Best Scenery of the Trip

Sunday, Aug. 28, 2016--Sarajevo to Niksic to Zabljak

It was another LONG travel day to go only a fairly short distance.  I left the apartment at 6:30 and caught a trolly-bus to the Eastern Bus Terminal.  It went faster than it did the previous time I went there, because of lack of Sunday morning passengers and traffic.  Then I took a bus from there to Niksic in Montenegro which also took less time than scheduled.  Finally, I took a bus from Niksic to Zabljak which was slow and had a driver who should not have been driving.  Fortunately, we made it fine, but we were about 40 minutes later than scheduled.

Our highway followed a river at the bottom of a very narrow and tall canyon almost all day.  The water in the river was beautifully clear and green with everything in the bottom of the river visible.  The mountainous sides of the canyon were covered in trees, but also had stone outcroppings.  We twisted and turned and twisted and turned again.  I tried taking photos, but I could only do it straight out of my window.  If I tried to angle the camera, I got reflections on the window glass.  So my options for good photos were very limited.  Still, I couldn't stop snapping more and more.  At one point, there was a sign saying, "Europe's Deepest Canyon."

Niksic itself was on flat land.  With 2 1/2 hours to waste until the nest bus, I went walking through the town.  It was okay, but not a place I would want to visit overnight.  I climbed (with my luggage) through a huge cemetery to the Orthodox Church and saw part of a service.  I sat out front and started reading a new novel.  Then I went to a park closer to the bus station and sat reading while watching other people in the park.

I made a bad decision when our bus came.  The driver was obviously frustrated when he saw a line of about 8 of us each with luggage for the trip.  It was a small bus.  He opened the luggage compartment and left it to us to figure out what to do.  The backpackers quickly accepted that their bags wouldn't fit with the three already there.  They suggested that maybe my smaller bag would.  I tried and tried reorganizing and couldn't make it fit.  But I felt guilty about having my suitcase AND my small backpack.  I usually ALWAYS have the backpack on the bus with me because it has my computer; my charging lines for the computer, the camera, and the phone; my medications, etc., in it.  Anyway, it would fit in back, so I put it there.  When I tried to close the door, I realized that it lock didn't seem stable.  Instead of the handle going straight down, it barely went past half-way, and at half-way, it was open.  Still I jumped on the bus with my suitcase.

That's when I started worrying.  What if the back of the bus comes unlocked and the luggage back there falls out onto the highway?  As the driver took our tickets, I used hand motions to emphasize that he needed to be sure the luggage compartment was locked.  But the whole trip, I was worried that I would lose my backpack.  I'll never, ever let it be anywhere but with me on the bus again!

But just as bad as my worries about the backpack were my worries about the driving.  The driver stopped to pick up his son to ride with us on the way.  The son kept talking, and the father kept looking toward him instead of at the winding mountainous road.  Then he got a phone call.  So he was now driving us while holding and talking on his phone, and holding a cigarette and smoking it!!  But it got worse.  As we got closer to Zabljak, he started doing paperwork while driving us down a steep mountain with tight hairpin curves.  He was using his elbows to drive at one point.  During that period, we met another, larger bus on one of the hairpin curves.  It was such a bad situation.  He could have easily lost control with the bad habits he was exhibiting.  Fortunately, we made it (and my backpack was still in back), and I will not be using the same bus company when I leave here on Sunday.

My apartment, Double bed apartment, city center, is very centrally located.  It is large, too, and has lots of English channels on TV.  I made myself some fruit tea that the owner left for me and did some quick research before going out.  Then I wandered around town.  Zabljak is a small place, but it is filled with tourists.  (Probaly 75% of the passengers going through the Niksic bus station today were tourists who were going to or coming from Zabljak.)  They are here for two things--Durmitor National Park (for hiking) and the Tara River Canyon which is a World Heritage Site (for river rafting).  And they were all downtown as I wandered through it--looking for restaurants, shopping at the supermarket, and, like me, just checking out the town.  Most people only stay about 2 days, so most of those I saw tonight were new to the city like me.

I made one great discovery as I explored.  There is only one bakery in the town, but it is unusual in that the owner apparently makes all the pastries.  They looked different from those in the cities where most bakeries buy from wholesalers who deliver the pastries either already cooked or ready-to-cook.  I bought a dessert that looked great.  Think of a 12-inch (30.5 cm) diameter that is 1 inch (2.5 cm) thick cut into 4 parts.  That's the size of my pastry which was many layers of filo dough filled with a chocolate mixture (probably made from cocoa, sugar, and butter) and drizzled on top with a caramel sauce.  It was warm when I bought and ate it!!