K & J on tour: BALKAN camping adventure

SLOVENIA - CROATIA - MONTENEGRO - BOSNIA and HERZEGOVINA

...a 3 week long,very interesting summer adventure - full of new cultural experiences!

1. Starting in Styria/Carinthia
to visit Opa Sepp at Turracher Höhe for a nice summer hiking tour

2. 2nd day: LJUBLJANA
One day at camping "Ljubljana Resort" with the cool "Laguna" swimming pool and an evening in beautiful Ljubljana

3. Heading south through Slovenia and Croatia (via Novo Mesto, border at Metlika, Karlovac, Zadar, Sibenic..) to the coastal region around SPLIT

We had a pre-booked reservation for camp "Rozac" on the small island Ciovo - connected with the medieval island town TROGIR via bridges.
We spent 3 adventurous days with Parasailing, Jet ski and a boat trip to SPLIT (with the "Bura Linea Ferry boats).

TROGIR

SPLIT

On the very last day - on our way to the ferry boat terminal in SPLIT - we experienced a very cool and breath taking ZIP LINE adventure on the mountain range behind Split.

a short foot path, 6 long Zip lines and a canopy bridge ...and a wonderful view of the SPLIT coastal region!

With nice company and a very nice guide:

ZIP LINE SPLIT

4. The "lavender" island HVAR:

With the Jadrolina ferry boat (2h) from Split to Stari Grad.
We chose the beautiful renovated camp "Holiday" near the pittoresque little town JELSA to stay for 4 relaxing days:
cristal clear water, a breath taking view of Brac and the mainland, a nice beach bar, windy "Bora" nights, an aquapark and nice bays for SUP tours, ...riding the bikes to visit Jelsa and the "adventure park Jelsa" for a paintball session ;-)

JELSA

We rented a (cheap but uggly) scooter for a wonderful day trip to explore the island HVAR and its beautiful towns and villages, the Stari Grad fields and the hills full of (already dry) lavender.

VRBOSKA

STARI GRAD

Very professional scooter pilot Julian!

HVAR city from the castle hill

HVAR

We left HVAR via the "main road" of the island - a windy and "dangerous" narrow road - and the short ferry boat connection from Sucuraj to Drvenik on the mainland. After about 1hour along the "Jadranska magistrale" we took the ferry boat from (the uggy town) Ploce to the...

5. ...mountainous "wine" island PELJESAC

We choose the big nice family camp "Nevio" on the south coast near OREBIC - a nice village with old captains' villas and wine yards (from the mountain range to the sea shore).

the view from our pitch

and our "pet" - a sweet baby kitten

Orebic and its villas and wine yards

We spent 4 nice days snorcheling, with SUP tours, on the pool...
...and a wonderful day trip to the island of KORCULA - with the camping taxi boat and back with the (much cheaper) ferry boat and a cool rented scooter:

crossing the Peljesac - Korcula channel

Korcula old town

exploring the island Korcula: the Lumbarda sandy beaches, the beautiful north coast with its villages Kneze, Rasisce,...

...and then uphil a tiny, windy road (perfect for our scooter adventure ;-) to Pupnat

Kneze beach

scooter "hero" :-)

and the challenges along the
island roads

After 5 wonderful days we left the Peljesac peninsula via its connecting to the mainland near the old city of Ston. There we climbed a part of the city walls with a nice view over the salina ston.

STON city walls (over the hill to Mali Ston) and the salina

6. the Dubrovnik riviera

After a short road trip along the Jadranska magistrala and the beautiful cliffs of the Dubrovnik Riviera we chose the Mini garden camp "Kate" in Mlini for our next stop:

our pitch in the "garden" under fig, pomgranate and khaki trees...

..and with a chapel

and a 5 min foot path down to the sweet village Mlini (about 15 km south of Dubrovnik)

We took a taxi boat from Mlini for a day trip to Dubrovnik:

old harbour of Dubrovnik

the "Skradun"

The best view of Dubrovnik: from the cable car that took us up to the Srd mountain peak

impressions of Dubrovnik

7. Two days later we left Croatia to explore MONTENEGRO:

Just 30km later (through the green Konvale valley) we had a long forgotten border experience:
1h for that: the border from Croatia to Montenegro:

After about 1h drive through the city Herzeg Novi and along the west coast of the Kotor fjord we reached the Mini garden camp "Naluka" near Konstancija/Morinj:

garden camp Naluka with figs falling from the trees on the breakfast table ;-) ...

...and on a chilly cold, refreshing river

Morinj beach looking over the bays and mountains of the Kotor fjord

a new physical experience: warm salty sea water (not always) mixed with cold fresh water from the river

After a snack in the nice and surprisingly cheap (!) beach bar we took the public minibus (blue line) for the 50min ride to KOTOR

along the fjord, its monastary islands and its nice village
Perast...

...in an old very cheap public minibus that needed extra water

KOTOR old town and city walls

view from the city walls

impressions of Kotor

On our 2nd Montenegro day we made a afternoon trip with the bikes and the ferry boat..

to Tivat and the "artificial" Porto Montenegro ("Monaco of Montenegro")

naval museum

and 30 min later, on the way back we got caught by a heavy montenegrinean thunderstorm

On the next day (sunny again) we left Montenegro via a very beautiful and well kept road through the mountains above the Kotor fjord towards the Bosnian border near Trebinje

8. On the way to a new adventure: cultural experience BOSNIA

After about 3 hours along simple and not very well kept, windy roads through Serbian and Croatian regions we reached the "Half island - River camp" in Buna - at the chilly cold river Buna (15 km south of Mostar)

the best refreshment: jumping into Buna river!
and the best service offered by camp owner Gaga!

a testemony from war times: a demining center in Buna

Visiting the Derwish house (monastary) in Blagaj with our personal tour guide and
taxi driver Gaga:

and the medieval town MOSTAR with its famous bridge

view from the big mosque

traditional bosnian food

after a visit in the very interesting war museum we explored the quarter around the old bridge

the old - reconstructed - bridge over river Neretva

The next day we left our new friend Gaga and Mostar and had a wonderful road trip along river Neretva to small family-"camp Sarajevo" in a village outside of SARAJEVO.

Our first Sarajevo impressions, honestly speaking, were disappointing: we couldn't find the public bus and needed a taxi, we found no open snack bar (Sunday) and the outer districts of the city looked communistic and poor and dirty....but a bit later we experienced a very interesting cultural (islamic) mixture in the old center..

the old bazar quarter

But after this afternoon we needed a break from that intense cultural experience and went back with the tram and a taxi (and with Ajran, Burek and Baklava) to the camp for a cool, lazy evening.

The next day driving north through Bosnia was tiring and not very nice: not finished highways, bad country roads, villages and cities with old industry and smog...and it still looked so strange for us: green hills and villages like in Austria and mosques every where ;-). But the worst was the boarder to Croatia in the middle of a village (Gradice) - hard to find (we needed the Navi!) and then 1,5h traffic jam over a single track fenced bridge!
One hour later on the Croatian highway we finally reached Zagreb and "camp Zagreb! in Rakitje: 17km north east of Zagreb on a lake.

Camp Zagreb

We desperately needed a drink at the beach bar after driving through Bosnia ;-P

9. A very nice final stop in ZAGREB:

After a refreshment we took the public train from a village next to the camp to Zagreb city center...
...and spent a very nice evening in this beautiful city ("miniature of Vienna"):