely worth it
for our pockets too, costing us only 75 euro each since we left Dubrovnik. Ready
for Greece to rape our wallets though …stay tuned for the Greek Island
adventures.
A local diving off the bridge
Snippet of footage shown in the museum
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