Hostel Miturno Mostar

... building. But it wasn’t in the sense that parts of the city (mainly near the Neretva river) were so beautiful. The water was so blue and the mountains surrounding the city (seen from the river area, mainly) were so picturesque.

The Muslim population (Bosniaks) live on the east side of the river (where we stayed) and the Catholic population (Croats) live on the west side. There were dozens and dozens of mosques and minarets. It was really cool also to see ...

... day would have ******* out early on right there in the parking lot of the Zadar Airport.

Knowing that a bus ran from the Zadar Airport to the main bus station, I searched and found the battered yellow beast idling in front of baggage claim. I assumed it was the right bus because a) it said Zadar in the window, b) it was where it should have been, and c) it was the only bus within a mile. You know what they say about assuming...it just makes and ...

... nge b*t no red*ction in the scenic be**ty, *s the ro*d to Most*r crosses pristine l*kes *nd forested hills. I didn't h*ve eno*gh time between b*ses in Most*r to check o*t its eponymo*s bridge. For * fee yo* c*n j*mp off the 24 meter (79ft) bridge, * tempting opport*nity to bre*k my c*rrent 45ft person*l best.

Al*s, I only h*d time to wolf down the b*g*ette *nd spre*d I'd bo*ght e*rlier before bo*rding the ...

... had been a tradition going until 1993 when Croatian forces shelled the old town and destroyed the bridge. Then it got rebuilt in 2004 and these contests kicked off again

The next day I was going to take a look around town however something kinda
funny happened. I woke up, rubbed my eye and accidentally rubbed somegrit or what felt like a dozen eyelashes tied in a knot into the back of my eye... nice one.

Tried washing it out, didn't work. Still felt annoying but thought ...

... paprika paste, and Bosnian cream cheese. Mmmmmmmm... cheeeeeese.

Subsequently, we go to Medugorje, the town famous for being the place where there was an apparition of the Virgin Mary in 1981. Its a pilgrimage destination for many across Europe now. Its superstar being the site of the apparition, a memorial to the Virgin, and a statue of the almight JC, which over the last few years has started releasing fluids from the cracks in the knees, earning it the nickname of ...

... funny, raw, and open all at once. It was quite an experience to spend a whole day riding around in a van with him while he told his story of the war.

He started the tour with the place thought to have started the war - a bombed out soldier barrack. The fact that it was empty when the bombs went off shows that the Croatian soldiers were tipped off, and that the war was mostly against the Bosnians, despite what most people said.

From there we drove to a ...

... as 'Stari Most', Bosnian for... you guessed it... old bridge. Elvis takes a detour to show it to me by the night's light. It's beautiful, sure enough, slim and gracefully arching over frothy waters. Elvis is having fun making detours to the 'motel', totally eliminating any chance that I'll actually remember the route, but that's okay; he's having fun. When we finally get to the 'motel', it looks like a real place of business, not ...

... on the participants. In such a crowd it wasn`t hard to lose our French pals. We were wandering in between picturesque streets full of stalls with antiques. Think about it, 300 m apart from the place, there was still such a scale of destruction! A contrast making you think about it actually. We`d been waiting by the Frenchies` car for about 1,5h. We found out they never got our text message neither we got theirs. We left Mostar around 8pm, and at 9pm we stopped by at a restaurant for ...

We decided to get a minibus tour into Bosnia, as we aren't insured to drive there. We went with Tony the driver and another couple from Hungary. It really is a lot poorer than Croatia. The roads are not as good and the aftermath of war is still evident, all these years on. We went to a religious site first, Meduyorje. This is where a group of teenagers claimed ...

... pick us up from the bus station. It was just as well, because once again the bus station is quite a long way out and it would not have been a comfortable walk. The Kriva Cuprija (crooked bridge) is a small stone bridge that crosses the river Radobolja which at this point is a raging torrent. The motel itself is a converted mill and the water flows all around it making a deafening roar as you enter. Jasna, one of our hosts ...