Adventurous Balkans – or the difficulties of traveling ecologically through the former Yugoslavian Republics
wHave you ever returned more exhausted from a journey than when you started it? Filled with new impressions and memories and tired from two weeks of sitting in busses and trains, hauling around the backpack and changing accommodation, it is time now to reflect on some of the lessons learned during the trip.
Ljubljana – Eastern-Europe’s disneyland
The journey started in Ljubljana – a city that has more and more turned into a Disneyland version of a medieval town. Beautifully lingering between lush green hills it features a thick-walled castle overlooking a newly-renovated old city, coffee-bars and tourists everywhere.
With the Euro as its official currency, Slovenia feels much like a Western-European country. Prices have risen moderately in the last couple of years. Following the hint of the Lonely Planet, the choice for sleeping became the Hostel Celicia, a former prison turned into a burlesque youth hostel. The atmosphere was matched by the prices: 23 Euros for a bed in a heated four-bed-room.
This prompted the decision to switch to the Dijaski Dom Tabor Hostel for the second night in Ljubljana which offered dorm beds for 10 euros, with Portuguese, Koreans and Germans sharing a former class room. The night was quite uncomfortable due to the lack of pillow and blanket.
Luckily the earlier trip to Lake Bled had provided enough activities to allow a sound sleep. Lake Bled is a blue, lucid lake about two hours north of Ljubljana. Surrounded by sylvan hills and a church on an island in the middle of a lake, it is a perfect spot to escape the city – even though escaping the flow of tourists from Austria is less likely.
Croatias problem with ecotourism
To use the train route less traveled, Rijeka and not Zagreb was put on the compass the following morning. Rijeka is a small city at the Croatian Adriatic Coast. As the Lonely Planet writes, it’s simply a hub for backpackers to travel south.
It is advisable to spare yourself the long bus trip down the Croatian coast. There are no train connections, bus prices are comparably high. Travelers are charged a fee for reserving seats – but this does not mean that you can actually sit in a seat. If the bus is full, then seating is assigned on a first-come-first-serve-basis. The bus driver prohibits heavy luggage on board, but charges an extra fee for storage in the trunk. Busses move at a slow pace from town, while the bus driver steers, chats with the passengers, controls tickets and speaks on the phone – all at the same time.
It is also advisable to skip most of the islands and cities on the Adriatic coast between Rijeka and Split. The island Krk, for example, used to be a nice hold-out with large stretches of rocky beaches, now it is horded by tourists and mass camping sites. Hostels are charging a surplus-fee of 30% on top of the high prices if you stay less than three days, combined with a minimal breakfast, run-down showers and crampy rooms. With the money paid in a laundry-place you could buy a washing machine in other countries. Sun glasses from China are offered at the price of a China round-trip. The city of Krk (pronounced Kirk) offers a medieval atmosphere, but also features tourist traps like a summer ice-skating arena (certainly not reducing the impact of tourism on climate change).
Croatia’s big challenge of the next decade will be to minimize its ecological footprint. Despite vast natural resources – sun and wind – it’s relying heavily on fossil fuels for transport and energy. Croatia needs to find its way of balancing tourism and preservation of its wild environment. In many coastal towns, swimmers and yachts share the same waters – not necessarily a precondition for clear water.
The streets at the coast are heavily filled with traffic going both sides. With the coastal line meandering back and forth, often large detours have to be made in order to travel short distance. For instance near Kraljevica a bridge of 500 meters could easily help avoid driving 10 km around the bay and save enormous CO2-emissions by trucks, busses and private cars.
It is maybe more advisable to take the overnight-ferry from Rijeka to Split, but plan ahead because the ferry only leaves twice a week and otherwise you will have a nine-hour bus-ride on your back when arriving in Split.
The Crowded Planet
It helps to listen not too closely to the Lonely Planet. With almost every backpacker owning a copy, the guidebook should be renamed the Crowded Planet. Hostel recommendations by the guide book lead to full hostels along the way. Fortunately there are plenty of other accommodations. In Split a cheaper hostel with close access to the old city can be found easily – even though the hostel of choice might force the guest to provide themselves a clean table before being able to eat.
The old city is surely worthwhile to visit, but can stand no comparison to the old city of Dubrovnik further south. It’s still a ride of five hours, but with luck and the permission of the bus-driver it is possible to jump in the front-seat, watch the dramatic landscape unfold itself in front of your eyes and pay only half-price at the end.
In Dubrovnik, just like in every other city, plenty of women usually wait at the bus station to offer private accommodation. With luck it was possible to acquire a two-bed-apartment not far from Lapad beach – perfect for sun-bathing, long sleeps, self-made morning bacon.
Dubrovnik as a city is astonishing. Despite heavy damage in the Civil War, the city boasts with a culture of two thousand years, heavy fortresses, marble pavements, fish-restaurants at every corner. If you endeavor to walk the steep steps up to the outer city walls, you might even find a small pub named Buza sitting on the cliffs.
Border craziness
Dubrovnik is nowadays surrounded by international borders. From Split to Dubrovnik you enter and exit the small Bosnian Corridor, and south of Dubrovnik the Montenegrin border waits. Border control takes time but is often surprisingly relaxed. Often the guards did not even look into our passports; the EU-twelve-stars seemed to provide ample pass-through.
Given the superficial border regimes, the mere existence of these borders is dubitable. For political reasons, borders might convey some sense of national identity, but for most of the population they merely a nuisance and surely an obstacle for economic growth. For instance, from Dubrovnik only two daily busses shuttle to Herceg Novi in Montenegro, even though the city is practically around the corner from Dubrovnik.
Things you didn’t know about Montenegro
A small fisher-town turned holiday-super-tourism center, Herceg Novi features large hotel sites. But the old city is picturesque and prices in Montenegro are very low: Cappuccino for a few cents or a ‘Cheeseburger’ (a flat disc of grind meat covered with a slice of cheese) little more than a Euro.
It is worthwhile to look further down the coast. Kotor is a wonderful choice. Nested between large mountains in a fjord filled by the Mediterranean, overlooked by a castle on the top, it is a small city that was worth staying a little longer.
The accommodation, found after waiting a few minutes at the bus station and being approached by a middle-aged woman, was very peculiar. Ten minutes on foot away a family provided their living room for sleeping and some freshly-harvested grapes from their garden for eating. At night the water supply was turned off (probably to save water), but the garden featured a shower fed by rain-water. The bed made its own noises at night, the husband looked like Martin Walser and it turned out that the whole family had recently migrated from Dubrovnik to Kotor. These kinds of stories you can find all over Montenegro when you simply choose private rooms instead of going to a hostel.
Sitting in bus all day is burdensome, but individual transport is even harder to organize – unless it’s motorized. A few cyclists went up and down the mountains of Montenegro, but given the reckless driving of the car- and bus-drivers they needed to focus on their own safety instead of enjoying the breath-taking landscape.
Almost all young Montenegrins use small scooters, but it takes a fair amount of time to travel at 20 km per hour between the cities. For foreigners it might be an option to rent one of these scooters. They can profit from the relaxed attitude of Montenegro police to foreigners and the incredibly low gas price.
Budva, one of the possible destinations of such a journey, is just like Herceg Novi a touristy beach-town with a lively old part. However, not far from the city small bays open up which allow secluded, even nude, swimming. Until, of course, a horde of Italian tourists enter the bay on their speedboats, smoke puffs which end up in the ocean and listen to Eros Ramazotti at thunderous noise levels.
At night you might devour a favorite dish of the region: Palatschinken with all kinds of fats: cream, cheese, dough, meat, mushrooms. Yummy but a stress signal for your arteries.
This kind of food together with the warm weather, the hot sun and the salty beach water will help you sleep soundly – which is a good thing if you want to go travel further and need to get up early. In fact, traveling across the Balkans surely will make you an early bird since often the only long-distance train and bus connections are at six or seven in the morning.
From Kotor, there are good connections to Belgrade, but in order to travel to Mostar, the next destination, it is necessary to stop again in Dubrovnik and then endure long waits at the various borders.
Rebuilding cities
Mostar however reimburses the wary traveler with unforgettable experiences. Firstly, hospitality: great rooms including washing services and shuttle to and from the train station (in the morning even in a night-gown) provided in a private accommodation. Secondly, newly-renovated houses adjacent to ruins of bombed buildings. The famous Mostar Bridge is restored and dares young people to jump into the swirling river beneath. The old city’s pebble stones lead the traveler into small coffee houses. Leave the Lonely Planet in your bag, its maps are useless and just find your own path through the city.
The same advice can be said for Sarajevo. The train-ride from Mostar to Sarajevo is half as spectacular as its description in the guide book. And the city council of Sarajevo publishes a small leaflet explaining the sights which is much more useful than the Lonely Planet. And the prices are sometimes far from accurate, even up to twice as high as written in the book. It is far better to approach one of the many agencies for private rooms – even if you end up with an easy-angered host who shouts at you for asking how far the old city is.
Don’t worry, stay calm, he’ll turn nice once you paid. Then there is plenty of time to drink Turkish coffee in the Turkish quarter out of brass stoves containing hot water engrafted with coffee powder. Please avoid eating Cevapi – all tourists do it and the smoke from the grills sits on the city. Visit the tiny city museum of Sarajevo (one room) or delight yourself at the ‘To be or not to be’ – a well-priced restaurant visited before by Hillary Clinton and other celebrities. Wonder about the US Army driving around in Jeeps in the city, with all lights blinking and waiting in front of liquor shops. Buy cheap sunglasses. Drink Frappuccino and watch the shoppers until late at night. Observe flocks of fishes trying to go upstream in the Miljacka-River.
Go to bed at a decent time in the morning to catch the first train to Budapest (the overnight train unfortunately was cancelled) which takes only 12 hours that you can easily sustain if you don’t need a clean toilet with toilet paper.
Hungarian lifestyle
It is a fine luck of life to have relatives in Hungary. A comfortable bed, long talks, Hungarian food, funny beers, the working style of construction workers and other insights into the Hungarian lifestyle emerged. Cooling down at one of the public fountains is a great experience, far better than searching for a public bath and then discovering that the only available ticket is a monthly one for 20 euros.
The time in Hungary went by incredibly fast – too fast! But after two weeks on the road, the traveler’s fatigue started to kick in and only little touristy attention could be given to stops like Bratislava or Prague – although it was nice to have a safe haven with a friend in Prague before the last leg to Berlin.
And finally the lessons learned: it is worth going south in this part of Europe. Traveling could be made much easier if the transport infrastructure would be improved. Even if you try to travel ecologically, budget traveling forces you on busses – including all the necessities of buying plastic bottles to fight the thirst. But the memories from these travels will last a lifetime and maybe help you to appreciate the complex history of the Balkans more.
Februar 8th, 2010 at 17:10
Great blog! I’d be interested to know your thoughts on hitchhiking around the region.