The Great Circular European Railway Challenge · Chapter 10
Balkan trips and Balkan kips and Balkan nips and …
A passport stamp! With a picture of a train on it!
Balkan trips and Balkan kips and Balkan nips and …
A passport stamp! With a picture of a train on it! The Skopje to Beograd service was already winning.
We crossed the border into Serbia at a civilised time, around 10pm I think. Certainly well before the beds were made. We had the lights out when passport control happened in a bid to rid our cabin of the 100 or so mosquitos flying around. I was already bitten to fuck, Jason had a nasty one too, and none of us fancied being fed on overnight. After a bit of killing, we set the beds up. I sparked out at about 11pm, I had a solid and wonderful 6.5 hours uninterrupted kip. Everyone else had a rough night. I just don’t do things the same as the others. But my sleep architecture (a term I learnt from Paul) seemed sturdy once more. Apparently Lester had come in to look for something and gone back to his cabin in rejoicing mode: “he’s asleep! he’s asleep!”.
There was an excellent sign in the train corridor telling us the rules of the house. The smoking is not permitted after 10pm.
As usual we were late, about 70-80 minutes so. This was a less bad thing than it could have been, since our original arrival time was 0543 and we had 3.5 hours to kill on that schedule.
Also Belgrade is an uninspiring shithole. I left the station for about 30 seconds and saw nothing in any direction to tempt further exploration. Paul and Lloyd did venture a bit more, only to return and tell me I’d been right to not bother. Left luggage was a guy hanging out of a building site tea room. We kept them with us and sat ordering coffee and tea in a hybrid of German, Russian, and English. Steve did a bit of work. The rest of us leeched electricity and wifi. There was an excellent four candles moment:
“what’s the wifi password?”
“Internet”
“yes, the Internet, what’s the password?”
“Internet”
“yes, I’m trying to get on the Internet, can you tell me the password?”
<exasperated glance to other member of staff>
“Internet”
“yes, WHAT’S THE … oh, I see, right. thanks!”
None of the station’s signs worked. All the platforms said the same thing. Nowhere seemed to say Uzice in Latin or Cyrillic. Due to leave at 0910, Mark set off to see what the deal was. After a while he came running back.
It’s not a good sign when Mark runs.
So, there was our train, heading to Podgorica and Bar in Montenegro. A nearly 4 hour trip to Uzice in the middle of Serbia for us, spent entirely in the vestibules and corridors. It was rammed and we had no reservations. A very deft “no, please, not required” combined with a backhand palm from the conductor saw us spend a few euros, but to no avail - we were not getting seats on here. Actually there were two, flip down things in the corridor, which we tag teamed, and for about 10 minutes Paul actually sat in a compartment before giving it up for an elderly lass.
Serbia wasn’t overly picturesque. The most impressive part of the journey, and it was bloody impressive, was Steve constructing a kitchen area out of rucksacks and a bread board, and making cheese and cucumber sandwiches for all. Real cheese too, not the squeezy kind.
My ankles were still massive and hurting a bit. Not much. But a bit. The loo was grim and sink blocked, so all washing came in the form of baby wipes. Thanks for those, Mike.
Precious electricity had given me enough juice to do a lot of GPS work on this train, to track and keep track. I was fulfilling my duties as chief navigational officer pretty well, knowing exactly where we were and where we should be at all times. I’ve never spent so long simultaneously cluelessly lost in the middle of bastard nowhere yet also precisely aware of my location to within 50 metres. God bless modern technology.
So, on my instruction, when we got to Uzice we opened the door and started to get off. Then we hurriedly got back on, because a guy on the ground was shouting at us. This was not the Uzice we wanted, but a suburban station about 5 minutes early. Evidently this place was a fair size, and evidently I’m a fool sometimes.
At Uzice we had prearranged road transport to take us to Sarajevo. We arrived 10 minutes late. What’s 10 minutes between friends?
The Incident at Mokra Gora
You’d think we’d be used to a bit of surrealism and chaos by now.
Three guys with cabs were at the station. They mentioned Sarajevo before us, and were indeed going to take us there, via a narrow gauge tourist railway called the Sargan Eight, so called because the line follows a figure 8 as it tunnels and climbs its way up, down, and through some mountains. Off we go, then.
After a cannonball run drive through the countryside, punctuated by a stop at a petrol station where the driver ahead of us bought the passengers beer, but our cab remained dry, and a narrow miss at the single lane bridge, we got to Vitasi Sargan with about 15 minutes to spare. Not quite the dilapidated nowheresville we expected, this was actually a very well presented yard with nice water features and a train-bike thing and well looked after rails and HELLO, SHE’S SELLING BEER.
Sargan Eight
We bought beer.
What we (almost) didn’t buy was tickets. Obviously we’d not actually got any Serbian currency, expecting to pay in euros everywhere. Moreover, we didn’t bloody expect the conductor to refuse not only the currency but the amount. We wanted to pay with €50, which was roughly 50% more than the asking price, and we only wanted to go one way. He only agreed when it was obvious that he couldn’t bloody leave us behind, especially because our cab drivers - told to wait until we’d got on the train just in case something went wrong - had fucked off.
The ride was top fun. Twisty turny tunnely stuff, great views across the valleys and of the tracks we were yet to use, or had already left behind. A couple of stops, lots of photo opportunities, and a descent into Mokra Gora where our carriages waited.
Sargan Eight
Sargan Eight
Sargan Eight. Er, I think. What?
Sargan Eight
Sargan Eight
Sargan Eight
Sargan Eight
Lloyd and Mark at the top of the Sargan Eight
Ah yes, about these carriages…
So, we now only had one cab driver, one of the Serbian guys from Uzice. Also 2 Bosnian fellas, who apparently had no wheels but swore blind they were our real ride. What? This was an incident.
Lots was shouted in lots of languages, some of it into phones. Yer Serbs wanted the €300 to take us the rest of the way. If we agreed, the other two would turn up with our bags and we’d go. Yer Bosnians said oi, we were at Uzice, we came from Sarajevo to meet you, you’re our fare so come on, get in our vans, and pay us the €300. They’re around here somewhere. Probably.
We just wanted to pay the sovs and get there. However, this was all meant to have been sorted by a Sarajevan who was also in control of our accommodation. Oh dear.
Hand shakes and hugs were exchanged, laughs were had. It seemed the incident was over. It wasn’t. For another 15 minutes or more voices were raised again, by now added to by the train guy who insisted we take our return trip to Vitasi (er, no). Again the phone came out. Some truth had been learnt: the Serbs were just enterprising cabbies, and the Bosnians had turned up late, missed us, and headed here to catch us up.
They were our transport, but had to catch us up. Like fuck were we going to pay full whack to them, but we obviously had to pay the Serbs for taking us to the start and hanging around (doubtless catching new fares, but still …). The main Bosnian guy wouldn’t accept our offer, but the man on the phone told him to. Cabs and luggage arrived, the Serbs shook a lot of hands, some minibuses appeared. The conflict was over.
For now.
Mokra Gora is very close to the border with Bosnia. We crossed, noticing there were businesses in the no mans land between the two (exit and entrance). How does that work?
Perhaps as a display of geographical sibling rivalry, our Bosnian drivers were even more insane than the Serbs. There was a palpable sense of dismay, disdain, disgust whenever traffic approached us on the other side of the road, using their lane legally but denying us our right to keep the racing line at all times. We zoomed, we overtook when it was dangerous and illegal, we had lots of fun. Well, I did.
Bosnia is gobsmackingly beautiful. The first, I dunno, hour or so of the journey was jaw dropping. Like the bus to Fauske but with trees and colour, a long trip hugging mountain sides and a new vista at each turn. It was amazing. After a while we were merely treated to expansive countryside, but soon enough it became grand again, mountains everywhere and then, oh, hello Sarajevo. You’re beautiful.
So, er, why are we still driving?
The vans took us way up hills to a youth hostel way out from the manifestly gorgeous centre. We weren’t happy with this. Were we being punished for the incident? Whether we were or not, more voices were raised, a phone came out again and before we knew it the 9 of us were ensconced in a decidedly central hostel, full of showers and lovely precious electricity.
And, relax. Time for a raki.
Sarajevo