So sorry for the delay on these posts- the last few days have so busy! Let’s play some catch up!
July 26, 2015
The bus from Sofia to Nis was 10x better than the bus I had taken to arrive to Nis. So basically, the reason I kind of side tracked to Sofia in the first place instead of following my initial plan to stay close to the coast from Greece was because crossing the border into Macedonia, which until relatively recently was a “territory” of Greece and the Greeks aren’t too happy that Macedonia took that name which is also what the northern part of Greece is named (like Thessaloniki is in the Macedonia area of the country). From the research I had done, to get in Macedonia, I would have to take a bus from Thessaloniki to the border town of Florina, get out of the bus, WALK ACROSS THE BORDER, then hope there is a taxi waiting there in Macedonia to take me to the bus station…. Okay I can handle that. But THEN to cross into Albania, I could not find any current information on bus times or trains or anyway that these two bordering countries were connected. Albania is also technically considered a third world country, and has not quit developed their tourism as much as other countries in the area so as a solo female traveler, I wasn’t feeling too confident on having this adventure to cross these borders. I have since heard that Albania is beautiful and rather “untouched” by tourism which gives the experience a more authentic feel. Plus, the people are supposed to be SUPER friendly and helpful. Give the country 10-15 years and it will probably get up there with Croatia!
Anyways, so I knew that Sofia to Nis had several buses a day, and it was only 4 hour, with a one hour time difference, so we arrived around 6pm. Crossing the border was a struggle… there was one guy that I am pretty sure they just profiled and they took him off the bus and searched his person and luggage. There is a lot of problems with illegal immigration in this part of Europe and I guess with the high tourism season, the border control people are even more vigilant.
I did this meet a very interesting Serbian girl a bit older than me from Belgrade. She is a free lance artist and gets to travel all around Europe to create sculptures for different festivals and events. What a life- to do something you are passionate about and be able to travel and meet people from all different cultures. We had a long chat over a coffee :) Traveling alone really gives you the opportunity to share these moments with strangers that you probably wouldn’t have talked to if you had a buddy.
We got to Nis, SERBIA! A country that I NEVER thought I would get to visit if you had asked me five years ago. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to visit Belgrade and Novi Sad that are really supposed to be beautiful in the north of Serbia… 5 weeks is no time -_-
I met a Canadian couple as well that had come from Sofia and were staying at the same hostel as me in Nis! Thank god for them because otherwise I would have never found the place we were staying… it was in the middle of a bunch of buildings basically in a parking lot…. Idk. Thank you Josh and Jenn!
I talked to the guy at that works the hostel to try and figure out how I was getting to Montenegro…. I had NO idea it was so far! Like 10 hours! And by the time I got to the bus station to figure out when I would go, I had already missed the night bus for the day. Looks like my stop in Nis was turning into a whole day thing. So Nis is the second largest city of Serbia and they actually do have quite a bit of sites (a concentration camp for Serbs during WWII, a skull tower that the Turks made during the Ottoman empire of 600 Serbs that were slaughtered in order to intimidate them from rebelling, a huge fortress, several churches etc…) but unfortunately EVERYTHING is closed Mondays! So I talked for a long while with the Canadian couple, this Dutch girl named Karen, and some French Canadians about hostel things- you know: our culture/country/politics… those things that naturally are discussed when traveling and I love it :)
July 27, 2015
Wow the first day I don’t have to wake up early to sight see! I was actually really looking forward to having a relaxing day, eat well (Serbians eat WELLLLLL and it’s very inexpensive comparatively), catch up on blogging (oops), and just explore the city to see what it has to offer as more of a local since the tourism part was closed.
I woke up at almost 10am and it was amazing and ate some leftovers for breakfast and chatted the morning away with Karen. Around lunch time, I asked the guy from the hostel if there was perhaps a small town close by that I could take a local bus to just walk around, and of course take pictures. This is where the day took an unexpected turn: “Would you want to go parasailing today???”
UM YEAH! Definitely not what I had had in mind as a day off but when you get the chance to PARAGLIDE IN SERBIA. Yeah you do it. And for 30 euros. Count me in.
Karen was actually supposed to take the 1330 bus to Belgrade but after I told her of what Nenad (the guy at the hostel) had in store for us, she moved decided to stay another day.
feeling reallyyyyy anxious
Add the Canadians and we were a group of 4! We were picked up by an old Volkswagon van by this older guy that has literally been paragliding for 37 years- with no accidents :) I of course didn’t tell my parents until after I landed safely…. They were not happy about it still… oh well.
Paragliding is like riding a bike in the sky- so smooth, I was even able to bring my Nikon camera….
It was probably a 10 minute glide down the mountain side but ahhhh so amazing! He said that the longest he has ever gone was SIX HOURS. He used to compete (does this exist in the USA???)
The hardest/most nerve racking part was the lift off. You basicallly run down a hill as fast as you can with someone attached to you and hope the wind catches before getting to the treeline.
Karen actually had some minor difficulties… I think it’s because she was like a head and a half taller than the pro.
She was a trooper… but look at this:
After paragliding, we went to the small town that has natural hot springs running through the park. Felt soooo good for the feet.
These old men were like bathing in it lolz.
Ahhhh the views <3
Back in Nis, Nenad recommended a great place for dinner. We met a bunch more people at the hostel and had our own tour group parading through Nis- I literally felt like we were the only non Serbs in the area!
And we feasted……
Salad with CHEESE
Ham and beef meatballs that literally tasted like bacon
Pork ribs and CHEESE
And lots of PIVO! (beer)
I was really bummed when I had to leave the hostel for my 22h overnight bus :( Such a cool international group of people- Dutch, Australian, Kiwi, Canadians, German, and me! But I was at a nice buzz for the 2 euro bottle of wine (I shared) and the pivo and a stomach full of cheese and meet :)
Lack of planning worked for me this time- such an unexpected wonderful day with wonderful people in the south of Serbia.
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