Chisinau

I didn't know what to expect when going to Chisinau (pronounced chiss-in-now) because I already knew Moldova was perhaps the poorest country I was going to visit and various people I had met in Romania didn't exactly have great things to say about the place.

However, Chisinau at least is actually really nice and the weather was hot when I was there. Actually a bit too hot, like 35 degree's!



I was just walking down the street and turned to cross the road and saw the words "Chopin 2010" which caught my attention since I love Chopin's music. Then, when waiting to cross over I suddenly realised that the zebra stripes are a piano keyboard!


This is the national museum. Inside were exhibits from Moldovan history including a massive diorama depicting a scene from WW2. They had decorated the museum with the exact shadeof "communist green" which is a sort of cheap looking darkish pea green that looks old and new at the same time.



The blue church.


I actually think that Chisinau is quite a nice little city but it doesn't feel as "modern" as other capital's and I guess this is because Moldova is a poor country and has actually only recently opened its borders to visa free travel for western visitors.

Steve.

Bucharest

Bucharest was not quite what I had expected.

Some of the architecture is really grand and imposing and wouldn't look out of place in say, Paris.

The center of the city is quite compact with the old town being a small strip just above the river.

This is the parliament building, I told it's the second largest building in the world:


There are many grand buildings housing state departments in the city center:


And other interesting looking buildings too:


Monuments and statues are around every corner in the old town.


I saw this and started thinking of silly vampire jokes:


The triumphal arch:


I went to a museum where traditional houses from different regions all over Romania are shown. They are not replicas, they were physically moved from the villages to the museum from 1936 onwards. This was very interesting, they also displayed traditional dress from each area and had other buildings such as churches, water mills, wind mills, stables etc.


Drivers in Bucharest are not very careful. I was almost run over several times on crossings because, although the crossing was green for me, they didn't feel like waiting.

The city doesn't feel like it would be very safe at night but its ok during the day.

Overall my visit was ok, I would like to see more of Romania but I don't think I'll hurry back to Bucharest any time soon.

I travel to Chisinau in Moldova tonight.

Steve.

Sofia

My visit to Sofia was really good.

I got to finally catch up with my Bulgarian friend that I met on the overnight train from Prague to Krakow!

Sofia is a big city and there are a lot of drab buildings but there are some nice places too:


I visited the Rila monastery which is about 120km from Sofia, a very important place in Bulgarian history:


The statue of St Sofia:


The fountain that is next to the Presidents house and the Communist Party building:


The Russian Orthodox church:


The huge University building:


So, Sofia was good.

It seemed to be very safe, even all the stray dogs in the streets were friendly :-)

If anyone says that the pavements in the UK are bad, they haven't been to Sofia!

I took a short bus ride to the "student town" and got to see some of the more "real" parts of Sofia too.

Steve.

Belgrade

Belgrade is quite a nice city, I definitely got the impression that it is very safe come here, even walking around late at night (or really early in the morning!) is totally fine.

And there are some nice places to visit too, such as the fortress and associated park:


A lot of things in Belgrade are signed in Cyrillic (the blue square is a street sign):


There are two big buildings that were damaged in the last war that haven't been rebuilt yet:


The cathedral of Saint Sava, I'm told it is the second largest in Europe, although it is not quite finished yet:


A view of the old town from a bridge across the Sava river:


Republic square at night. Its a big meeting place:


One of the old side streets in the old town at night:


My visit to Belgrade was good and I would come here again.

The place I stayed in fantastic and food and drink are still cheap, by western Europe standards anyway.

I'd recommend anyone to visit this city because I has a good balance of things to do and see.

Steve.

Sarajevo

Sarajevo was a mixed experience.

On the first day I went to the tunnel museum which is located in a house by the airport.

During the Bosnian war from 1992-1995 the city was surrounded by Serbian forces but the airport was controlled by UN forces so that they could distribute aid and observe the war.

In 1993 a tunnel was built in secret underneath the airport that allowed food and arms to get into the city and for people to leave it. More info click here.

The tunnel museum was very interesting and they showed us a 20min film of amateur and professional video footage shot from both within the city and with the forces around it.

Close to where I stayed was a main road they called "snipers alley", or something like that, where around 10 people (civilians only) would be killed by snipers in the hills overlooking the road.

Still today a lot of buildings have bullet holes in the walls and in some of the places where mortars landed on pavements, they have filled the holes with red concrete.

This is the Holiday Inn where the journalists and photographers lived during the siege:


Bullet holes all over these buildings:



Inside the tunnel:


The monument to all the children who died during the war:


The Latin bridge near where Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife were assassinated on 28th June 1914, an event which sparked the start of World War I:


There are nice buildings in Sarajevo too:



And some funny things too:



It seemed to me that Sarajevo is an unfinished city. You would see a nice building next to a bombed out one, next to another nice building next to an ultra-modern tower. It just doesn't work well.

I think to return in 5-10 years time would definitely be a good idea as there should be some big changes.

Steve.

Ljubljana & Slovenia!

Slovenia is an awesome country!

Ljubljana is such a pretty city it could easily be in Slovakia ;-)

I had a great time here and met some great people.

The train ride from Zagreb was nice and for a lot of the journey the train passes close of the Sava river which, in this part at least, is a milky greeny/blue colour which looks great against the trees and mountains.


This is a view of Preseren square taken from the top of the tower of Ljubljana castle. There is the pink church and you can see a little of the triple bridge.


Preseren square as seen from ground, facing the triple bridge. It's hard to believe that 3-4 years ago traffic used to pass through here.


The statue of the poet Preseren. Part of one of his poems is now the Slovenian national anthem, "A Toast...".


The triple bridge from the side.


Ljubljana is in the middle of Slovenia and there are many places to see that are 2 hours at most away.

This is lake Bohinj which is just within the Triglav national park. It's a great place to see.





This is lake Bled which is perhaps better known than Bohinj and is certainly more developed. It has an island in the middle and you can hire boats!


A recent tradition in Slovenia is "Matura" which is when all the high school students take to the streets and dance in pairs after exams are finished.

It was a really, really cool thing to see.


Much of the architecture in Ljubljana was designed by Joze Plecnik who designed his own house on what was then the outskirts of the city. It is now a museum and contains many of the man's personal belonging and tools of his trade. It was very interesting to see.


I loved Slovenia and Ljubljana especially and stayed for two weeks in the end!

It's a very relaxing city, very safe, very clean and pretty, has all the modern shops, nice places to eat and drink and is only an hour or two from really cool places in the countryside.

Ljubljana is somewhere I can imagine living.

Everyone - visit Slovenia!!

Steve.

Zagreb

I really like Zagreb.

It's a very pretty city with lots of parks and other green spaces.

It felt very safe and clean.

The buildings are not really tall and there seems to be a uniformity which makes the city feel like it's "finished". Other cities cannot boast this.



An extremely short funicular railway. You can actually walk up all the steps in about a minute and it's not that steep.



The main square which is a big meeting place at evenings and weekends.

There are also lots of cultural events happening here and I saw a group called "InCulto" perform their song "East European Funk".

This was actually the Lithuanian entry into the Eurovision song contest and I saw them first!



My visit to Zagreb was really good and I would definitely visit again.

I thought that the museum of the city of Zagreb was especially interesting.

Steve.