I never want to see another hill again. After the awesome descent into Bihac a couple of days ago, I should have realised it was coming. I was entering one of the most physically demanding parts of the trip (there are three that I’ve identified, those being the Swiss Alps, Tuscany in Italy, and the mountains of Bosnia and Herzegovina). But even the Swiss Alps couldn’t prepare me for the gruelling ups and downs of central Bosnia.
The biggest difference is that, in Switzerland for example, I was at least starting from a valley that was already about 400m above sea level, and I might do one pass per day. Most of it was spent hugging the gorgeous valleys and not actually slugging my arse over the mountains. Yesterday in Bosnia, I cycled between Bihac and Jajce – about 130km – and climbed three enormous passes, each around 800-900m high. In essence, I did more climbing uphill in Bosnia yesterday, than I did in Switzerland in an entire week. And I was totally knackered when I arrived at Jajce in darkness at about 8:30pm that night.
Despite the hills, parts of the cycle were extremely enjoyable. Bosnia wasn’t as scary as one might think. Many people don’t know a lot about Bosnia before they arrive, and I was no exception. The most obvious point to note was the natural beauty of the country. One Bosnian joked to me, “did you notice that there are no trees on the Croatian side of the mountain range?” He was right; on the coastal side of the mountain range it was stinking hot and the hills were covered in sparse shrubs and not much else. However when you cross the peak and head down into the valleys of Bosnia, the scenery changes to dense, green forest. I think the joke was as the expense of the Italians, who they say came over and take all the trees or something. In any case, the difference in the environment is startling. I recall seeing footage of the civil war on TV nearly two decades ago, and all you saw was the barren, near desert like terrain, tanks rolling over ruins and refugees spilling along the roads. Well, now the picture couldn’t be any more different. It’s so beautiful and lush, that it’s hard to believe you are actually in the same country that you saw in all those news reports. I remember thinking that I could very well be back home in Sydney cycling through the Royal National Park, except there were no gumtrees.
My first encounter with a Bosnian local was when I arrived in Bihac (pronounced bee-atch), the first major town across the northern border from Croatia. I had really just stopped at a red light and the road in front of me split into two directions. One was clearly the correct road to Sarajevo, but in any case, a local guy who spoke a little bit of English walked up and started rambling on to me. It was an interesting conversation which ended as abruptly as it started, when after a few minutes chatting, he seemed to think that it was the end of the conversation and just walked off as quickly as he arrived. But out of him I did manage to get directions to a campsite less than 2km down the road. We also talked about cycling in Bosnia. “You know, it’s OK to cycle in Bosnia, but the drivers are not always nice to bikes” he said. I would come to find that as long as you make it obvious what you are doing, and were clearly visible and not hiding in the gutters, then you would be generally OK on the roads. Speaking of the road conditions, he also mentioned that I should watch out for the potholes and things. I was well aware already. I mentioned that as long as I didn’t get stuck on a highway, then I’d be happy. He seemed amused that I would even think that would be a problem. “Highways! Ha, in Bosnia there are no highways!” he laughed, and then strolled off down the street.
Cycling in Bosnia was actually quite enjoyable in parts, besides the massive hill climbs. I started to pick up little details that were changing as I’d moved between west and east Europe. For example, I noticed the road kill gradually changing as I moved further east. I’d never seen so many hedgehogs in my life. Dead or alive. Now I’ve seen dozens of the little battlers scattered all over the roads. On a more pleasant note, I found it entertaining watching the locals going about their daily rituals and routines. Farmers would walk their cows through the villages at dusk, and they also used those funny bells around their necks like in Switzerland. If anything, it was even more authentic here, as I couldn’t make up my mind in Switzerland if it was just for touristic show, or if the cows actually needed to be walked into town. Here in Bosnia, I got the impression that it was a way of life. On the farms themselves, the locals construct peculiar stacks of hay around a central pole, and they line up several of the stacks in a row. From a distance they almost look like an Indian tee-pee tent. The farmers’ wives seem to spend all day beside the road in makeshift market stalls, selling their fresh produce – everything from fresh fruit and veg, goat cheese, home-grown honey and flavoured cordials. It’s very seasonal to what is on sale, and currently it appears that watermelon and peaches are the flavour of the month.
And just when you think you never want to see another cathedral ever again, suddenly they are conspicuous in their absence. Instead, one of the first things I noticed when I crossed the border was the local village mosque. Standing central to the town was the domed building and a single tall spire. The bigger the town, the more spires the mosques seemed to have. Bigger towns such as Jajce suddenly had two mosques with two spires each. Maybe in Sarajevo they will have a mosque with four spires? Time will tell. It will be interesting to see what Istanbul is like, where I expect that the muslim culture will be rife! Maybe eight spires, or maybe I’m just getting ahead of myself…
Back at the ranch (or the campsite more appropriately) I was dismayed to find that after all that hard cycling, the campsite was no longer selling food. Then by the time I got back up the hill to the main road to the market, that had just closed. A restaurant further down the road which was my last, expensive resort, was nowhere to be found and must have also closed. So I spent my dinner money on a variety of ice creams, coke and beers. I did however find something interesting on the shores of the lake near Jajce when I was looking for the restaurant. There were a series of tiny wooden huts situated over some small waterfalls, and I asked the girl at the campsite reception what they were. Turns out they are historic water mills, and they were UNESCO World Heritage listed. I then recalled reading about them about a year ago, and then it dawned on me exactly why I’d decided to cycle these God forsaken hills to Sarajevo in the first place – to see them. Well, as fate would have it, I’d stumbled across them and planned to check them out thoroughly in the morning. They are clearly not used anymore for their original purpose, however I was given some insight into their modern application when I opened a door to one of the tiny huts and saw a condom packet on the ground. Hmm…
I cycled along the beautiful lake (jezera) the next morning, on the way into town to see the nice waterfall and the old fort on top of the hill. Everything was wet that day, it had been raining constantly for 3 days the reception girl said, and as a result, everything was moist, damp and I even ended up cycling through some low cloud (yes that’s how high the mountains were the day before!) and got caught in a small shower too, but nothing that stopped me riding on.
Anyway, I was cycling on past Jajce and through Travnik on my second day in Bosnia, when I heard the ‘wailing’ for the first time. It took me a few seconds to figure out what it was because it didn’t sound too unlike the scream of somebody getting brutally murdered. I looked up to the spire of the mosque, but there was no wailer or singer or prayer going on. Turns out they’ve gone and modernised all the mosques so these days it’s rare to find a real person doing the prayer song. Each spire is fitted out with a couple of loud speakers connected to a PA system. They are so loud you can hear them all over town, so too bad if you are not muslim, you have to put up with it, no choice in the matter. Personally I don’t mind them practicing being muslim in a country where the vast majority of the population is muslim. But then you need to remember the political correctness sweeping its way through the western world, and I couldn’t help but wonder how well it would go down if suddenly the Catholic church wanted to broadcast choir hymns to the whole town every Sunday morning….
Anyway, it was stinking hot, and I stopped regularly up the hills and in the towns to grab some fairly cheap ice creams, bananas and to top up my water at various free water fountains. I’ve still only had to purchase water twice on the whole trip, simply because I couldn’t find a free water source nearby. That’s pretty good going I think! Money saved on water is more money to spend on trying the local pivo (that’s beer for you uneducated, untravelled plebs). Purchasing energy drinks is a source of amusement everywhere I go. I tend to stay away from Red Bull simply because it is always the most expensive energy drink (just like Coca Cola is the most expensive cola drink). The locals seem to go to amazing competitive lengths to come up with the most creative name for their products. So far, I’ve come across “Pimp Juice”, “Big Bill”, “Hell”, “B52 Bomber” among others. All are decorated with cartoons of fierce, muscled up bulls or something. I’ve also discovered that the eastern Europeans delight in making jaffa cakes with different flavours. I’ve so far discovered on top of orange (authentic jaffa) they also come in lime, cherry and strawberry. I’ve purchased a box of each, and must say all are nice, though the strawberry ones are the only flavour I would rate up there with jaffa. Finally, the basis of every breakfast, lunch and dinner for the past three days has been either burek or pizza. In fact I never thought I’d say this, but if I ever see another slice of burek, I think I’ll puke! Time for something different, and tonight I’m having some pasta with some salad, with any luck.
The campsites I’ve been staying at have been well equipped, some even have wifi Internet over the whole campsite area, which was unexpected in this part of the world. I would have been more inclined to camp in some of the more remote (off road) abandoned buildings, however I must say, the prospect of encountering one of the 600,000 land mines that are still scattered around Bosnia & Herzegovina turned me off the idea. In theory, these numerous minefields were taped off and signposted with warnings, but I am as yet to even find an official landmine area, and then there is every possibility that a mine or two had escaped notice. So I will be sticking to the “road well travelled” so to speak and continuing to use campsites, which aren’t too expensive.
I’m now probably one day away from Sarajevo, which I’m looking forward to (of course). More updates then, but so far, now that I’ve calmed down and got my breath back, I must say that Bosnia is definitely a cool country, still with a bit of that Soviet roughness to it, and far enough from mainstream Western Europe that it’s a welcome, cheap change. Keep that coming please!
