The Balkans, Part Three - Travel 2018

Before 2025, our last trip to the Balkan Peninsula was in 2018. Robin and I visited Rome, Naples, Pompeii, and the Amalfi coast, flew to Palermo and drove around Sicily then to the southern Italian port of Brindisi.  There we caught the ferry to Corfu to rendezvous with travel companions Kate and Aaron for our trip to Albania. After a day revisiting the island we took another ferry to the port and resort city of Sarande on the southern coast of Albania. We typically like to stay off-the-beaten-path and therefore drove north about an hour and a half to the small hamlet of Himare and our AirBnB. 

Looking back to Sarande on drive north

Guided to our apartment we all thought we made a terrible mistake. We dragged our roller boards uphill over stone rubble and between the remnants of what was once a castle or fort thinking it impossible there could be a habitable place tucked in here. And yet, we came to a door and entered our lovely apartment overlooking the hillside where goatherds grazed their animals on the slope below and we looked to the sea.

Looking up to our unit on left and the ruins above we walked through

Looking down from our unit to goats grazing and sea beyond

Albania was originally home of the Illyrians; an ancient and important collection of tribes in the western Balkan peninsula extending well into today's existing neighbors. 

Ancient extent of the Illyrian tribes

They co-existed with their Greek and Thracian neighbors until conquered by the Romans and then were absorbed by invading Slavs who crossed the Danube. In the eighth century they disappeared from history.  

Slavic migration to the Balkans

After the great schism of the eleventh century, which split western Roman Catholic from Eastern Orthodox, Albania was on the dividing line and split north and south religiously. After the fall of Constantinople the Ottoman Empire continued to expand well into Europe. The Christian occupants were continually marginalized and heavily taxed. Many converted to Islam to survive financially.  Thus is the way of conversion.

Extent of Ottoman Empire

Early in the twentieth century, prior to WWI, Albania declared their independence from the Ottoman Empire, the "sick man of Europe", and began a series of Republics. During WWII they were invaded by both the Italians and the Germans. However, before the end of the war a communist group led by Enver Hoxha liberated Albania from the Germans. While the northern Balkan countries were unified under Tito into Yugoslavia, Albania retained their independence. However, Hoxha a Marxist/Leninist authoritarian leader tried to build economic alliances with other communist countries; first with Yugoslavia, then retreated when Tito wanted to incorporate them, then with the Soviet Union but disagreed with their policies, and finally with China but didn't want to be a dependent state. Albania became the first constitutionally atheist state. The authorities began public executions of both christians and muslims, taking their religious property and demanding renouncement of their faiths.

During the cold war Hoxha became increasingly paranoid of being invaded by the west and built defensive pill-boxes up and down the coast to repel an invasion that never came.

Mushroom pill boxes along the coast of Albania

After the fall of the Soviet Union the then President of Albania supported a corrupt Ponzi scheme to fund his cronies.  Many citizens sold their houses and invested any savings into the account. It all collapsed in the mid 90s. The leadership was forced to resign and a UN peacekeeping force entered to prevent a civil war. After the communist party fell, Albania moved in fits and starts towards westernization and NATO membership.

Today the country is on the road to being a tourist destination. Our daughter Teigan and friend went to Albania several years after us. They are young and went to a popular resort town along the coast that did not exist only six years before. Jared Kushner is planning a mega resort just north of Himare in a remote beautiful nature area. The beautiful country is being developed.  Good for their economy, but another paradise lost.  

From Himare we drove inland and continually north through Butrint, a Greek then Roman City, and Berat with its "thousand windows", a remnant of the Ottoman period, both UNESCO sites.  

Greek ruins in Butrint with bull relief carved on lintel

Bust of Slavic leader

Robin and Bill on overlook in Berat

Ottoman era of "a thousand windows" in Berat

From southern Albania we continued north to Durres on the coast, the beginning of the Via Egnatia, which connects the Via Appia from Rome to the Italian coast, through the Balkans to Constantinople. We will encounter this important Roman highway on our most recent trip.  

Sun setting over the Adriatic and Italy in Durres

Map of Via Egnatia

We ended our trip in northern Albania to hike the Accursed Mountains at the southern end of the Dinaric Alps. They are aptly named.  Fortunately, our driver had a four wheel vehicle as none of us had been on a more rugged and remote road.  We explored the mountains for three days in a high alpine lodge.  

Dinaric Alps

Other visitors crossing stream at waterfall

Aaron, guide, Kate and Robin at mountain lodging

From the northern border town of Shkodra we departed our friends.  They traveled to Montenegro while we flew to Belgrade, Serbia.  We arrived in Belgrade and settled into our AirBnB near the city center.

Entry corridor from the main street to our AirBnB

Although at times gritty, Belgrade is one of several beautiful cities along the Danube river which flows from the Black Forest in Germany through Vienna, Austria; Bratislava, Slovakia; Budapest, Hungary; Belgrade, Serbia, and near Bucharest in Romania before ending in the Black Sea. 

Route of Danube from Germany to Black Sea

Belgrade seems caught between two eras and often seemed on both the right and wrong side of history.  It's a beautiful city with grand pedestrian promenades, Orthodox Cathedrals and a wonderful Danube river waterfront. 

Kneza Mihailove Pedestrian Street, Belgrade.

Dining in the historic district of Skadarska Street - Restaurant Row

St Marks Cathedral and Tasmajdan Park, Belgrade

Kalemegdan Park and Belgrade Fort overlooking the Danube

Iconostasis (Altar) of Orthodox church, Belgrade

Their economy was also struggling after years under Soviet control and then isolation after the 90s Balkan wars.  At the time of our visit they were still struggling with their neighbors.  

Local Commercial street, Belgrade

Urchin playing for coin

Several public banners protesting NATO and Albania

Like other Balkan countries it was originally settled by various tribes, invaded and assimilated by slavic peoples from the east, conquered by the muslim Ottomans, and made fits and starts at independence from them in the nineteenth century.  By the start of WWI they were an independent nation, incorporating Montenegro and Kosovo, with a very powerful neighbor. Austria/Hungary Empire controlled Serbia's other neighbors; today's Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia Herzegovina, while Albania to the southwest was independent.  When a Serbian nationalist assassinated Austria's crown price in Sarajevo, Austria delivered unacceptable terms to Serbia and when they were ignored, Austria declared war on the country.  The political dominos of alliances fell.  As Otto von Bismarck famously remarked: "the next European war would come out of some damed foolish thing in the Balkans." 

After WWI Serbia was the power center of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY).  When that country disolved after the fall of the Soviet union, Serbia initially maintained control of Montenegro, which declared independence in 2006.  Kosovo, sandwiched between Serbia and Albania, declared independence in 2008. However, Serbia, almost alone, does not recognize them as a separate state.  This continues to foment conflict between Serbia and Albania.

Due to the NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999 to stop the ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Albanias under Serbian forces lead by Slobodan Milosevic, which Serbs view as illegal aggression rather than humanitarian.  In the end the leader was arrested for war crimes, but before a judgement could be issued he died of a heart attack.  

After visiting Belgrade we took a bus north, passing fields of sun-flowers, for a day trip to Novi Sad, close to the Austrian Border.  

Fields of sunflowers with Novi Sad in distance.

Protest poster of before and after NATO bombing of bridge in Novi Sad

Novi Sad town square with Austrian Baroque city hall

We returned to Belgrade and hired a tour guide/driver for several days to take us east to the Danube along the border with Romania, and drove south along the river to Nis, before returning north to Belgrade.

Map of Serbia with Belgrade center top third, Danube winding on right and Nis at right bottom third

Our first stop was a medieval fourteenth century fortress. The site was originally settled, as most of the Balkans, by the Romans.  Over the centuries it was occupied by Serbian Kings, Hungarians, Timisoarans (Romanians), Hungarians, Ottomans, Austrians and others. Life in Europe's middles ages was "nasty, brutish and short".

Golubac Fortress on the Danube

Further down the Danube we reached the Iron Gates, a narrow gorge separating the Carpathians mountain in Romania from the Balkan mountains in Serbia.  Along this stretch of the river is the archeological site of Lepenski Vir, a human settlement from about 10,000 years BCE.  It is Europe's first planned and continuously occupied (meaning not nomadic, rather than existing today) settlement along the migration route from the middle east to Europe.  It was a shift from hunter gathers to neolithic farmers.

Enclosed archeological site with enhancement of settlement foundations

Reconstruction of triangular housing

Illustration of humans revering the sturgeon from the river.

Fish mouthed sculptures from the site.

Although it was a very rainy day, it made the Iron Gates even more mysterious and ancient looking.  It reminded me of the river passage in The Lord of the Rings first movie.  

Romania on the left and Serbia on the right.

The local communities along the Danube Iron Gates still maintain their local traditions and costumes. 

After leaving the Iron Gates on the Danube we spent the night in Negotin.  The next morning we toured the Bukovo Monastery.  The Orthodox religion split from the Rome (Latin) religion in 1054 for several reasons including theological, the universal jurisdiction of the Pope, liturgical differences, and the celibacy of priests. Today many monasteries produce commercial wine.  Both lack of celibacy and enjoying fruit of the vine seems much more relatable to parishioners. 

We enjoyed sampling wine with a very jovial priest

Our guide arranged for us to have lunch at this couples homestay.  

We arrived in Nis (pronounced Neesh) in time for dinner.  Across from our hotel was a small, very local corner restaurant.  It so happened it was the birthday for an 18 year old boy.  Part of the tradition seemed to be to invite family and friends to a restaurant to celebrate coming of age.  In this case the teenager's transition to becoming a man was not being abandoned in the wilderness to survive, but to perform electronic music for the guests.  They set up a synthesizer and microphone to display his talents.  We couldn't understand a thing he sang, but thoroughly enjoyed listening and watching his joy at his debut performance.  

Restaurant across the street from the hotel

The young man singing and performing with the electronic synthesizer

There were no tourists, only local friends and family wishing him happy birthday. 

Nis is the third largest city in Serbia and, like much of the country, has a tumultuous history.  A couple key sites are the Red Cross Concentration camp, Nis Fortress and the Skull Tower.  The Skull tower is from an early nineteenth century rebellion by the Serbs against the Ottoman empire.  Despite being outnumbered they resisted fiercely.  Eventually, the Ottoman's overwhelmed and slaughtered them.  The muslims skinned their heads and sent the skulls to the Sultan who commanded they be built into a tower to remind the locals not to resist authority.  

Partial reconstruction of Skull Tower.

After returning to Belgrade we up-graded our habitation for our last night to the Moscow hotel (Mockba) in the city center. A delightful step into past elegance. The next day before our flight we visited the small suburban town of Zemun.   Any return trip we'd like to spend more time in this charming river side village.  

Elegant Mockba Hotel

Zemun with Belgrade in the distance

Like many places from the Baltics to the Balkans in eastern Europe, Serbia has a complicated past that is still visible in the cities, country side, and the people.  However, that is what makes it fascinating to visit where history is still alive.  While in the Balkans Slovenia feels Austrian, Croatia Italian, and Albania nature, Serbia feels slavic and Russian. 

Next Post:  Balkans, Part four - Who am I - Where am I from.  Finally, our 2025 trip.

The Balkans, Part Two - Travel 1980 - 2015

My first trip to the Balkan Peninsula was in 1980 before I headed off to graduate school. As a young wanna be architect I felt I needed to do a Grand Tour of France, Italy and Greece beforehand. While Greece is technically a Balkan country, it felt more like - well - classical Greece. It was not part of former Yugoslavia nor as culturally diverse. 

Me at 26 on the steps of the Parthenon.  You could still walk onto and around the ancient temple.

In Delphi Greece.  Two strangers ignore the other then pass and turn to check each other out.

Following Greece I booked a train from Athens to Bucharest, Romania. I had tickets only for general seating, not reserved, so I just sat down in the most convenient car. As the hours went by through the Greek countryside, I thought we should have crossed the customs into communist Bulgaria. I approached the conductor and, with hand signals, pointed the train’s direction and questioned “Sofia?”, suggesting the next stop.  He replied “No, Alexandroupolis”, a Greek city on the boarder with Turkey. I didn’t realize that I needed to board specific coaches because mid-trip cars would uncouple and some would travel east to Istanbul while others continued north to Sofia, Bulgaria.  This was only a few years after the movie “Midnight Express”, the true story of a young couple my age traveling on a bus in Turkey in the 70s. The young man was arrested for carrying hasheesh, convicted of drug possession, and jailed and tortured in a Turkish prison.  Eventually, his family helped him to escape by smuggling in money to bribe guards. This frantic imagining must have crossed my face as I insisted that I needed to go to Sofia, NOT Turkey!

The conductor motioned for me to calmly sit down in the space between cars and he’d come back.  When the conductor returned, he again motioned, pumping his palms down, for me to remain.  Then I felt the train slow in an open field in the middle of nowhere.  When it stopped, he opened the door and on the other track was another train stopped going in the opposite direction with their door open.  I understood to descend the train heading east and board the other heading west back to where I could resume my correct journey.  It would never happen today. 

The next day, after getting on the correct train and transiting through Balkan Bulgaria, I visited Romania to visit relatives my grandparents left behind when they immigrated to the United States in the early twentieth century.  Although a small part of Romania is considered in the Balkans, it is only the southeast corner on the Black Sea, where I didn't go.

Train through Bulgaria

R - L: Me with my father's second cousin Thresia and husband Andres and Girlinda, my third cousin by marriage.  

My next trip to a Balkan country was in 1994 to Turkey with Amy and friends Kate and Aaron. While most of the six week trip was on the Asiatic side of the Bosporous our last days were in Istanbul on the European side and the far eastern edge of the Balkans. This is where most of the attractions are located such as the Grand Bazaar (Souk), the Blue Mosque, Haigh Sophia Mosque and the Topkapi Palace.  

Me at 40, with old fisherman drinking Raki, on the Black Sea and Bosporous

I returned to Romania again in 2007, this time with my siblings, German cousin, and Robin.  

Sister Linda, Robin, me at 53, German half-second-cousin-once-removed Maria, and brother Paul

Robin and me in traditional Carpathian fur hats. 

In 2014 I went back to Istanbul with Teigan, Robin, and her ex-partner. Again, we stayed on the European side, and also crossed Golden Horn over the Galata bridge and ascended the namesake tower for a view down the Bosporus to Asia and the Black Sea.  

Beyoglu neighborhood, Galata bridge, Golden Horn, Old Istanbul, and Bosporous. Asia and Black Sea in hazy distance

Our first trip specifically to visit several central Balkan countries was a year later in 2015. Robin and I planned to visit Slovenia, then drive south through Croatia, Bosnia Herzegovina, and Montenegro.  

Former Yugoslavia.  Note the Dinaric Mountains that runs from

the Austrian boarder in the north to Albania is the south.

Slovenia has been part of multiple Kingdoms and Empires over the millennia: the Illyrian Provinces, Byzantine Empire, Carolingian Empire, Holy Roman Empire, Kingdong of Hungary, Republic of Venice, Napoleon's First French Empire, Habsburg Empire, and Yugoslavia in 1918. In June 1991, Slovenia declared independence from Yugoslavia. We found a constantly changing architecture from these previous empires.  

One of the reasons I wanted to visit this country was to hike the Julian Alps, part of the Dinaric Mountains, which forms the northern boundary between Austria and the Balkan Peninsula. A surprise to us was to discover intense WWI battles in severe weather along the Soca front that were fought in these mountains.  Very similar style of trench warfare found in Belgium and Flanders, but here at 6,500' and in trenches of snow, not earth and mud. Many casualties were frostbite, and deaths were hypothermia.  

High in the rugged Julian Alps

Me at 61. Still early in the seasons for high alpine hiking.  

Right of center, near top of slope, fierce winter battles were fought in snow trenches.

From the mountains we drove southeast to the Adriatic coast. The influence was clearly Venetian, whose city/state occupier was only a hundred miles further west.

Hill towns reminiscent of Tuscany

Coastal towns reminiscent of Portofino 

On returning to the capital Ljubljana and nearby Lake Bled, only 60 miles from the coast, one sees the urban planning and architecture from a century before reflects the Habsburg and Austrian occupiers to the north, rather than the Venetian to the west.

Church of the Assumption of Mary on island in center of Lake Bled and the Julian Alps beyond

Historic Ljubljana, capital of Slovenia and Baroque architecture of Austria

After taking the train from Ljubljana to the Croatian capital of Zagreb, we rented a car and returned to the coast.  

Central Plaza of Zagreb

En-route we visited Plitvica National Park with its series of sparkling waterfalls tumbling into streams and rivulets.  Boardwalks hovered inches above the cascading waterways draped with lush vegetation.  

Enroute to Split Plitvica National Park is a series of low waterfalls cascading into connecting streams

Several miles of hand hewn timber walkways meander along the streams and under the waterfall mist.

The cities of Split, Dubrovnik and the island of Hvar on the Dalmatian coast the urban influences were more ancient Roman and Italian. But we also saw the impact of the recent Balkan wars in the early 90s: The Croatian war of Independence and the Bosnian War. Trying to keep Yugoslavia together after the fall of the Soviet Union, Serbia's ultra-nationalist, Orthodox Christian, leaders raged ethnic cleansing war against its Latin Christians and Muslim neighbors. 

Split is a Roman city.  In the center is the remains of Emperor Diocletian's Palace from end of the third century.  

Peristyle (central square) within the palace and entry to the Emperor's quarters

The historic Fortress of St. John in Dubrovnik was bombarded from the mountains above by the Serbians

Dancing in the central square of Dubrovnik

After visiting Croatia we headed inland to Bosnia Herzegovina and the cities of Mostar and Sarajevo.   In this nearly land locked country, with only twelve miles of coast line on the Adriatic, we experienced the cultural and religious mixing the Balkans are known for.  It was also here we revisited the start of WWI with the assignation of Arch Duke Ferdinand, and some of the most horrific attempts at ethnic cleansing, in Sarajevo.  The muslim population was more tolerant than further east in Asia, no headscarves or dishdasha.  They had an attitude of "we must all get along", not revenge, recently experiencing the impact when not. 

At Mostar bridge, destroyed during Balkan war and rebuilt

Miljacka River running through Sarajevo

Corner where Arch Duke Ferdinand of Austria was assassinated starting WWI.

Artifacts remain of the Bosnian War with Serbia

More human atrocities

Road back to Croatia from Bosnia Herzegovina 

After returning to Dubrovnik, we took a day-trip to Kotor, in Montenegro.  We would like to have had more time in this small but beautiful mountainous country.  

Small city of Kotor on Bay of Kotor

Main street of Kotor

Dinaric Alps of the Balkans surround the fjord

On reflection during our turbulent time, the horror of the era and its return to semi-normalcy today, reminds me that the human condition is chaos, strife, and change. The US has been sheltered for the most part.  Our current situation is just a return to the mean (pun intended) and that this too shall pass.  It will not be the same, but it will pass.