A Seaside Rendezvous

Back on the Balkan Express, we eased our way into Serbia, passed Nis and stopped in the capital, Belgrade. The trip was very pleasant, the cabin was shared with a young female uni student and a ragged 'businessman' who had about eight winter coats around the cabin. The coats were wrapped up in a big bundle after we'd crossed the border. He also went back and forth, screwdriver in hand, to the WC. On one occasion he left with an empty sports bag to return with a packed sports bag. The armed border police payed particular attention to our cabin, inspecting under the seats and between the armrests. One guard came in to poke around the ceiling cavities and heating system but found nothing. The 'businessman' bought us a packet of biscuits to share at one stop and entertained many guests who got on and off the train regularly, leaving or taking bags or packages. At one stage we had twice the amount of luggage than in the beginning. We took no photographs.





Belgrade was to be a transit stop but it became a main event, holding our interest for five days. We voted in the Federal election, took up passive smoking, made plans for the weeks ahead and got very comfortable in our hostel, just near the centre of town.










We saw a lot of the town on foot, getting off trams way before we should have. I like this shot because of the grass on the tram tracks, it looked fantastic in the middle of the city, against the drab pavement and bitumen. Maurizio is the fella on the left, from Milan. He joined us to visit the 'furniture exhibition' which turned out to be largely office furniture, though we were treated well, particularly enjoying the massage chairs, as for all they knew, we were big OS buyers in town for the three day event.

Lisa and I visited the Kalemgdan Citadel on a few occasions, particularly enjoying the sunsets over the city and watching the Danube below.

Belgrade had many pastry opportunities. I found it hard to make a decision here but settled on a jumbo baklava, swimming in honey in a stainless steel bowl. The camera couldn't focus on my face as I recoiled with the sugar injection. It did focus a little on the ridiculous creations in the cabinet behind me. One was enough. Heavenly.

It was time for a trim, so we wandered next door for the royal treatment. This barber and I chatted with our hands for a bit and he was off to work. Lisa got out the camera and he called for his daughter. He then got out a bottle of Rakia and we all endured a glass, his was the biggest, before resuming my haircut. Traditionally, I've always said that hard alcohol and haircutting don't mix, but he seemed to have done it before and matched my right side to my left. He was very proud of being a Serbian Christian, that was for sure.

After museums, cafes, cooking and resting, it was time to take the overnight train down to Podgorica and bus it out to Budva, on the Montenegrin coast. We ran into Scott, an Australian we'd met in Belgrade and the three of us rented a pansion together, $30 for a little apartment on the top of a big house in the town centre. We cooked in our own kitchen and enjoyed the various citrus and pomegranates that the Mama left in our room every day. This shot is the view from the road up from our apartment back to the fortified Stari Grad (Old Town).

Contemplating my next move by the Budva Marina.

We walked as far as possible around the coastline, looking back to Stari Grad admiring the occasional brass sculpture looking out over the Adriatic Sea towards Italy.

The next stop was Kotor, further north up the coast, situated on the deepest fjord in Europe. We were approached by a man at the bus station and decided to take up his accomodation offer. We arrived at their house and were promptly served brandy and turkish style coffee, they were a lovely old couple with a spectacular view. We later met their son, daughter and friend who spoke plenty of English and were keen to show us around. This shot is from in front of the house, this team paddled past every day, despite the cool weather.

Taken from the same position as above outside the house, looking left as the sun set.

They were interesting siblings, these two, she had much more English than he did but he was very keen to communicate. Here in a club in the old city, we sampled a few of the local beers and enjoyed the company of Kotor's beautiful peolple.

They took us for a drive around the bay to Parast the next day. We chose not to rent.

Walking along another beautiful road, crystal clear water, narrow streets and a range of buildings currently being snapped up by the rich and famous from Russia and the UK.

We pulled over to let this wedding procession pass. We were told that they're driving through the bride's old neighbouhood where residents ply the party with booze. Notice the hand on the horn in the red car. This hooting seemed popular amongst the sloshed motorists.

That afternoon, I took my hiking companion up to the top of the old town, along the fort line.

We were all alone except for two nuns cleaning the chapel at the halfway mark. I'm told that having to reach the top of any given hill is a boy thing.

Back outside the house, we met ??? the next day before he set out. A giant cruise ship had docked in Kotor and flooded the town with Brits, Ruskis and Americans dripping with travel accesories and high expectations of customer service. A trip to Herceg Novi and a few meals out and we were ready to get moving. Off to Croatia.

Two days in Dubrovnik gave us time to visit the old town at different times of the day and have a few coffees around town. This is a laneway inside the old town, plenty of spending opportunities here.

Looking back at the Dalmaitian Coast from the southern wall of Stari Grad.

Looking out over the Adriatic. We stayed here to watch the sun set and will remeber the view, not only because of the beautiful buildings changing colour but because we decided together that we would continue our trip beyond January.

Another little bay near the Old Town.

Just before the bus into Herzegovina we had our Burek and pastry lunch on the bay. Croatia is one we'd love to return to when we're millionaires.

Winds of Change

Walking for over an hour across the border, we were watched by the hundreds of truck drivers lined up to go through the EU x-ray machine. The warning sign on the machine, with a silhouette of a family in the back of a truck, was a little alarming, but we kept on walking, whistling 'Winds of Change' until we'd had our passports scrutinized and stamped and were left to fend for ourselves against the 'taxi' drivers who all looked like Bulgarian Olympic weightlifting coaches.


Arriving by train in Plovdiv, we were met with curiosity and assistance as we tried to make sense of the Cyrillic alphabet. The 'old town' became our home and the UFA cafe our food source. The Roman Theatre is above, still used 2000 years on, and looks out over the city from one of the seven hills.


Our backpacks are getting very light as every piece of clothing is being worn. This area had its share of Orthodox churches, mosques, universities, cafes and 'new money' strip malls. We were quite comfortable here as we began to enjoy the winter food - think cheese, salami, stews, thick bread, red wine, dark wood...


We relaxed in another train to Sofia, watching Autumn from the window, leaves falling from trees and concrete from power stations. Quite often, I'd pass a blue sign indicating how much the EU is injecting into a particular stretch of track or road. The figures are enormous.


Wandering around the capital, Sofia, we followed the tourist map to the law, arriving for the changing of the guard with some young families. I elbowed my way to the front with this little fella but we soon had to jump out of the way.

Aleksanda Nevski Cathedral was decidedly numinous. The interior was particularly ethereal, dripping in gold and mosaic work, with an electronic image flashing for half a second near the donation box every few minutes.


Outside the Cathedral (no cameras allowed inside) I snapped this scene that I saw repeated often. Bulgarian parking police are tough. The team of three removed this car in under sixty seconds, giving me a wave as they sped off in their diesel truck.

At the southern end of Sofia lies Mt Vitosha, the city's own ski field. We found it by PT and then walked up to the lifts along the trickling creek.

After two lifts, at about 10 minutes each, we broke through the clouds and the gloom into the sunny playground at the top. Mountain bikers, hunters, walkers and berry pickers wandered about up here at the 2000m mark. We'd brought some pastries and the local paper and enjoyed a few hours of sunlight before shivering our way back down.

Here's one of the riders following the lift line. We made enquiries in town but the month before ski season all the MTB renters are switching to skis and boards. Lisa was relieved as it was very cold.

After a long weekend in our Sofia apartment, we headed south to the Rila Monastery, an Eastern Orthodox haven where they have maintained traditions far away from the darkness of some of the regional history. My traveling companion (pictured) declared we would stay there, in a cell, and pay the $50 mandatory donation for the pleasure. We did, and agreed it was well worth it when the others had to leave on the public bus only an hour after arrival. Despite snowing, it was stunning, in a beautiful mountain setting.


Like elsewhere, no cameras inside, but this was the detail outside which continued all the way around the central church.


Down below the monastery was the cemetery, with its own 200yr old chapel.


Below the chapel was the creek, along which you could walk the 21km back to town. I got no support for that idea.

The plan was to head south to Melnik for the wine but we'd missed the bus for the day so made three further bus trips to arrive in Bansko, Bulgaria's hope for the 2014 Winter Olympics. The place is abuzz with construction and real estate agents with Union Jacks in their windows and UK mobile numbers. We stayed for four days, entering the NP a little bit, falling in a creek, sampling a bit of the local wine and avoiding a certain tout who we think had spent a bit too much time in the military.

And ultimately back up to Sofia where we stayed overnight and woke up to snow! Back on the Balkan Express and off to Serbia while my one woman audience is getting sick of me whistling 'Winds of Change', but 'we've only just begun'.

The Candy Shop

We brought our flight forward to the weekend to meet Claire and her boyfriend Jonathan, who made the trip from London for a few days. Istanbul made for a nice reprieve, suddenly we were in an (almost) European city. Claire had booked us in to a place at the end of Istiklal Caddesi, so we were right in the thick of it. Cobbled pedestrian roads, music shops, book stores, cafes and buskers everywhere. Packed fulla cultcha.

Here they are, two sisters and an unsuspecting Englishman, in the shadow of Galata Tower, right by our home for the week.

The view from our hostel room, looking to Europe over the Bosphorous and around to Galata Tower.

The Londoners had us on the move for the four days. Claire had a list. This picture is from the grounds of the 'Blue Mosque', looking towards the great Aya Sofia.

Inside the mosque, I came across this beautiful local woman. I also admired the amazing tile and glass work in every aspect of its interior.

The local woman accompanied me outside and we found Jonathan had been mistaken for Justin Timberlake by a group of Turkish school girls. This is only one of many celebrity shots taken here.

The old couple, resting their bones.

What the old couple saw as they rested - the 'Blue Mosque'.

Claire, equipped with candy, commentary and Claridge.

Inside Aya Sofia, we were stunned by the scale of the interior, and especially the age. UNESCO are hard at it, restoring the roof, with possibly the grandest scaffolding I've ever seen. Here I'm pretending to know what I'm talking about to a London architect.

We wandered back over the bridge, ducking every time one of these blokes cast his line, back to Asia and relaxed before the World Cup late that night. Saffas and Poms packed in to two nearby smokey pubs and stretched their neck muscles to watch the end of the series that didn't quite catch the attention of the Turkish population.


A trip to the spice bazaar, big bazaar, the Design and Technology museum as well as selfless research into local beers and cuisine meant we were all a bit beat by the third day so off to the Hamam. We had the option of visiting the same place as Cameron Diaz and her like but found this one to be much more appealing. A little off the track, the two men in towels behind the desk drinking tea were a little surprised by Lisa and my entrance, but they agreed that we should come back after six, when they would shut the doors for the four of us to be 'bathed'. At about $30 a head, we received an amazing experience, being scrubbed, lathered, massaged like he wanted to squeeze the muscles out of our toe nails, all on a big heated central marble altar over three hours. Steam and suds washed away, we were served tea, talked about the deaths that had just made the news and played with his three kittens. The place seemed to have a similar maintenance budget to a suburban Sydney squash court which only added to the charm.

On our last night together, we had a kebab and beer picnic under Galata Tower, while boys played football in the courtyard and stray cats sniffed around our ankles for crumbs. It was good to see Claire after over a year apart and look forward to seeing more of Jonathan.

Lisa and I spent a few days more in Istanbul, soaking up the atmosphere and slowing back down. The protests about the PKK issue escalated, to the point where bus loads of riot police were on hand throughout Istiklal Caddesi. It was peaceful but passionate.

We got on a bus to make the pilgrimage to the battle fields of Gallipoli. Staying in Canakkale, we wandered around for a few days there before returning to join a tour of the peninsula. The tour, unsurprisingly, comprised of Aussies and Kiwis, who were good easy company. Our Turkish guide was excellent and had met enough ANZACs to successfully incorporate a little humour into the presentations. Walking through trenches, seeing Lone Pine and sitting on ANZAC cove was moving and memorable, putting into perspective all the history lessons and ANZAC days we'd lived through.

Before I knew it, Lisa had organised a bit of a do and six Sydneysiders found themselves having dinner together. The couple at the front, Chris and Nicole, celebrated their birthdays on either side of midnight, so we helped them celebrate. Besides a questionable establishment trying to overcharge us for a dodgy bottle of pre-opened wine, we enjoyed the home-grown company on a day when I felt proud but equally mystified by WWI.

We made a fairly major decision over the next few days. We would head into Eastern Europe rather than further into Turkey. The 'busyness' of the trail we found ourselves on meant that we too often felt like we were paying and excessive 'tourist tax' for every move we made. Turkey, for us, would be better visited with more money and, ideally, our own car or camper.

Off to the border, Edirne, where we could cross over into Bulgaria. Here, Lisa enjoys some Turkish delight after she took me to the candy shop.

We ended up staying in this town for five days, and in many ways it was just as much a highlight as the other two stops but for different reasons. Apart from one tourist Lisa spoke to in the info office, we seemed to have arrived in a place where tourists, like ourselves, were missing as they rushed through to elsewhere. The town was full of charming people, interested in our being there, and keen to give us tips on what to visit. We got around on foot and enjoyed the novelty of rugging up as the temperature dropped. The photo above is of my increasingly bad habit of trying to offload a certain currency in its own country rather than visiting a dirty exchange in the next. We had a look in this taverna type restaurant and decided it would do, the people looked happy and warm. Upstairs, we were sat next to this friendly group of men, the nearest to me spoke to us a little and called his girl who is a Turkish English teacher. She arrived, Lisa got to talking, the band played and there we were, eating and drinking away with this lot. The music was fantastic, the front man a real showman. A great night out.

We visited many of the local 'Mimar Sinan' designed mosques. This one, the Bayezid II Complex, had a health museum within its grounds that had won the 2004 EU museum of the year prize and was a fascinating look into the use of alternative medicines (like music and herbs) at the same time the mentally ill were being burnt at the stake in Western Europe.

This baker and I became friends, he sold me water for less than the supermarket and his date and cinnamon rolls made for a pretty rich but very satisfying breakfast, washed down with his sugary tea. I'm proudly wearing a t shirt made by some of my students when I left who had treated themselves at many bakeries with me over the years on our DoE trips. The tour continues.