June 30, 2015
To The Black Mountain: Mostar to Kotor.
Saturday
"Where did you see that bear?" Kyle asks me.
"In Bosnia" I laugh and add "he could be near Dubrovnik now"
His plan is to cycle toward Dubrovnik and wild-camp a bit short of the city, but understandably is fearful of bears.
It is already midday and hot out. Kyle has spent an incredibly long time gathering his things together and has taken his bike downstairs ready for the road. Then at last sits down, saying, I'll stay another night. I'll get to bed early and get up tomorrow morning earlier and set off.
Myself, I planned on an easy day. I have the journal up to date and thought another day in Mostar won't set my schedule back too much. I spend he morning walking around town and taking some photos. Have lunch of veal and salad for three euros at a cheap restaurant: the low prices is something I'll miss when I leave the Balkans. Lunch really fills me up and with my book along, I read a couple of pages until the heaviness of food and heat makes me feel drowsy and I return to the hostel for a siesta.
I wake up at five and go down to the café across the street for a wake-up coffee and read my book more.
In the evening when Kyle had gone to bed early, I and others from the hostel go down to the river embankment below the bridge. It seems the place to go of an evening in Mostar. There's a bar to buy drinks and then we sit in a circle by the river bank. We meet a young man from the Basque country with his tent camping and he has a new friend, one of the many stray dogs is laying asleep outside his tent. He said he fed it a sausage earlier, but when he offered the dog bread, the dog wasn't interested. Fussy dog.
Sunday
I have a turkish breakfast of sheep's cheese, salad, black and green olives and omelette at Café Istanbul opposite the hostel. There's a large photo of Istanbul, viewed from the Asian side of the Bosperus looking across at the Blue Mosque on the city hilltop opposite, taking up the whole of one wall. And another photo of the Taksin tram. The owner tells me he moved here from Turkey a year ago.
As I sip my second coffee, I know when I return across to the hostel it'll only take me about ten minutes packing the panniers and I should be on the road by half nine. Then glancing toward the hostel, I see Kyle is looking out the window yawning having just gotten up.
Back upstairs in the hostel reception area we decide to set off together, although once outside Mostar on the Dubrovnik road, I'll turnoff for a place called Blagaj and then continue on across the mountains to cross into Montenegro, which thankfully uses the euro. I've been watching not to be left with five euros worth of Bosnian marks and in Croatia they use the "Kuna".
The sky is grey and dripping rain when we get the bikes out in the street, but it doesn't look like it'll be much as it is bright to the west, the way we're going.
We shoot the wrong way along a one-way street, taking us directly upon the road for Dubrovnik. It is the first time in a long time since I've had company and so don't think about navigating, but Kyle points out a left-turn sign I'd missed "It says Blagaj" so looking for traffic, I move over into the filler lane and turn left, leaving Kyle going straight on. We wave as we go are respective ways and I shout back "watch out for bears!"
The one annoying thing about this road I've turned onto is, they're painting the broken line down the centre and so to prevent cars driving upon fresh white paint, have set out cones along the middle, meaning cars, there's a constant flow, cannot move out very far when passing me. This lasts a few kilometres. The road heads across a plain toward mountains with rows of vines to the left and Mostar airport on the right. On drawing close to the mountain, the rain which has continued dripping, intensifies to steady rain and looking ahead, the only way on will be climbing up into the mountains where it appears to be a miserable wet day.
When I get to Blagaj by a small river emerging from a ravine, it is still raining. The road narrows to a street with cafes and further is lined with stalls selling souvenirs and there are groups of tourists strolling along. Then the road come to a dead end with no obvious way on for the road to the Montenegrin border, even though on my map, Blagaj in on the road. I ask at tourist information. The girl there says I much return back to the main road. The road I want is a few kilometres further.
The rain has stopped and the grey cloud is breaking up and the sun is warm. Having returned to the Dubrovnik road, I took the right left-turnoff and I'm on a road to Trebinje, which on the descent to Stolac there's a sign: Trebinja 84km: a lot more than I envisaged. With the heat I've already drunk a two litre bottle of lemonade and I've only a litre carton of orange-juice left. The two litres of water I've got is for camping.
There are lots of cafes in Stolac, but no place open where I can buy lunch. I'm not terribly hungry, I thought I'd just eat now and get it over with and if I do find somewhere, hope they except euros, having only two marks left.
The small town is attractively located in the bottom of a valley with grassy pine dotted slopes on three sides. At a cross in the centre there's a turn for Bileca, which is another way to Montenegro.
The way on to Trebinje climbs steadily along the valley with rocky dwarf pine dotted slope across on the left and up the bank on the right are red signs with scull and cross-bones warning of landmines. Then passing a "Welcome To Republic Of Srpska" sign, the hill becomes steeper and seems to go on and on up a dry exposed hill without any shade. Normally if I can ride at at least twelve kilometres an hour, the draught of movement is enough to keep me cool. On this slope which is nine per cent gradient in places, my speed is reduced to walking pace, which isn't fast enough to keep me cool and of coarse if I stop, the heat is unbearable.
| Heart | 0 | Comment | 0 | Link |
Once I've crested the hill, it is great to be descending, feeling a cool draught created by cruising at over forty kilometres an hour. The way is across a bumpy green wooded plateau for a few kilometres until descending sharply to a scattered village, Ljubinje, in an agricultural crop-striped flat valley bottom. Having passed the village on the right, I pull into a petrol station on the left. With two marks to quench my thirst, I look at the outside fridge with coke and sprite, all marked one mark fifty. The red faced and greying proprietor come out of the shop and with a friendly smile asks "Da Drobri..." or something. I reply "pivo" (beer). He goes into the shop and returns moments later with a cold can of beer, then motions with finger that'll cost one mark fifty. He then motions with his hand gripping an invisible glass, would I like a glass to pour the beer. I nod yes please and he takes a glass from the shop and sets it on a table under an umbrella to the side. I take a seat and savour the cold beer. When the proprietor finishes with a customer stopped for petrol, he come and sits opposite and lights a cigarette, then asks me where I'm cycling to. I say Trebinje. He holds all five fingers of one hand up and a single digit of the other hand up to indicate that it is sixty kilometre, then tilts his forearm to indicate a big climb.
The climb when it come is only a short affair and soon I'm sweeping down and the route takes a sharp turn to the left along a long wooded valley closed by mountains far off ahead.
By now it is getting on for six o'clock and I'm feeling the fatigue and heat of the day. I need to sit down, so when I get to a suitable place, lean the bike against the roadside crash-barrier and taking my cloths pannier, sit upon it on the inside of the barrier which is shaded by a tree and drink the remainder of my orange-juice.
When riding on again, I'm lucky to come to a church, where I find a water-tap, so fill the two litre empty lemonade bottle.
Riding on there is soon a river artificially contained in a straight concrete channel, parallel below the road on the right, up from which by the roadside are flat areas hidden from the road by hedging, typically like a grassy laneway alongside, which lens itself well to free camping.
Dinner is pasta with peanut-butter mixed in as a sauce. The result is pretty good.
Monday
I'm out of the tent at quarter past seven. I was for diary writing but by the time I've breakfasted, the sun is getting too warm to hang around, so I decamp and I'm on the road at half eight.
I reach Trebinje an hour later, from which it is thirty-one kilometres to the Montegrin border according to my map. The way follows a picturesque lake filled valley for quite a bit of the way, before reaching a dryer valley, before a high barrage of mountain blocks all further easy transit. A natural border in which the road winds it's way up for about eight to ten kilometres. Pass the Bosnian customs the road climbed even steeper for a kilometre or so. Then beyond the Montenegrin customs, it keeps climbing. To the side is a long drop into a remote un-inhabited wooded valley.
| Heart | 0 | Comment | 0 | Link |
Once I've crested the summit and freewheel down, I turnoff right for Vilusi, marked with a circle on my map it is my first chance to buy some lunch. It is only a small hamlet with a bar and a shop where I buy the basics: bananas. a peach, bread and juice. And sit on steps to the side to eat.
The forty kilometres down to Kotor bay, being all down hill goes quickly. Then on the long ride around the bay, my feet inside my cycling-shoes become agonizingly painful. In the heat, the feet expand and even if I close the shoes loosely, it doesn't seem to make much difference.
Anyway I'm glad to be checked into a hostel here in Kotor and will remain a day.
I've met up again with Kyle.
And there only remains a short day's ride to Bar where I'll get the ferry to Italy.
Today's ride: 217 km (135 miles)
Total: 6,031 km (3,745 miles)
| Rate this entry's writing | Heart | 0 |
| Comment on this entry | Comment | 0 |