The Balkans: Dubrovnik, Mostar, Sarajevo and Belgrade

1. Jour 1 : Arrive in Dubrovnik

   Dubrovnik Airport (DBV) to your hotel in Dubrovnik

   • Environ 30 min de route
   • Repas du soir
   • Nuit : Dubrovnik
   Détail du jour 1

   Fly into Dubrovnik Airport (DBV) at Čilipi, about 20 km south-east of the old town. A driver meets you whatever time you land and takes you to a central hotel for two nights. Plan to land by about 4 pm if you want to join the evening walk; the exact time is confirmed with your final itinerary. In the early evening your See Sight Tours guide meets the group for a short briefing on the ten days ahead: three countries, two border crossings, a one-way route that ends in Belgrade, and how the walking is paced. Then we walk in through the Pile Gate and down the Stradun, the polished limestone main street, after the day visitors and cruise passengers have gone and the stone turns gold in the low light. Dinner is together at a restaurant in or near the old town, a first taste of Dalmatian fish, olive oil and local wine.

   Compris

   • Pick-up at Dubrovnik Airport (DBV), whatever time you land
   • Welcome briefing with your guide
   • Evening walk through the Pile Gate and along the Stradun
   • Welcome dinner

   Temps libre : Free until the early-evening briefing

   

2. Jour 2 : Dubrovnik: the walls at opening

   Dubrovnik old town on foot

   • Petit-déjeuner
   • Nuit : Dubrovnik
   Détail du jour 2

   We are at the city walls when they open, around 8 am in the main season, to walk the full circuit of about 2 km before the heat and the cruise crowds arrive. The walk looks down on terracotta roofs, the old harbour and Lokrum island, and climbs to the Minčeta Tower, the highest point. Afterwards a licensed local guide takes us through the old town at street level: the Rector's Palace, the Sponza Palace, the Franciscan monastery with its old pharmacy, and the story of the 1991 to 1992 siege that you can still read in the mismatched roof tiles. The tour ends by late morning. Lunch and the afternoon are yours: swim off the rocks below the walls, take the small boat to Lokrum, or ride the cable car up Mount Srđ for the view back over the city at sunset. Your guide suggests places to eat away from the Stradun prices.

   Compris

   • Dubrovnik city walls at opening, full circuit (ticket included)
   • Old town walk with a licensed local guide: the Rector's Palace, the Sponza Palace and the Franciscan monastery

   Activités en option

   • Boat to Lokrum island
   • Mount Srđ cable car
   • Sea kayaking below the walls

   Option plus facile : Walk the walls from the Pile Gate as far as the Minčeta Tower and leave at the next exit; the steps are steepest on the land side.

   Option plus active : Walk up Mount Srđ on the zigzag path (about 400 m of climb) in the late afternoon and take the cable car down.

   Temps libre : Afternoon and evening free

   Activité : The walls involve many steps and little shade. Go early, bring water and a hat.

   

3. Jour 3 : Trebinje, Radimlja and on to Mostar

   Dubrovnik across the border to Trebinje, then Stolac (Radimlja) and Mostar

   • Environ 3.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Mostar
   Détail du jour 3

   We leave Dubrovnik at about 8:30 am and climb behind the city to the border at Gornji Brgat and Ivanica; Trebinje is only half an hour beyond it. This quiet Herzegovinian town has a walled Ottoman old town, a market square shaded by plane trees where farmers sell cheese, honey and dried figs, and the 16th-century Arslanagić bridge over the Trebišnjica. We walk the town with your guide and sit down to lunch there. In the afternoon the road crosses the karst uplands to Stolac, where the Radimlja necropolis holds more than a hundred stećci, carved medieval tombstones with figures, hunting scenes and spirals, part of a group listed by UNESCO in 2016. From there it is under an hour to Mostar, where we arrive in the late afternoon and stay two nights. The evening is free; the walk down to the river as the bridge lights come on is the obvious first stop.

   Compris

   • Trebinje old town, market square and the Arslanagić bridge
   • Sit-down lunch in Trebinje
   • Radimlja necropolis and its stećci tombstones near Stolac

   Temps libre : Evening free in Mostar

   Activité : Border waits are added to the drive time; they are usually short but can run to an hour on summer weekends.

4. Jour 4 : Mostar early, then Blagaj and Počitelj

   Mostar old town, then Blagaj and Počitelj and back

   • Environ 1.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Mostar
   Détail du jour 4

   Mostar fills with day visitors from the coast from late morning, so we go out early. At 8 am a local guide walks us to the Old Bridge, built in 1566, destroyed in 1993 and rebuilt in 2004, while it is nearly empty and the light comes down the Neretva gorge onto the white stone. Climb the minaret of the Koski Mehmed Pasha mosque for the view down onto the bridge, then walk the Kujundžiluk, the old coppersmiths' street, as the shops open. Mid-morning we drive twenty minutes to Blagaj, passing the Orthodox church of St Basil of Ostrog, to the place where the Buna river rises from a cave at the foot of a high cliff. Beside the spring stands the tekke, an Ottoman-era dervish house you can visit inside, and lunch is on a terrace over the water. On the way back we stop at Počitelj, a fortified Ottoman village stacked up a hillside above the Neretva, and return to Mostar by about 4 pm.

   Compris

   • Mostar old town walk with a local guide, starting at the Old Bridge at 8 am
   • Koski Mehmed Pasha mosque and minaret
   • Blagaj: the Buna spring and the dervish house (tekke)
   • Sit-down lunch by the Buna river
   • Počitelj: the old village, the mosque and the tower viewpoint

   Activités en option

   • Museum of the Old Bridge
   • War Photo Exhibition

   Option plus facile : Skip the minaret (narrow spiral steps) and the climb to the Počitelj tower, and wait at a café with a view of the bridge or the river.

   Option plus active : Climb from Počitelj village to the round tower at the top of the walls for the view down the Neretva valley.

   Temps libre : Late afternoon and evening free

   Activité : Remove shoes and cover shoulders and knees in the mosque and the tekke; scarves are lent at the door. Počitelj is all steep stone steps.

   

5. Jour 5 : Konjic and Tito's bunker, then Sarajevo

   Mostar up the Neretva to Konjic, then over the Ivan pass to Sarajevo

   • Environ 2.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Sarajevo
   Détail du jour 5

   We follow the Neretva north through its gorge, the river running green between limestone walls and the lakes behind its dams, past Jablanica to Konjic. Hidden in the hillside outside the town is ARK D-0, the nuclear bunker built in secret for Tito and the Yugoslav command between 1953 and 1979, and shown on guided visits that we book ahead. The tour takes about an hour through its long corridors, command rooms and dormitories, kept with their original furniture, and some contemporary art shown there. Lunch is a sit-down meal in Konjic near its rebuilt Ottoman stone bridge. From there the road climbs over the Ivan pass to Sarajevo, about two and a half hours of driving in all. We check in for two nights in the mid-afternoon, and in the late afternoon your guide walks you through Baščaršija, the Ottoman bazaar quarter, past the Sebilj fountain and the Gazi Husrev-beg mosque, and along Ferhadija, where the Ottoman city turns into an Austro-Hungarian one.

   Compris

   • Guided visit to Tito's bunker (ARK D-0) at Konjic
   • Sit-down lunch in Konjic
   • Orientation walk in Sarajevo: Baščaršija, the Sebilj fountain, the Gazi Husrev-beg mosque and Ferhadija

   Temps libre : Evening free in Sarajevo

   Activité : The bunker is cool inside all year; bring a layer.

   

6. Jour 6 : Sarajevo: the siege and the city

   Sarajevo, the Tunnel of Hope and Trebević

   • Environ 30 min de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Sarajevo
   Détail du jour 6

   This morning a licensed local guide takes us through the siege of 1992 to 1996, the longest of a capital city in modern European history. We drive along the boulevard once known as Sniper Alley to Butmir, where the Tunnel of Hope museum keeps a short section of the tunnel dug under the airport runway in 1993, the city's lifeline for food, fuel and people. Back in the centre we stop at the Latin Bridge, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot on 28 June 1914, and at the City Hall, burned with the National Library in 1992 and reopened in 2014. Lunch is at an aščinica, a Bosnian home-cooking canteen. The afternoon is free. The Trebević cable car, reopened in 2018, climbs the mountain above the city to the graffiti-covered bobsled track from the 1984 Winter Olympics, a good walk in the late light, and your ticket is included.

   Compris

   • Siege of Sarajevo tour with a local guide
   • Tunnel of Hope museum
   • The Latin Bridge and the City Hall (Vijećnica)
   • Sit-down lunch at a traditional aščinica
   • Trebević cable car ticket

   Activités en option

   • Gallery 11/07/95, on the Srebrenica genocide
   • The Jewish Museum in the old synagogue
   • A Bosnian coffee and sweets tasting

   Temps libre : Afternoon and evening free

   Activité : The siege tour is detailed and can be upsetting; your guide answers questions openly.

7. Jour 7 : To the bridge on the Drina

   Sarajevo east through Pale and Rogatica to Višegrad

   • Environ 2.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Višegrad
   Détail du jour 7

   The morning in Sarajevo is yours, a chance for Gallery 11/07/95, the Jewish Museum or a last coffee in Baščaršija; we leave at 10:30 am. The road runs east over the hills through Pale and Rogatica and drops into the Drina valley, about 115 km and two and a quarter hours. Lunch is by the river in Višegrad, looking at the reason we stop here: the Mehmed Paša Sokolović bridge, eleven stone arches completed in 1577 to a design by the Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan, listed by UNESCO in 2007 and the subject of Ivo Andrić's novel The Bridge on the Drina. Your guide walks you across it and through Andrićgrad, the stone town-within-a-town built in 2014 in Andrić's honour. In the late afternoon a boat takes us out on the Drina between the green hills. Staying here one night splits the Sarajevo to Belgrade road, about six and a quarter hours of driving in one go, into two shorter days.

   Compris

   • The Mehmed Paša Sokolović bridge with your guide
   • Andrićgrad
   • Boat trip on the Drina
   • Sit-down lunch by the river in Višegrad

   Temps libre : Morning free in Sarajevo; evening free in Višegrad

   Activité : Višegrad is a small town with a small choice of hotels; this is the trip's only one-night stop.

8. Jour 8 : The Šargan Eight and on to Belgrade

   Višegrad across the border to Mokra Gora, then Užice and Belgrade

   • Environ 4 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   • Nuit : Belgrade
   Détail du jour 8

   We leave Višegrad at 8 am. A short drive up the Drina's side valley brings us to the border at Vardište and Kotroman and into Serbia, and we reach Mokra Gora by about 10 am, in time for the 10:30 am departure of the Šargan Eight, the first train of the day in season (timetable confirmed at booking). This restored narrow-gauge railway climbs the hills in a figure-of-eight loop through tunnels and over viaducts, built to cross a slope too steep for a straight line. We take the full return trip with its stops at viewpoints and old stations, about two and a half hours in all, of which the running time is well under an hour. Lunch is a sit-down meal at Mokra Gora, near Drvengrad, the wooden village built by the film director Emir Kusturica. In the afternoon we drive past Užice and up the motorway to Belgrade, about three hours, arriving in the early evening. This is the longest day on the road, about four hours of driving in all, with the train and lunch in the middle. The evening is free.

   Compris

   • Šargan Eight heritage railway at Mokra Gora
   • Sit-down lunch at Mokra Gora
   • Drvengrad wooden village

   Temps libre : Evening free in Belgrade

   Activité : We leave Višegrad at 8 am to make the 10:30 am train. Drive time is about 4 hours plus the border; the train ride (about 2.5 hours with stops) and lunch break it in the middle. The railway runs in the warmer months only.

9. Jour 9 : Belgrade: Kalemegdan and the National Museum

   Belgrade on foot: Kalemegdan, Knez Mihailova and Republic Square

   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Belgrade
   Détail du jour 9

   We start at 9 am at Kalemegdan, while the park is cool and quiet, with a licensed local guide. The fortress walls stand on the ridge where the Sava meets the Danube, and from the terrace by the Victor monument you look across the two rivers to Zemun and New Belgrade. The guide tells the city's long story of sieges, from the Romans and Ottomans to the bombing of 1999, and then walks us down Knez Mihailova, the pedestrian street of 19th-century facades, to Republic Square. Here we visit the National Museum of Serbia, reopened in 2018 after fifteen years of renovation, from its medieval Serbian icons and manuscripts to its European paintings, which include works by Degas and Renoir. Lunch is at a traditional kafana. The afternoon is free, for the House of Flowers where Tito is buried, the Nikola Tesla Museum, the Church of St Sava or a river cruise. The farewell dinner is in Skadarlija, the old bohemian quarter.

   Compris

   • Belgrade walk with a licensed local guide: Kalemegdan fortress, Knez Mihailova and Republic Square
   • National Museum of Serbia
   • Sit-down lunch at a kafana
   • Farewell dinner in Skadarlija

   Activités en option

   • Museum of Yugoslavia and the House of Flowers
   • Nikola Tesla Museum
   • Cruise on the Sava and the Danube
   • Zemun's riverside promenade

   Temps libre : Afternoon free

   Activité : The National Museum is closed on Mondays, so we plan departures to keep this day off a Monday.

   

10. Jour 10 : Novi Sad, then Belgrade Airport

    Belgrade to Novi Sad, then Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport (BEG)

    • Environ 2.5 h de route
    • Petit-déjeuner
    Détail du jour 10

    After breakfast we load the luggage and drive an hour and a quarter north to Novi Sad, Serbia's second city, on the Danube. A local guide meets us at the Petrovaradin fortress on the far bank, an 18th-century Habsburg stronghold with a clock tower whose hands are reversed, the big hand for the hours, so boatmen could read it from the river. From the walls the view runs across the Danube to the city. Then we cross the bridge into the old town for a walk along Zmaj Jovina and Dunavska streets, lined with pastel Habsburg-era houses, to Freedom Square and the Name of Mary church. We leave Novi Sad at about 1:30 pm and reach Belgrade Airport, about an hour away, by about 2:30 pm, so book a flight leaving after about 5 pm. If you fly earlier, we drop you at the airport on the way out of Belgrade; if you are staying on, we take you back to the city.

    Compris

    • Petrovaradin fortress and Novi Sad old town with a local guide
    • Drop-off at Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport (BEG) or a Belgrade hotel

    Option plus facile : Stay on the fortress terrace with a coffee while the group walks the old town, or skip Novi Sad and go straight to the airport.

    Temps libre : Lunch free in Novi Sad

    Activité : Book a flight from Belgrade (BEG) leaving after about 5 pm.

    

Faune et météo : July and August are hot in Mostar, Belgrade and on the coast, often over 35°C, and Dubrovnik is at its busiest, so we start early and keep the middle of the day free. May, June and September are the best balance. Sarajevo and Mokra Gora sit higher and are cooler in the evenings. The Šargan Eight and the Drina boats run in the warmer months, which sets the May to October season.

• Dubrovnik2 nuits
• Mostar2 nuits
• Sarajevo2 nuits
• Višegrad1 nuit
• Belgrade2 nuits