Zavidovici...fantastic trip!

On Monday morning we had said our goodbyes to the family and friends in Sumnjajce. We had actually had a very early breakfast in the sunshine with Branko, the still manager, who had insisted that we all went to his house for a goodbye breakfast. It was actually like a British summer by 8.30 and they lent Father a baseball cap to shelter his neck from the sun. All he really needed with that was a skate-board! In actual fact they insisted that he kept it as a present. There is little doubt that if he wears it in Windermere he will be one of the funkiest nonogenarians in Cumbria. In the afternoon we went to the farm where Vllora lives with her husband Nurko and her two children, Hirudin, now aged 2 and her 7 month old daughter Almedina. They live in the upper floor of a "farmhouse" on the central area of the plateau which is actually really not much more than a living area above a store and attached to a large barn. By UK standards it is rough living. The children, though healthy and well loved, live in a situation which would cause our social services departments to have nightmares (and daymares!). The staircase to the first floor is an open wooden one with no protection across the top. It leads into a sort of summer day area where they leave their shoes before going into the house. Muslim households always take off their shoes and walk about in small knitted slippers, which are beautifully made and very comfortable. The Bosnian muslim people are very moderate in their religion compared to many of our immigrant muslims. They do not dress in any different fashion or live any any very different way or eat very different foods, and the only thing s of note which mark them out are that they usually do not use toilet paper in their lavatories but wash instead, they take their shoes off in the house, they have different names and use some different words, and most have more children. Many of them in Bosnia are sheep farmers or have worked on the land, and some of them have a sort of itinerant family set up, living in the mountains with their flocks in the summer and outside main towns in the winters. Vllora and her husband live here all the year round however, but are already quite successful with sales of their sheep and are buying a house in Livno. The kitchen, likemost in the valley, has long settees down two sides with a low coffee table between and in the corner is a wood burning cooking and heating stove and a sink............

back the story of Zavidovici........

Vllora has a habit of sending me demanding text messages, mostly just “Haw are yau and yaur Dad? Call me!” Actually this is sometimes irritating, especially as she has no idea how much it costs to phone her mobile phone from the U.K. I don’t resent the occasional call, because, at the end of the day, I do like her and the family a lot, but it is usually because she wants something rather than that she is particularly interested in either of our wellbeing. No, that’s unfair, she is, but self preservation and relative poverty and paucity of material things push her to it. Vllora loves her material things, but sadly hasn’t got many. She really is a very attractive 20 year old, with a brain, and if she had been sensible like Ranka, she too would have been at university and be preparing to make herself a better world. Instead, at sixteen, she went off with a middle aged Bosnian sheep farmer and got pregnant. So she now faces the prospect of following the usual tradition of Bosnian female subservience, multiple children, fat. flabby and poor, looking 50 when she is 30, and bent over,wrapped in an old headscarf and grey or black blanket-like clothes at 60. It is sad really. In a fairer world she would have been born on the other side of the Adriatic in Italy, where she would have become all the things that she secretly yearns to be inside the young grubby farmer’s wife exterior that we now see. But, back to the phone call, this time, four weeks before we set off, she asked if I could bring her a computer and a new mobile phone and an iPod. The call back cost me about £16-00! The truth is that I have sometimes taken things like that. I was given some obsolete computers when I was in Germany, which I took to Bosnia. They went down well at the schools I took them to. I have had several one or two year old mobile phones from people who have changed them every year. iPods however are in a different league. The chance of finding an iPod going spare is just a no starter. I did change my own phone this year and now have a Nokia N73 instead of the 6230i (or something like that) which I had had for 4 years. I intended to take that to Bosnia for her because I knew she’d like it. Vllora won’t get that now though. I am determined that she must learn not to demand like she does. She never says please, although she does say thank you, and she just seems to expect me to conjure up the goods whenever she wants. She does not realise that many of the things I have taken out to Bosnia, like sewing machines, cookware, implements, seeds, and babies clothes, I have actually been out to buy specially, albeit from Clitheroe car boot sale on a Sunday morning. The telephone call persisted in asking for a favour when I come; will I take her and the children and Arzija her mother, to see Samire her sister and her new husband? Samire has been married for 18 months and they have not seen her 7 month old baby. ( Samire is just coming up 17 now) “Where do they live?” “The other side of Livno, ‘in the mountains, in the country, ‘bout two hours”. “Well, O.K., we will do a day trip out there before we leave”, I had said. I thought this would be a good way of spending time with them and doing something other than sitting in Arzija’s hot smokey kitchen, which Father hates. With this family, it is always a bit harder to know quite what to do. In Sumnjajce, time is always unpressured and relaxed, but here the atmosphere is slightly different and can verge on boredom. The television is always on in the corner and overshadows easy conversation, while Grandad watches and smokes. Two years ago, we had thought that Arzija and Samire, who was 15 then and not yet married, might like to go to Mostar, a predominantly Muslim town, to see the wonderful newly restored Mostar bridge which had featured in the world news only weeks before. It was a lovely journey and Mostar was just fabulous, the new bridge and the whole great river gorge and area around it was all it was reported to be. Samire however spent the entire trip there and back sleeping in the car, and when we arrived spent all the time texting, and talking about, “my boyfriend this… and my boyfriend that….”.(Not, incidentally, the one she has now married, but Father and I got pretty sick of hearing constantly about this wretched fellow, nice though I am sure he was) She had no interest in what we were seeing other than some passing interest in the shops. She was just sex and text that day. Arzija was rather better, but in general, treated the day rather as I would treat a trip into Skipton. Neither of them showed the slightest appreciation of the architecture or beauty of the river. Father and I had enjoyed it immensely, but I guess we may as well have done it alone for all the apparent benefit or enjoyment that the girls seemed to get from it. So, a day trip to visit Samire, seemed on the surface of it to be something that Arzija and Vllora would certainly enjoy, and Father and I could relax and tolerate.
On Monday evening, we sat eating at Vllora’s house. Two and a half year old Hiroudin was alternating between leaping on the sofa next to the open window, staggering past the steel stove pipe on the red hot wood burning cooker in the corner, and trying to escape on to the outer landing next to the open staircase. He picked up cups and anything on the table, including my new Mobile which Vllora took off him and confiscated, suggesting that I would leave it or swap it with her when I left. I quickly retrieved it. She wasn’t joking. Arzija tried to entertain him. She gave him a packet of cigarettes, from which he took one. “This is party trick by Grandfather” she proudly announced. I watched in even greater horror than I did at the ever present dangers of the kitchen, as he put the cigarette to his mouth and held it there. Arzija lit it and he sucked and blew out a little smoke and gave it to her. “Arzija, you can’t do that” I exclaimed. “He’s only two! He can’t be encouraged to smoke at this age, whatever he may do when he is older” “No,” she said, “is good he no like it make him cough sick and he no smoke when he grown up” I would have said more but I felt Father’s usual quiet calmness about to erupt, and nudged him with a look. How far apart are our two cultures.
We looked towards the following day and I asked where exactly Samire lived so that I could look it up on the map and plan the trip. “Zavidovici”, I was told, and because it sounded to me something like the names of the villages in the Glamoc valley, and I had been told it was “on the other side of Livno” I started to look on the map to the East and South of Livno. I couldn’t see it, so asked Vllora to show me. She pointed. “There, Zavidovici!” “But that’s miles away!” I exclaimed. “No, ‘bout two hours,maybe three”she retorted. Distances in Bosnia are often measured in hours rather than kilometres. It is almost impossible to know how long it will take to get somewhere because of varying road surfaces, forestry trucks and accidents. Generally “’bout 2 hours” probably means about 130km (80miles), but in a camper van that could be two and a half. I measured the distance as well as I could with the edge of a piece of paper. The road was so full of obvious “S” bends that it was difficult. East out of Livno into the Hrbijina Mountains, north west to Kupres. From Kupres to Bugojna and then north following the river valleys of the Vrba to Donji Vakuf, and on at it’s confluence, now in a new range of mountains, the Krušćica Mountains, into the Lasva valley via Travnik to the Bosna valley, through Zenica to Zavidovici. Well, bugger me! That was almost 300km, 180miles! “Vllora, that’s 300 bloody kilometres!” I said. “You said it was just the other side of Livno, about 30 kilometres!” “No”, she insisted, “I say ‘bout 300, you no hear right on bad telephone; I need new telephone for better hear” “But anyway,”I said, “whatever, that’s never 2 hours,maybe three” “Well, three hours maybe four” she replied. “Five hours, maybe six”, I snapped back. “I know men drive that three hour, fast drive” “Maybe, bloody Bosnian drivers all over the road and high on slivo” I muttered, “and not in a bloody 8 metre long diesel camper van”. She could see I was ruffled. “No problem with good mobile”, she sulked, “I know you have me new phone and I can speak better next time”. I quietly seethed inside. All I really didn’t need was a trip like this, through difficult country with a 95 year old Dad with colitis, Vllora and her mum, and two kids playing up in the back. And no, she definitely bloody wasn’t having a new telephone now under any circumstances! Vllora’s little boy could really play up and was into everything and frequently quite demanding. I would have to lock everything up and really batten down the hatches. I accepted the inevitable and quietly broke the news to Father that I had inadvertently seemed to promise a 360 mile round day trip, hooked, lined and sinkered! I suppose I could have pulled out, made some excuse, but I knew inside it was a sort of promise, it was what they had actually wanted and asked of me. At the end of the day I had agreed to take them, even though I had not realised what exactly I was embarking on.
I told Father what a long trip it was. He wasn’t phased. His usual trust and enthusiasm for the adventure was still there. “Can you do it safely” he said, “you’re the driver, I can’t help” “Yes, I can DO it,” I said, “but it’s going to be a very early start and a late return”.
Father and I went across the field to the camper to go to bed. A 7o’clock departure was needed so bed now. It was cold in the valley, the sky was black with millions of stars. No light pollution in Glamoc Polje!. The camper was alongside the diamond shaped wire sheep fold where Vllora’s husband had gathered his herd for the night to protect them from the grey wolves that live in the forest. The massive sheepdog lay outside, even two wolves would have thought twice about him. He stands almost to my hips and is about the size of a deer hound but has a brown and cream shaggy coat about as thick as the sheep themselves. He is as soft as putty with people in his owner’s company, but not a dog you would want to meet up an alley on a dark night!(or if the owners were called Baskerville)
The following morning, we woke, dressed, breakfasted as usual and got packed up by 6.45. I ventured out. The sky was clear, brilliant blue as the sun was just rising over the mountains to the east of the plateau. The sheep rustled in the cage, thinking I was going to release them to their pastures; the dog growled and then smiled as he recognised a known figure and lay down again. There was a thick frost everywhere, which we had not had in the more sheltered northern end of the valley. Soon Vllora came out. She looked stunning. Thoroughly washed clean, hair done, lippy, foundation and eyes on, smart, clinging, and rather revealing dress and small heeled shoes. “My goodness Vllora, is that really still you under that?” “I still like be pretty when see my sister” she said, “and go out for trip with you,”she added smiling beautifully and flashing her eyes. I take it all as a tease, and laugh. She always was a flirt, well practised with the Canadian and British soldiers who had been in the valley, because she could speak English so well. ( well, American really because she had learned most from American films and TV programmes) How she ever managed to not marry a Canadian or British soldier I shall never understand. She had at least half a dozen offers.
Arzija comes out next holding baby Almedina, and Hiro follows, charging off to see the great dog. “Vllora”, I say, “can you please try to keep Hiro under a bit of control when we are travelling. It could be dangerous if he starts to run about” “Hiro will sleep good” she says, “Nemo problemo” We set off at 7.00 as planned. It is a beautiful day. Little Almedina sucks on a bottle and within a few miles is asleep on Arzija’s lap. Hiro climbs on the rear facing bench seat and lies down. Within minutes he is asleep. The girls relax in their finery in the back with drinks and cigarettes and children fast asleep. Almedina is finally put into the sleeping bag on my berth at the back of the camper with a safety board in front of her. With the exception of stopping then for loos and coffee, the children sleep the whole four and a half hour, 186 mile trip. We didn’t even know they were there. The journey was truly magnificent. Unbelievable. This route took us to the East of Bosnia, into a part that I had never visited. The mountains and river valleys rival the beauty of any in Europe and they are all quiet and just ours, and we are the only tourists, and this is likely to be the only camper van in Bosnia! This is the true country, the part of the old Yugoslavia that my late Great Aunt Hilda talked about from her coach trips. This is the part that you really should see, much of it restored after the war, much of it farmed with an ancient husbandry and forestry of many generations of Balkan peoples back to the times of the Ottoman Empire. I bet many things have changed little here other than perhaps the dress and the road surfaces. The river valleys were spectacular, deep cool green, verdant, rich gorges; the mountains often deeply forested in the middle areas , barren and rocky scrub high up, and ascending fields from the valleys 600 feet below the road. to rivers meandering across the meadows in their floors. The road wound back and forth around the ridges, following contours through rocky passes. Slow driving, but terrific views at every turn, often almost turning 180 degrees before straightening up and continuing north and eastwards. No, I admit, “bugger me” had been my initial reaction, but this trip was one which Father and I enjoyed every mile of the way. It was a real highlight. You could not have paid for a better excursion. “Haw are yau, and yaur Farder?” Arzija questioned as we entered the outskirts of Zavidovici at about 12.45. “Fine” I said, “sorry about the upset yesterday, we would not have missed that trip for the world, It was fabulous”
As we approached the town centre, Arzija, who had been there once before, guided us out on very rough roads, across the back of the railway tracks, and down a narrow track. Here we were between two sets of railway lines, one raised up high on a grassy bank on our left and one on our right on gravel.. “In minute, we turn left” she said. I wondered how. Another 200 yards and we arrived at a square concrete bridge, under the tracks to our left. I looked at it in horror. We had travelled all this way and now, a mile from where we were due to arrive for lunch, we were confronted with a bridge that was almost certainly about the same dimensions exactly as the camper. There was no way that Father could walk the last bit, and I could not push him up the side of this mountain to our left in the wheelchair. I got out to have a closer look. It was obvious that height had been a problem here before. The floor of the bridge had been dug out about another two feet so it was like a bridge over a shallow basin under a low railway track. I paced out the width of the bridge with my feet. I paced out the width of the camper with my feet. I drove to the entrance, got out and looked carefully at the height of the van and the bridgefrom a little stand off. There seemed just about 4 inches in the height and we would drop as we went under. There was about one shoe width on each side if the wing mirrors were folded in. I asked Vllora to go up front and watch as we came through, and then we went for it. She took a photo. Marvellous, still no disappointments, still a great day out.
To cut to the end now, rather than give the reader(s?) further pap, our visit to Samire was lovely. We had a good lunch with her Parents in Law and her husband, and saw her little boy who she has named Mohammed, which I personally felt was rather inflammatory in a future secular Bosnia, but perhaps it is a sad sign of future divisiveness. They live up at the top of the hill overlooking the railway from Zavidovici to Banja Lika, in a modern comfortable, tidy and clean bungalow. Her father in law looked very cachectic and ill to me. He had a tremor and sallow face. I would guess he is terminally sick whether he knows it or not. Samire’s husband has no job and no prospect of one. There is a factory there but one has to pay the foreman about £200-00 bribery to get employed and then that is no guarantee that the job will continue. They have about £100-00 a month between them in some bit of pension and some small amounts of casual labour that the son gets occasionally. It beats me how they all survive, but they do seem to somehow. We gave Samire the baby clothes and push chair and crib that we had got for her. She was delighted. We had a family photograph of the two sisters with their families and tears when we left. A day that was lovely, reuniting, fulfilling for all of us and a real success.
We departed at about 7.00p.m. I felt happier now I knew what to expect from the road. I could remember the phases of the journey, the markers of the distance travelled, the landmarks we had seen on the way. The drive went smoothly. We stopped for a bite of supper, watching the camper with the children fast asleep inside, and taking it in turns to pop back every fifteen minutes or so to look through the window to check on them. The journey was fast as the sun set, and we moved rapidly from dusk to dark, as you do in the mountains, now with the hardest part of the circuitous route behind us. A wonderful sunset, the dark shadows of the mountains, the brilliant sharp beam of the main headlamps cutting the darkness of an empty road, the silence from the sleeping children, the resting adults with hushed and spasmodic conversation, and the gentle growl of the big diesel, its powerful intercooler whistling slightly as it sucked in great gulps of mountain air, climbing once again into the mountains around Kupres before the final descent to Livno and the home straight.. To cap it all, a late text message came in from N. She had been to Sarajevo to sign her new contract for work. S had taken a day off work to drive her there and while there, he had bought her a ring and asked her to marry him. Great! Perfect end to a perfect day.
The following morning, after the late return, we again had an early start. It was the start of the journey home, leaving Bosnia and heading for Strasburg where we wanted to visit A and S, about whom, later. We went up to the kitchen for breakfast, even though Father had already had his porridge of course! Vllora was back to Cinderella. Hiro had woken up and was into everything again, Almedina scuttled around the stove in her baby walker, and we ate bread, Kymac, eggs, and coffee of course. Sad good-byes, hugs and a few tears and thanks for such a lovely day. Zavidovici…..fantastic trip!

Oh, yes, Vllora did get my old mobile phone!


Next…Strasbourg and Paris, the long way home, but the pinnacle of success!

Best wishes,
Doc.

Mountain Moonshine and more……

….sorry for the slight delay in the Bosnia tales. As soon as I returned I had to take a Luton van down to Evesham to move out my furniture and supervise the laying of a carpet where I had had the flood in the front room. It was a very hard two days, lifting and humping all the furniture out of the house and loading up the van. Thank God for the tail lift. It was absolutely chocca, but I still had a lot of rubbish and still quite of lot of clothes and kitchen stuff I couldn’t get in. When I arrived back at the farm it all had to be stuffed in the garages and boat shed and the place was so full that I could hardly move about. A full turn out and tidy up was needed over the next three days and then on Saturday a return to Evesham to put the remaining rubbish in a skip, the last few bits in a trailer and the big clean, some of which I confess I decided to contract out to a cleaner next week. I hate the idea of moving into someone’s dirty house, so I can’t leave it anything but perfect. Actually, with the new carpet and decorating, and a good clean, I almost wanted to move back!. (But, it hasn’t sold at a price I want, so I will probably let it at the end of May as I can’t do any sort of legal stuff while I am in the States.) On Monday, I returned back to Catterick to work, so since returning from Bosnia, I haven’t actually stopped yet, and blogging has had to take a back seat. In fact, I am off yet again, on the Harley, tomorrow, this time to Pershore, partly to get a new battery from All American in Kidderminster, and partly at the invitation of the girls from the surgery who have invited me to one of their “Ladies wot lunch” meetings; quite a privilege this, since it is not usual for males to attend at all. ( I don’t quite know what this says about me really, either I am no threat and some degree of fun, or I am a threat and even more degree of fun!)
................................................................
…and so, back to the mountain still. The process went on late into the night on the first day, with lights rigged up. We sat round the hot still and boiler with slivo and beers and potatoes baked in the ashes. The smoke and steam and glow of the fire and the atmosphere under the dim lighting was mystical and secretive and very laddish and a lot of fun. Moonshinedistilling is a lot more romantic and enjoyable than doing it in the daytime, although this was only being done, not out of secrecy, but necessity to finish the processing of the mash today. At about 11.30, the whole of the mash had been processed, and the first distilling stored in numerous containers in the cow shed until the morning. Hot, sweaty, tired and not a little inebriated, we all retired to bed until 6.30 when the process was to start all over again. I confess to being late, as I had to get Father up and get the porridge on and get breakfast, so it was actually about 7.30 when I actually arrived on the scene and by that time, they had thoroughly washed out the copper and had a new hot fire in the burner underneath it. The smoke rose from the stove pipe mixing with the early morning mist as it lifted off the valley in the warmth of the sun as it rose over the edge of the mountains bordering the plateau. “Dobra dan” all greeted each other, “Caco ste?”, how are you. “Dobra, havala, caco vie”, fine thanks, and you? Jefto and Branko were busy the former stirring the great handle of the copper and the latter feeding the fire beneath. Zarko was sat by the edge of the condenser, this time the collecting bucket covered with a fine cotton cloth as a filter, while the new clear liquid from the second distillation of yesterday’s liquid dribbled into the bucket. He was testing frequently with his hydrometer to check when the alcohol concentration was right. It seemed to be perfect, about 72% pure alcohol! He offered me a taste of the new brew. I took the small glass and smelled the aromatic scent. A heady mixture, somewhere between apples, plums, Eau de Cologne and Petrol! I raised it to my lips and sipped it, like tasting a new vintage of wine. It was good indeed ( as far as Slivovic goes anyway!) definitely some of the best I have tasted. Finally I downed it….WOW….yes indeed.pretty hot stuff this batch. We were sort of bi-lingually nodding and gossiping and making approving noises when Ranka arrived, somewhat early for the student who normally manages to arise for about mid morning coffee, like most students in Europe I suspect. She was bringing breakfast down the field with Jela, pickles and eggs, bread and Kymac and coffee. (The bottle of slivo was, of course, already on the table and being attacked prior to breakfast and coffee…one shares glasses to a great extent…they are self sterilising!) And then also, Father pottering slowly down the field to join us. The men made to help him, and I stopped them. He needs to do these things by himself sometimes, it is good for his confidence. Ranka helped him the last 30 yards and sat him on the old bus bench that was our “dining room sur l’herbe” next to the busy still. He had already had his breakfast and declined more having been happy with his porridge, but gradually an egg and some de-crusted bread and kymac and a coffee disappeared, so he was on good form. He even volunteered to turn the handle of the still while Jefto had his breakfast, so the old “White Ribboner” who has always been so true to his ethics and teetotalism, joined in for the greater good of the work to relieve one other old man for his breakfast! However he did want me to note that it was only because it was friendly and right to join in, and not because he actually approved of the product or the enterprise in any way. About mid morning, we had to leave the brewing boys, in truth although we had participated, I am quite certain that they could have done it without our help anyway! The end result was that, from 5 oil drums of mash, they finally distilled 63 litres of rocket fuel, all sparking clear after filtration through the cotton cloths and stored in the usual fashion, in almost any bottles they had saved, water bottles, coke bottles, old brandy bottles, last years empties, mostly with various odd labels still on them, belying their contents.

Father and I were off to Livno to see N for lunch. We called into Dulicani on the way to collect Arzija, another friend who is Bosniac. She had been the “boy’s mother” in the Glamoc camp. She was the principal laundry lady, and always regarded the soldiers as her boys. She did indeed look after them rather like a mother, doing their washing and sometimes bits of mending for them. She was always very chatty, talking in a pidgin English of Austrian, Serbo-croat and English, oddly comprehensible but amusing! Arzija had lived in Austria for some time with her mother and father when they fled at the beginning of the war, but they had returned in the early 90’s. The girl we were going to see, N, had been an interpreter when I worked in Glamoc, and she lives and works in Livno, her home town. She is a lovely girl in her early 40’s who is left almost alone since her parents died and her brother fled to Austria during the war. He never returned and hardly gives her any support, and for a single muslim girl on her own, with no father or brother to support her in any way, life has been hard and often lonely. She is a most open, honest friendly and caring woman, eclectic like Ranka, and non-judgmental, and I have liked her ever since I met her. She still works as an interpreter, and has just fortunately got a new contract for another 12 months, but to get and keep work is very hard in Bosnia, and harder still nowadays if you are ethnically different from the majority in your town, as N is. N’s father used to be in charge of the water department in Livno, looking after the great sluice gates that control the flow of water which comes gushing out of the mountain cliffs which overshadow the town and diverting water along the old race, now in decay, to the water mill, now also in ruins. She was brought up in the Water keeper’s house under the cliffs and had shown it to us 18 months ago, together with the beautiful re-constructed mosque where she had been as a child. N and Ranka’s mother had been at university together, in the days when a Serb and a Bosniac could be friends with no thought about it. It was while I was in Glamoc that I met them both and almost accidentally reintroduced them to each other. They have always been and remain firm friends still, which is lovely.

We went to the Forum, the central shopping precinct in Livno. Livno is predominantly ethnically a Croatian town nowadays, and wherever there are Croatians, there is plenty of German investment. Large areas of town are owned and developed by German entrepreneurs and fronted by Croatian businessmen. New housing developments spread into the fields and hills around the town and there is little remaining sign of damaged buildings or recent war in the town itself. There are some expensive German cars around, some driven by German visitors, some driven by Croatian spivs. It seems in some places that there are some people who really made a good profit from the civil war. The same is true in Croatia itself, certainly not now lacking in massive investment and redevelopment of infrastructure and businesses, unlike it’s poverty stricken neighbours of Bosnia, Montenegro and Kosovo. There is some investment by the European Union, but where real progress is being made, you can almost always see that it was from a money laundering procedure during the war or it is new German money. This aside, the Forum is very much what you would expect to find in Milton Keynes, but about a tenth the size. It has several restaurants, an art shop and gallery, beauty salons, expensive clothes and perfume shops, and one particularly good restaurant where most locals would need a month’s income to have a meal, but to us, a good meal is about £18-00 a head, and that is where Father and I take Arzija and N for lunch. ( not wonderful photo but gives you an idea of the style of the place) It was nice to sit and chat together about what has been happening in the last 18 months. I was happy to learn that N has found a really nice male friend, Y, who she has been seeing for about 12 months. He is the same ethnicity and has a good job and is similar age and not married and treats her well, she deserves it…N is hopeful! About 4.30, we leave the restaurant. Tomorrow N has to travel to Sarajevo to the U.N. office to sign her new contract. It is a long way by Bosnian roads, about 150miles. We also have a long trip, about the same distance, to Zavidovici, with Arzija and her daughter V, to see her other daughter S who is married and has just had a new baby and they have not seen her or the baby in the last 7 months. We say goodbye, N rather sad that we are unable to stay longer or go up to have tea at her flat, but she lives up on the fourth floor of an apartment block and Father definitely can’t manage that amount of stairs, so we decline.

After dropping off Arzija until the morning, we returned to Sumnjajce and Zarko, Ranka’s dad, was with her at the long wooden table in front of the house, preparing a small pig for roasting on the spit, something he has done for us every year, although sometimes it has been a small sheep. Ranka is pouring water over its insides to wash out the blood and then Zarko passes a long stake down its throat through it’s empty carcass and out of its bum and nails a bottle top through its nose and sacrum to stop it spinning on the pole. Finally he wires up the feet to the pole and closes the abdominal wall with wire and makes a few small stabs over the body to let the fat baste it as it turns. The rotisserie is automatic!. A small engine, very common in Bosnia is used to turn the spit, powered by a car battery. These spit engines are made by a combination of large and small gear wheels often obtained from either old bicycles or washing machines, and the whole is powered through the wiper motor of a car. A bit of welding and mounting on a stand and adding a clamp to hold the pole, and you’re in business. The fire is built about 5 feet in front of the spit. It is wood and as it burns, more is added. The charcoal and burning embers are then shovelled underneath the spit, where they stay hot and glow, spread out like a red-grey rug under the turning sizzling beast. They are quite the best spit roasters I have encountered. It is quite an art form and does a wonderful job over about 3 hours, certainly producing the most amazing crackling I have ever eaten.Camping al fresco in the camper in their back lawn, they ask me to put out the blind, and we arrange a table and chairs underneath. The evening turns a bit chilly, as the sun turns red in the sky, and in jumpers and jackets and hats, and Father in my Goretex jacket and a blanket, we sit in friendship, tearing at pieces of the most succulent piglet and cracking with fingers, accompanied by pickled capsicums, beef tomatoes, raw onions, bread and kymac and washed down with Pivo, or fruit juice and finished, of course, with the new brew of slivo and “kaffa”. We toast, “Givoli, cheers, friendship, each other”. Another visit here draws to an end, as we depart for bed ready to move off early for our long trip with Arzija tomorrow morning. It feels sad to leave again. It’s never long enough. Two families from totally different worlds meeting annually in friendship now for 8 years. It’s an amazing thing, friendship, you hardly even need to speak the same language. We just know that we care about each other, and that is quite a good world philosophy!

The morning starts again at 6.30, and by 7.30, Father is up, we have breakfasted, stowed the table, bed and bedding away , and take our leave. Ranka asks us to see her one more time in Banja Luka in a few days time when she is back at Uni. We agree willingly, we will meet for coffee on the way through and phone when we are getting close. We embrace and kiss and some tears….”Sretan put”, safe journey, see you again, take care, come again next year. Oddly, for the first time ever, Father, who said that this would be his last trip this time ( he has said this every year!) did not say so this year; he just said “God willing”…which means the old rascal is up for it again! Let’s go.

next installment....Zavidovici...fantastic trip.

Best wishes, Doc

Post script: I am very sad to say that, this was the last trip for Father. He died peacefully in Hospital in November 2007 after a short illness following a fall in which he broke his hip. I saw him for just a month after I returned from the U.S. Roadtrip. The Bosnian trips can never be the same again, but he will always ride with me. God Bless you and keep you Father, and try and find a place for me! With love and thanks from your son, Paul

Mountain Moonshine

I realise that to write one’s travel blog from the comfort of the kitchen table at home is not quite in the spirit of travel journalism, but the truth is that, when you are paying an annual visit to so many people for such a short time in such a country as Bosnia, and you also have the responsibility for doing all the driving, some of the cooking and looking after your 95 year old Father, the available time for blogging is somewhat limited! Before I proceed with the tales, a quick report for those of you who may have been concerned about the A.P.’s welfare and the wisdom of taking him on such a trip. The first night we spent in the camper at the farm at home was a success. We both were warm and slept well. The small plastic B and Q paint kettle under the bed came in handy a couple of times a night, and neither of us snored, Father because he doesn’t, and me because Father takes his deaf aid out at night. The mornings started fairly early as neither of us are used to sleeping in much, and while Father got washed, I folded his bed away and converted it back to a dining area, and made the essential breakfast which he has eaten all his life, the porridge. Then, while he got dressed, I washed and dressed and we both sat down for breakfast. While actually with the families we visit in Bosnia, with the exception of breakfast, we ate all meals together with them. Meals in Bosnia are basic, but wholesome, and he put on ¾ stone in weight, and is almost back to his pre-illness weight. He stayed very well and his spirits soared. In company he was his usual bubbly self again, talking with the old Bosnians, often both sides at once in their own languages, whether there was an interpreter or not! In general a brilliant trip together and surprisingly, for the first time ever, he did not tell them all that he didn’t expect to see them again next year! The Archer may not have any more arrows to fire from his quiver, but it seems he’s not intending to let go of the First arrow he shot just yet.
So, back to the story. When we arrived, we were greeted by the self elected leader of “the five old pioneers”, who I had first met in 1999. Jefto is a remarkable man of 80 distinguished by his Stalinesque moustache. He never changes; same looking clothes, same cap, same twinkle in his eyes. He is tanned and wirey and always cheeky, mischievous and fun. He greeted us both with hugs and kisses and a lot of “Oyoy yoyoy” noises, “Moy doctore,moy doctore…moy Jon, moy Jon”. His wife Jela soon joined him with similar expressions of greetings and delight, particularly at Father’s arrival. She has always treated him as a very special guest, ensuring that he has cushions all around him and the best little bits of food. Neither they nor we speak each other’s tongue, although I know a few words of Serbo-Croat now, and yet their welcome needed no real language and our delight in seeing them, none either. Jefto grabbed Father’s arm and escorted us to their house and into the main room of their house, the kitchen. This is still much the same as it was in 2000 when I first returned. It is almost always hot in there from the wood burning stove/cooker. There is a corner bench with blanket and cushion covering and a small table with stools on the other two sides. The walls are furnished with photographs of them and their family, many of them doing agricultural jobs, but this year I noted last year’s and this year’s calendars were on the wall, the annual President Tito Calendars. Jefto in particular was a staunch admirer and supporter of the late President, the only man who has been able to unite the Balkans into a single republic under a liberal communism, and after whose death, the successful former Yugoslavia fell apart in civil war.
It was not long before the coffee was on and Jefto was getting out the Slivovic, motioning to me, out of Father’s gaze, by a gesture with his thumb towards his mouth that we should step outside with our coffee and neck a few! “Oy Paul, moy Paul, moy doctore….Kaffa?.....slivo? I slipped outside with him to the bench in the garden. Father was chattering and gesturing to Jela who was making him a milk coffee from the huge pan of milk simmering on the stove. Him in English, she in Serbian, both deaf and both communicating on some level. She bundled some more cushions behing his back and set a mug of Turkish coffee with milk and some of the special hot skin cram off the top, the Kymac. I sat down with Jefto, having a similar multilingual conversation, but with cigarettes, black Kaffa, and a full tot glass of Slivovic. “Givoli”, Jefto toasted, clinking my glass. “Givoli, cheers” I responded, and we both drained the glass. ( Now, once again, a word to the would be tourists amongst you. The average Bosnian mountain male drinks a very large amount of Slivovic ( pronounced ‘slivovitch’), and a considerable number of daily Pivos (‘peevo’) or beers. Slivo is a home made brandy made from either plums or apples or a mixture of both. It is lethal stuff, and if like me, you really only drink it once a year, the first one, especially if knocked back in a drain-the-glass toast, hits you like a red hot poker down the throat. First, the familiar slightly scenty taste, then the slight warm on your palate. This is followed by a sensation of heat spreading down your gullet and the warmth dribbling into your stomach. The heat dies down again from the throat and you become aware of the warm puddle of almost neat alcohol settled over the plug hole of your stomach waiting to pass your pylorus and then into the painless sensationless drainpipe of your duodenum. By this stage the glass has been filled for the second round! The only way to stop this vicious circle of social alcoholic downward spiralling collapse is to replace your glass upside down on the table, but at this early stage in the proceedings, this would be very rude, and besides, isn’t this ritual part of what I love about Bosnia? It’s quite controllable when you know how to control it, but very difficult to control on your first one or two visits!)
Soon after we have started the ritual, Jefto’s son Zarko arrives and he speaks a little, a very little English. The greetings repeat themselves, the ritual recommences with a Pivo or two added and a second round of cigarettes. Finally about 5 slivos down, a couple of beers and a about 4 expresso coffees, our real interpreter arrives. Ranka is now 20, a lovely girl who I first met as a 12 year old when she was still exciled from home in a squat with Zarko her father and Milka her mother, in Mrkonjic Grad. She is Jefto’s granddaughter and even at 12 spoke some English and it was clear that she was intelligent, ambitious and had a lot of potential. Ranka is a kind, caring, eclectic young woman; a fair, open minded person who, despite all that happened to her as a child during the war, maintains a willingness to see Serbians, Bosniacs and Croatians in equal light. Ranka is my hope for the future in Bosnia and is now at the university studying Law. Father and I have both looked forward to seeing her again. Ranka bubbles into English, rapidly trying to translate all that her grandparents and Father and ourselves are trying to say to each other. These few days with the family are exhausting for her, but her language skills have become excellent, and she copes very well with all but the most demanding of our vocabulary.( Yes….dear reader…I DO occasionally have some extended and demanding vocabulary…especially after my first 5 slivos for the last 18 months). Finally, Ranka's mother arrived from work. Her name is Milka. She has a degree in agriculture and works as an adviser to the local community in such matters. Zarko has a degree in Forestry management, but since the British Army left and the United Nations have reduced their input, he has lost his U.N. Forestry advisory job and is again looking for work, which, in Bosnia, is rather like hunting for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Jefto and Jela live on about £70.00 a month in national support pension.

One thing that is always in good supply is potatoes, (krompir) and that evening we had a dish of roasted potatoes wedges with lumps of roasted lamb bits. It is eaten with a lot of home made bread , often dipped into the roasting pan, together with kymac, this being the skimmings from the constant warmed milk on the stove which are then drained through a seive and concentrated into a more solid form. The result, after several days drying out and being put into large pots, is something like a cross between clotted cream and a light cheese and is used instead of butter. It is a staple food, and appears at almost every meal. Do not even contemplate cholesterol! The first night, as I was enjoying the dinner , I was tugging at a piece of the crust of one of Jela's home made breads and pulled a tooth of my top denture plate. So infuriating, and, although most of the locals have missing or carious teeth, to me, it was embarrassing. I tried to stick it back on in the next 24 hours with superglue, then with Araldite and finally with some Plastic Padding I had in the camper. Each time it came off again. What the hell do they attach teeth to plates with? Are they welded? Anyway, resigned to being toothless for the next 10 to 14 days, I accepted it in good grace; Bosnia puts life and priorities into perspective very rapidly.

We slept soundly and woke to our porridge as usual. As we left the camper at 7.30, Jefto had already been up at least an hour milking the cow. About 2 gallons of fresh milk were in the big pan on the stove. Jela dragged Father inside and stuck him on the corner bench amidst his cushions, and Jefto dragged me outside and the Kaffa and Slivo routine started all over again. Another day dawns in Bosnia. Soon after we are called in for breakfast. Father protests that he has already eaten and can't eat any more, but in vain. He is presented with a fired egg and bread and kymac and a milk coffee. I am presented with 3 eggs, bread and kymac. Definitely DO start to contemplate cholesterol. Ranka has taken a few days off from Uni, but is not yet up and so our protests about being stuffed would be in vain. ( Ranka, like my own daughter, likes to "mong" when she is at home. She knows how to chill out and a long lie in is the order of the day. I can't blame her. When she is up and not at Uni, granny expects her to do a lot of the chores. Later today for example, she has to clean the entire house, bathroom, toilet, floors, and the washing up. Men do little to help. It is like pre-Second World War roles in England. When British women were burning their bras and wearing hot pants in the 60's, Yugoslav women were dressed in canvas bras and boiler suits. Now they are dressed in "western 1980's style" mostly, but their job roles haven't changed much. The men have the drinking to do and the women have the clearing up and support role to do. Granny pretty much rules the roost, both Ranka and her mother, Milka, do a lot in the house to support Jela and the men folk. Now, today, Friday, Zarko, is not going to go to work because he has a job to do here. Milka has already left for her work. Zarko is expecting a vist from the travelling "Moonshine man"!

Soon after 8 o'clock, a tractor pulls onto the croft with a trailer and some large container inside.This is a chap from 500 metres up the road. His name is Branko and he owns.........a still. Yes, it's April, it's "Moonshine time" and they have planned it for us to join in! I hardly dared mention it to Father. He is a strict teetotaller and even Jefto has got the message that he tries to avoid letting Father see when he is plying me with Slico or Pivo. I broke the news gently. Father takes it in his stride and it is just another different thing of interest here. We are taken down to the old house, the house which used to be lived in by Jefto's uncle and aunt until they died. It is a traditional Bosnian peasant house, made of logs, like a Western block house, interlocked by tenon joints at each corner. The roof likewise is made of wooden tiles and even the guttering is mad from trunks, hacked out with an adze and supported on natural shaped bent branches which for the roof timbers. Underneath is the old cow shed and inside are 5, 25 gallon oil drums lined with polythene bags, in which we are shown a foul smelling mash of apples and plums which have been maturing there since they were picked last autumn. Gradually, Branko, Jefto, Zarko and I assemble the wonderful piece of kit which would of course be totally illegal here in this country. It consisted of a large steel burner with a door in the side and grate underneath in which was set a beautifully shaped copper boiling vat with acollecting funnel all hand beaten to shap. This vessel had a large screw down opening into it at the side and a large pipe from the lower side which came to a shut handle door on the outside of the steel burner. From the top of the funnel a pipe, almsost 6 feet in the air ran some 12 feet to another large steel vessel, about 50 gallons with what looked like a large silencer box in it. Inside the 'silencer', the connecting pipe joined a tight copper coil which came to a tap at the bottom which came out through the side of the large tank. Branko takes a tin from his tractor and inside it is a mixture of white and brown wholemeal flour. He adds some water from the cistern and proceeds to mould it with his fingers into a very dry dough and this is used as the fire cement to seal all the pipes. Jela id around with a large polythene sheet collecting all the pieces of plum tree prunings and bringing them over. Branko lights the fire in the big burner under the copper vessel. Smoke wisps into the warm sunny morning air and the flames start to lap out of the door. Zarko and Jefto get buckets of the mash and start to pour it into the lock down opening in the top of the vessel.. It takes about 15 gallons of the thick stinking mash. The fire gets hotter. Zarko puts a pump down the deep water storage cistern. Water starts to fill the other tank around the outside of the 'silencer box'. Jefto sits himself down on a chair alongside the boiling vessel and starts to turn a big handle in the side which turns a ratchet inside which moves three paddles round inside to keep the mash from sticking to it. The process is underway. It lasts for the next 48 hours! Gradually the mash boils, the alcoholic steam passes along the funnel and the collecting pipe into the silencer condenser. The cold water jacket condenses the distillate and it comes out through the tap at the bottom into a bucket, which is periodically emptied into other large containers. When the mash is very thick and difficult to stir, the process is over. It is checked by testing the tap liquid with a hygrometer. When the alcohol concentration drops back, the process is stopped. The lever on the side of the boiling vessel is opened and boiling hot diarrhoea issue forthe with a wonderful scent of apples and plums. Steam and smoke rise together. The sludge is collected in a vast wooden trough and then taken for feeding to the pigs and cows. At the end, when all the mash had been boiled, the vessel wash washed out with fresh water and then the distillate was put in for a second go. Now the alcohol content of the first distillate was 42% proof. The second time round it was 78% alcohol! Bloody rocket fuel! Branko demonstrated that the stuff bursts into flame if it is thrown on the top of the boiling vessel!. The buckets have to be kept clear of the burner when being moved...they are explosive...it's as flammable as petrol...you could drive a car on it! He chattily related the story of the men who had been badly burned by exploding buckets of Slivovic when passing the boiler!

Sorry...am tired and have gone to bed.......more to come in next few days. This Saturday I have to finish chucking things out at Evesham and tidying up the house. Wait for the results of the distilling, the trip to Zavidivici, the visit to Al and Sanja in Strasburg to see their new baby, and the cherry on top of the cake...the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Best wishes, Doc.

Pilgrims (a)Way

Saturday 7^th April was a very special day in our family, Father’s 95^th birthday. Sister A, brother N and myself had arranged with the Warden/Manager of the sheltered accommodation in Windermere, where he lives, to have a buffet lunch with him and the other residents, and apart from believing that A and I were joining him for lunch he did not know that Son and New daughter, A and A’s husband P and her children were all coming too. In fact N and his wife were due to fly over from Germany but in the last week N has been unwell after a fairly routine angiogram which left him with a large bruise and femoral artery swelling which needed some small but uncomfortable inguinal surgery at short notice, so sadly he was unable to come over for the event. S,the manager at the House, had arranged a fancy dress party and had made all the lady residents nurses’ aprons and caps and all the men had a white coat on and there were lots of dolls in baby clothes all around representing Father’s previous career in Obstetrics. It was a wonderful party with lots of fun and leg pulling from the residents and all enjoyed it immensely.

After the lunch, we all returned to our respective home, and Father, who was coming with me to Bosnia the next day came back with us. That night, in the farm yard, in safety, we tried out the camper van to see whether Father and I could indeed manage in there, and he had a good night’s sleep and we prepared breakfast in the morning and we up and dressed by the time everyone else was stirring, so the experiment was a success. After lunch on Sunday 8^th April, we departed from Yorkshire en route for Dover.

We were fortunate in the weather and surprisingly little traffic on the M1,M25 and M20 and made good progress, arriving outside Gravesend about 1900hrs where we stopped in a lorry park for the night, had a good supper and slept well. The intention had been to spend a little time in Canterbury on Monday morning before our ferry at 1430hrs. That worked well, and we parked in Canterbury at 0845 and walked very slowly and gently into Canterbury where we visited the cathedral and saw the holy site where St Thomas a Becket was slaughtered and walked into the monastery garden behind, which is beautiful. I was surprised F made it so well, despite the fact that I have brought a wheelchair in case he needed it. The only blight on this Holy diversion was that some “Jobsworth” parking attendant had decided to give us a ticket, because despite there being no obvious signs to the contrary and no height barrier, and even with Father’s disabled badge clearly in the window, the plonker decided that we were in contravention because we occupied more than one space. In fact all four wheels were inside a space, but the camper has a six foot bum, which like many others, protrudes rather into other people’s space! More of this later perhaps when I have had a gentle remonstration with Canterbury Council on my return.(Although by that time, no doubt, there will be a Court summons because I have been unable to contact them to pay the £60-00 parking fine.) I also find it offensive that so many of our holy sites now find it necessary to charge for entry, as indeed does Canterbury Cathedral. They have a small notice to explain their charging policy, and why they feel it is necessary, but I cannot help feel that, even though they might need the money for the fabric of the building, it is hardly in the spirit of the Lord whom they embody and whose policy was to cast out traders from the temple and state clearly that God’s house should not be profaned by trade. I wonder whether they will similarly expect to pay to enter the Great Temple of Valhalla because God will have a little notice that says that he needs the income for the maintenance of the universe? “Consider the Lilies of the field…..”

Having left Canterbury we went down to Dover and arrived an hour early and were lucky to be put on the earlier ferry, so we sailed at 1345 and arrived at 1515 European time. The Satnav device took us straight across France and Belgium into Germany where we spent the night with brother N in Monchengladbach, with the slight ridiculous problem that I programmed the right name of the street with a single number difference in the postcode, so we arrived at the wrong house first off and spent the next half hour along very small lanes getting to the correct place. Technology is only as good as the programmer! It was nice to see N and A and their son, N who is soon to go off to South Africa, where the family used to live, to do a training course to become a Game Reserve warden. N has fortunately recovered well from his operation and illness. After an overnight stay, with the family also working early, we left at 0830 and had a brilliant, staged 600 mile run from Monchengladbach to Graz in Austria. The weather was perfect, and we enjoyed the trip, stopping about every 150 miles for a walk and a drink, and to make lunch in the camper. About 100 miles outside Graz however we hit a slight problem as the fuel light came on and I drove to try to get a fill up but, with only 3km left to go, ran dry inside the 3km tunnel at Sasstadt, just south of Wels. All’s well that ends well however, and I started the flasher lights, took out the Hazard triangles and accessed the spare can of diesel from the garage of the camper. Apart from the incredible noise and the almighty wind created by the large lorries overtaking us, it was all going relatively well until I tried to start again and then remembered an occasion whre I had helped a similar diesel van in the same circumstances and the engine just doesn’t fire up from a fuel pump, it needs priming first after running dry. Well, I hadn’t got a clue where to prime it. When I had helped before, I had towed the other vehicle into a bump start, but nobody was stopping here unless they were mad…….or Police. The tunnel patrol Police vehicle came screaming down the tunnel and pulled up in front of us. A very kind police officer spoke in excellent English and said to get the hazard triangles, get in the van and they would tow us out. Perfect, and at just the right minute. Father sat sombre at my side, certain that I was going to get either a hefty fine or imprisonment and was beginning to make suggestions as to where I might leave him until I was released! Nothing could have been further from the truth. The officers were very polite, very friendly and amazingly helpful. They opened a gate at the end of the tunnel which lead to an emergency access road and thence off the autobahn to a petrol station. They would not even accept a gift for a drink or two. It was all part of their service they said and they had been pleased to help having had us reported by a CCTV camera. ( Obviously by someone who was as good as their technology.) The whole delay- 25 minutes! Now that is some service! Vielen danke!

I paid a little homage to the guardian angel, and smiled at the small child’s bootee on the camper wall,a reminder from the time that we did this trip and turned over a trailer in a jacknife incident in the middle of a 3 lane downhill stretch of the E3 autobahn, south of Frankfurt…..and survived!

The night spent outside Graz on a lorry park alongside the autobahn does not go down in memory as one of the best nights for sleep. It rather rivals the holiday we spent camping on a Municipal campsite outside Paris in the 1980’s. That was situated alongside a railway station, between two main roads and under the flight path of Charles de Gaulle airport. This Rastplatz was apparently perfect, very large and open with good parking about 60 metres back from the road. During the night however it was clear, that one could not have seen the railway line behind the embankment at the rear, and although the sensible lorry drivers were asleep in their cabs alongside us, from about midnight, the traffic picked up on the autobahn and with the thunder of double HGVs with trailers at 70m.p.h.all night, and the express trains behind, the noise was deafening and the ground literally shook as a small earthquake might. Father, without his deaf aid in, slept like a log.

On Thursday morning, 12^th, we decided that we could make it into Bosnia easily in the day, having really broken the back of the journey, and we cruised in beautiful sunshine from Graz into Slovenia, to Maribor, and thence to Croatia and Zagreb, to Okučani and then south off cracked concrete autobahn, which is the E70, heading for the border crossing at Bosanska Gradiska. Now, for those of you, (who are probably in the majority at this moment in time), who venture into Bosnia as civilian tourists, a few words of advice. Do not be too phased by this place! It is rather like stepping back into a 1960’s James Bond film, old, tatty, narrow, congested, and manned by armed, very authoritarian police and border guards. One approaches it across a two lane iron bridge, which crosses the River Sava, the northern border between Croatia and Bosnia. Actually coming out of Croatia involves an encounter with Croatian officialdom as well, who are always interested and concerned about, not what you might have been running in Croatia, or with what you may have taken whilst there, but what are you going into Bosnia for and why you want to go there, and what goods might you be taking their erstwhile neighbour enemies. A full search can take place at either of these delightful tourist traps, but this time we were lucky and everyone seemed, at least, to be taking life in a slightly more chilled fashion. This could be related to their anticipated membership of the enlarging European Union of course, and the possibility that, since the vast majority of eastern Europeans seem to head for us, we may be the interviewee they meet when looking for their new work permit? ( Only kidding of course…..who needs work permits when you have a Home Office like ours?

The River Sava is the place where, in 1995, refugees fleeing Bosnia who tried to swim across, died when they were shot by the opposing forces. The river ran red for a week.

And so, the first part of the pilgrimage is almost at an end. We drove down through the small townships on the rough roads into the outskirts of Banja Luka. The motorway link that was being started 18 months ago is in much the same state as it was then, in fact it does not look to have made any progress whatsover from the approximately two miles of optimistic three carriageway compacted dirt that was there then. However, many more of the houses have been repaired and the townships look poor but vibrant. The driving is still as maniacal and the roadside shrines are developing small satellite shrines of their own. The drinking of copious amounts of beer and plum brandy, and the lack of any real insistence of roadworthiness of the vehicles are predominantly responsible for the accidents, although the traffic police seem to have got hold of more hand held laser cameras and some breathalyser kits. (I was reliably assured by Zarko yesterday, that they are not capable of picking up the alcohol on the breath after drinking Slivovic or Vodka, so one can safely drink those with impunity, although I think he may realise that that is unlikely to be the case one day)

The final run in is from Banja Luka to Mrkonic Grad, and involves trip up one of the most scenic gorges I have ever seen. Father and remark on it together everytime we have driven it. The pictures give some slight idea of its beauty, but only getting out and looking can really explain what I would want to express. (Yes…the camper does just go under the overhang on the left but it is a blind right hand bend…actually not the best place to try to take a photograph, and definitely illegal to do so at the wheel except perhaps here!)

The final run climbs up to the Glamoc plateau out of Mrkonjic Grad. The road, on the edge of the mountain with precipitaous drops and little in the way of guard rails is again a spectacular trip, worthy of any tourist route of the future. Sadly the poverty, the war damage and the mines which are still in many parts of the forst and hillsides are likely to prevent this for a long time to come, but I think so often, that this is a cross between Switzerland and Austria, it has wonderful hills, mountains, rivers and valleys, magnificent and vast forests, superb summer climate and heavy snows in winter, and ideal all year round resort area which could bring rapid prosperity to an otherwise impecunious, scantily industrialised, country.

We phoned ahead. Yes, we could come in anytime, a day early, no matter, everyone is waiting to see us. We climbed the last ridge and then turned the last bend to see the plateau of Glamoc Polje spread out southwards in the distance, a vast flat fertile volcanic crater. Small smoke wisps arose from the areas where they were burning off the old grass on the fields and lower mountain slopes. On the western edge, snuggled under the hill side, we could glimpse the small white dots which was the village of Sumnjajce, our destination.

Bosnia or bust….well here we are, Archer and Arrow, 1380 miles and nothing’s bust. So far, so good.

Best wishes, Doc.

Time is of an essence here in Bosnia, so probably no more will get published for a few days; there are many old friends to see, and that usually involves a considerable amount of time over Turkish style coffee, Slivovic, and beers, but watch out for next issue… “Moonshine Mountain”