Never Confuse Having a Life with Having a Career: The Balkans! part 1

So thinking back to a few years ago, when my best mate Curtis and I were in Calgary, there was a funny moment outside a bar where some guys were yapping off and saying "F**k the Balkans dude!" so Huds stepped in, and was all confrontational with the guys asking what the hell their problem was with the Balkans and pretending to goad them into a fight....and they were all intimidated by him and became very meek and said "well, I nothing really man, we're really sorry! Are you from there?" Of course Curtis isn't from the Balkans, but I just suddenly remembered that random story, and now here I am, in the damn Balkans!!

So anyways, I made my way to Slovenia from Austria via train, for my first venture into the Balkans. I met some interesting Indian guys on the train, who were very loud but interesting enough, although the one German girl who was also in our cabin didn't seem to be enjoying their company so much ha ha. So upon arriving fairly late in the evening, I made my way to my hostel, checked in, and met some Canadian girl, who had been in Europe for several weeks and hadn't met another Canadian....very weird I know, considering on the traveling paths, Canadians, Aussies, and Kiwis are the most common nationalities you will find! So we chatted for a bit, and then I decided to head out to find something to eat. Well, while looking at my map, I was sitting on a street corner, and a nice fellow asked me if I needed any help finding a place, so I told him I was just wandering around looking for a restaurant. He ended up being a nice enough German guy, and was with 3 other people from various European countries, and they were all there as Erasthmus students. So they were off to some pub for Erasthmus student night, and he told me to tag along if I was interested....well, seeing as how I didn't know anyone yet, and there was the potential for meeting a bunch of foreign students, I was pretty keen on just joining them at the pub, and skipping dinner, so I did!

I ended up meeting some other cool Australian dude there, and lost the students I went with, but ended up hanging with the Aussie dude, and meeting some cool locals. At one point, we ventured outside for a beer, and then upon trying to re-enter the establishment, the bouncer wouldn't let me in because I didn't have a student card, yet the Aussie guy did....so eventually I was allowed to go back in under the pretense that I was just going to use the toilet, but then upon talking to some people, I realized that I could actually sign up for this student card for 2 euros, and get various discounts at the bar, so that's what I did! I ended up meeting several cool Slovenian girls, and a few other foreigners, but wasn't really having any luck with the ladies, other than little chit chats here and there, so I decided to head back to the hostel for the night. Of course, as per usual, late night hunger took hold of me, and when I was nearly at my hostel, I spotted a kebab shop still open just across the street. So, not thinking too much about jaywalking, I strolled across the street, and surprise surprise, I was then stopped by the Slovenian police! After 20 years of jaywalking and never being stopped, my first night in Ljubljana I am stopped, just my luck! Of course, I was a bit worried too, since at this point I was now about 8 days over my Schengen visa expiration date...oops! But I never carry my passport with me, so all I could provide was my driver's licence....of course there wasn't a whole lot of communication with the police, as they mainly spoke Slovenian and I had no clue what they were saying, but eventually they just gave me back my ID and drove off without fining me, win! Apparently it's a 100 euro fine for jaywalking, so over the next few days I was very prudent to observe locals and only do it if they were all doing it!

So back to the hostel for sleep time, after enjoying my delicious ~~102 Euro~~ 2 Euro kebab.

The next day I arranged to meet with a few couchsurfing girls, so first up in the morning was a meeting with lovely Irena. When we met she even brought me a gift, a small plush chicken, as Slovenia looks somewhat like a chicken when you look at it on a map :), so I told her I would travel the world and take pics with it and the Cube. We walked around the city for nearly 2 hours until she had to run off to class. She was a very lovely girl, who's mom was Croatian, and father Slovenian, so she had some good input on the way of life for both of the countries. Unfortunately she had to go to class after 12 pm, so we could only spend a short amount of time, but it was nevertheless a nice little tour of the city, since Ljubljana is so small!

The Slovenian train company allows Graffiti artists to decorate all the trains

The Ljubljanska River

Used to be a parking lot....

Tivoli Park (oddly enough there's also one in Copenhagen)

After Irena left, I grabbed a Balkan dish called a Burek on her recommendation, which is basically like a calzone. It was quite tasty, but shortly after eating it, I'm not too sure if I developed an allergic reaction, or if I was attacked by 10 mosquitoes simultaneously, or if there were some bed bugs in the hostel, as I suddenly developed several large itchy patches on my neck and arms.....strange times indeed. So being the joker that I am, I blamed the spots on the Burek, and on Irene for suggesting it to me ha ha.

So anyways, enough of my skin problems! In the afternoon, I agreed to meet up with a couchsurfing girl named Barbara, and head off with her and her friend for a hike up one of the hills just north of the city. So upon finding them near the train station I hopped in their car and went for a 20 minute ride, trying to find a place to park and begin our climb. It was rather entertaining to hear them arguing over where they should be parking and such, even though it was all in Slovenian, they got the point across to me about what was the deal. So we eventually find a parking spot, and begin the climb up. I'm not in very good shape anymore, but I still push a fast pace when hiking, and the girls were definitely struggling to keep up ha ha, but ah well. We eventually made our way to the top of the hill, which is home to a monastery of some sort, as well as some shops. It also appears to be a mini resort for older Slovenians, as there were numerous men in their 50s and 60s who had obviously hiked up, but then decided to sunbath at the top for several hours...interesting stuff indeed, but there was the opportunity to get some cool photos of Ljubljana from above, and to see exactly how small it really is.

Old men sunbathing at the Monastery

Slovenia from above

So after enjoying some quiet time up to top, we hiked back down, and the girls dropped me off at the hostel, and gave me some tips on what else to see and where to eat in Ljubljana. So I thanked them for the good company, and was back to the hostel. I ventured out to some Thai restaurant called Da Budda for dinner, but in all honesty, it wasn't really that great at all (although the atmosphere and decor was quite lovely, just the food left me a tad bit disappointed)! So I just returned to the hostel, read a bit and had a nice quiet night for a change.

The next day I decided to go check out a new hostel that was about 5 euros cheaper and not that far away from my existing one, but first I was meant to meet up with another couchsurfing gal for a coffee and "Ljubljana's best ice cream", or so she said. I met Tina and her friend near the statue in the city centre, which is by far the most common meeting spot for people in Ljubljana, and we made our way over to the ice cream shop for some tasty gelato. Now Tina told me she was wearing red pants so I figured that would be quite easy to spot....well apparently many people in Slovenia on this particular day decided to wear red pants, so I probably spotted at least 4 girls in red pants before she finally showed up ha ha ha. But anyways, off to ice cream/coffeeshop, and although I don't typically eat dessert, I figured since the girls were quite keen on the place, I would break my rule for this occasion. It was some pretty damn good ice cream, so we sat by the riverside and chatted for awhile and ate our gelato.

After hanging out there for awhile, and getting the common greetings out of the way, we then made our way towards the walking path up to the castle which sits on a mini mountain right in the heart of Ljubljana. The hike up was fairly simple, as I still appear to be in somewhat decent cardiovascular shape, surprisingly enough considering my lack of exercise and cardio in the last 6 months ha ha. So after climbing up to the top and checking out the castle for awhile, and almost entering the museum (it cost like 3 euro and I wasn't too keen on paying for the museum and neither were the girls), we descended back down, and made our way over to the student area of the town, so I could see where the girls lived during their earlier years of studies. They had since moved out of their student dorms and into their own apartment, but it was still cool to go see the student area of the town. Apparently, if you're a student in Slovenia, the gov't looks after you quite well, as you are given some monthly stipend for living expenses, and of course cheap bus transportation, and they also give you a set of coupons each month, which enables you to use your cellular phone to dial a number when paying your bill at restaurants in the city, and you are then given a discount on your meal. I guess they get like 20 of these "coupons" per month so that's a pretty decent deal if you like to eat out like I do.

View of Ljubljana from the Castle

Ljubljana Castle

Dragon Bridge

So we went and checked out a local student pub, had some cheap beers, then had to cut our get together short, as the girls both had to head off to work for a few hours, but they told me they would be in touch if they were going out in the near future during the evenings. So I was going to head back to my first hostel and grab my bags and head to the second place, but then I received a text from Irena, the couchsurfing gal I had met up with the previous day, and she wanted to meet up again for a short while. So I headed on over to meet up with her and her brother Igor, and we walked around for another 1.5 hours...they showed me this cool part of the city that was an old Yugoslav military headquarters, but had since been taken over by squatters, and was now kind of a lawless area of the much like Christiania in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Reminds me of a Gollum from LOTR

So we wandered around there for awhile, checking out the sweet graffiti and gnarly artistic creations, then wandered back towards the centre. The siblings had to head off shortly after, as Igor had fire practice, and Irena had to drive him, so unfortunately this would be the last time I would get to see Irena, as I quite enjoyed her company. So after saying goodbye, I finally made my way back to my first hostel to grab my bags, but then I ended up falling asleep on the couch in the common room, while reading emails. I noticed that the new hostel I had booked into had sent me an email, and said if I didn't show up by 1 pm, that my reservation may be cancelled (it was already 5:30 pm at this point) so I emailed them back, and told them I was still coming, and to phone me if things had changed. They called me shortly after, and were wondering where the hell I was...pushy hostels I tell you! So I made my way over there, but not before chatting up this cute German girl from my room, and asking what her plans were for the evening. I guess she was heading over to that artistic area of the city to hang out at the hostel that used to be a jail, and meeting up with some others. She told me to come meet up with her, so I made my way over there and meet a fun group of people, and found a pretty sweet hostel as well!

On the walk to meet the others, I noticed what appeared to be 2 M&Ms he he

We hung out in the common area for a bit, then wandered over to the lawless district and found a bar there that served beers for the same price as you would pay in the supermarket (no taxes or service charges after all), and then went and chilled out in some crazy treehouse thing for awhile....we shared some good stories, and then one extremely random moment occurred...I was telling the group where I was from, and as per usual, I said no one would know where Melville is....well lo and behold, the one guy was from Neudorf, which is like 20 minutes away from my hometown!! He had even played hockey in Melville growing up, so we began reminiscing about times back home and the mutual people we knew...he was in his early 30s, so a bit older than I, but we still knew a fair bit of the same people...absolutely amazing, considering Neudorf is like 400 or 500 people large...so yeah after sharing some good stories, we headed back to the jail hostel, as they had this sweet group meeting exercise where you were given ingredients and had to make mojitos in giant buckets!

So we're each broken into teams and given all the ingredients, and then have 7 minutes to make a giant bucket of mojitos, and then the bartenders judged who made the best one...unfortunately, our group didn't win according to his taste, but I think ours was better in the end....we made some fun new friends, and had a pretty good time doing it... so after the mojitos were finished, a few of the people headed down to this wicked cool Skeleton bar that I had heard about from others...but one of the German guys wanted to stick around for a bit longer, and kept buying pitchers of beer, so I hung out with him, as it was fairly cheap that way....eventually we made our way down to the skeleton bar, but found that everyone was ditching out and heading home early, but the German guy and I decided to stick around.

The skeleton place was pretty cool spot, with the bathroom being behind a fake bookshelf even...sweet. Of course the cocktails there were 2 for 1 always, and there was a neat collection of random skeletons all over the place...very cool place indeed....the German fellow couldn't quite handle his cocktails so well, and was pretty shy, so I took it upon myself to start chatting up some other people since it appeared he was about to fall asleep in the corner.....I met two pretty nice Slovenian girls, and eventually woke up the German dude and got him to come over and join the table....we had some good times and shared some laughs, then the bar was closing, so the girls took us to some nightclub that caters mostly to students...it was a pretty sweet place as well, although things were a bit foggy....I do remember the German actually falling asleep at the table in that next bar, and eventually I managed to wake him up and send him home...then the upstairs bar closed, so we went to the downstairs part which was more of a nightclub...I hung out there and ended up making out with some Slovenian girl for a bit, but just kind of floated around otherwise, not really sure what was happening ha ha!

So the club was closing, and I went to leave, and heard two guys speaking like Canadians, so I started talking to them, and they ended up being from Kamloops and Victoria....we were chatting for a bit, and they were asking what I was doing now that the club was closing, and I had no clue, so I just started talking to locals, including the girl I was making out with about what was happening...I guess she was just going home, but two of her friends were up for having an afterparty, so I just ended up walking with them....then one of the guys bailed out since he was tired, so it was just me and this other random Slovenian dude...so we went back to his place for some beers, and some late night risotto....he ended up being a super cool guy, and was a referee for Slovenia's highest ranked soccer league....he told me that his g/f would probably wake up if we were too loud and come and tell him to shut the hell up, and sure enough 10 minutes after being there, she came storming out and started yelling in Slovenian, but once he told her I was from Canada, she became friendly and politely asked us to be quiet in English ha ha ha....being Canadian has it's perks!

So before I know it, it's 6:30 am, and I'm crashing hard, so the random dude says I can just sleep on his couch, so I end up doing that, rather than walking back to my hostel ha ha....so anyways, it's like 2 pm the next day before I wake up, and am kind of wondering where the hell I am ha ha....so my new friend tells me he'll drive me back to my hostel, since he wasn't working that day, but then he remembered telling me about eating a horseburger before I left Slovenia, so I said we should go grab one, and that I would buy....so we end up doing that...we drive to the one place that sells them, but there wasn't any parking available, so we ended up heading to a different part of the town and finding the second restaurant that serves them...so we settle in and I try my first Seabiscuit...er...horseburger.....now the meat wasn't really all that great, and didn't seem to have that much flavour, so I'm going to give it a fail on the tasty burger scale...but hey, at least I gave it a try....sorry to all you horse lovers out there ;) he he.

Birds engaged in horseplay over remainders of Seabiscuit

Here Horsey Horsey

Extra's with an extra S

So after the horseburger, random dude drives me back to the hostel and I casually notice that there's a police vehicle outside, but think nothing of it. So I get back into the room, talk to the Canadian girl a bit who was at the previous hostel, and then realize I'm still quite tired, and end up just lounging in bed and falling asleep until 7 pm....well I later found out that the washing machine had caught fire on the upper floor, and the fire department and police had to come down for that event...quite entertaining I guess! One of the Dutch girls in the room had left her laundry to be done, and wasn't aware of the fire, so I was giving her a hard time later in the evening about her clothing starting the fire and how it probably had burned so she was quite worried ha ha....so I eventually made my way to the common room and met the young Canadian dude from the previous night....although I didn't actually remember meeting him the previous night, so he was sharing what he remembered from the night, good times. I guess him and the other Canadian had wandered into a park and some Slovenians invited them to share some moonshine with them, and things got a little crazy, and then they ended up at the club where they met me....interesting stuff anyways....so he was just chilling, waiting for some Israeli chick to wake up from her nap and head out with her, so I said I would tag along.....so we waited and waited, and then decided to make a quick supermarket run while waiting....so upon returning, he found that she wasn't actually in the room!

So we just hung out having some beers, and then the Canadian chick joined us, and we decided to head out on our own adventure, so we ventured down to the skeleton bar, where we met a few more cool Slovenians....we hung out with them for quite awhile, and they told us they would take us to a cool club where locals went...so we tagged along with them. The one fellow was quite a nice fellow and studying to become a doctor. He was quite insistent that if any of us wanted to, we were welcome to stay at his place over the next few days as he had plenty of room...I took his number down just in case I decided to stay longer. So we went with him and his friends and got to the club which actually ended up being just a few doors down from my original hostel. I remember laying in bed at night, and hearing really loud music every night from a club, and sure enough, it was the club we arrived at.

Entrance to Toilet in Skeleton Bar

So they were giving out free tequila shots to a select few people at this club, and because I just say hello to everyone, as girls were leaving, and we were in line, I just started chatting people up, and they kept giving me their free tequila shot vouchers, much to the annoyance of the Canadian girl who absolutely loved tequila ha ha....so we get inside, and because I have so many free ones I just start giving them out to the people I was with. So we eventually make our way downstairs, and am just hanging by the wall when a girl walks by and grabs my hat off my head and says something in Slovenian, so I tell her to "play nice" and she tells me she never plays nice, she's always naughty....interesting indeed....so we chat for a bit and then I casually act disinterested and try and pawn her off on my new Slovenian friend...all a game I like to play ha ha...so of course she becomes a bit more intrigued, and then keeps coming back to chat me up....I found out she had a b/f so I acted even less interested....and then eventually she kept getting closer and closer to me until finally she just started kissing me....ha ha women these days! So after like 3 hours of making out and dancing, and losing my other friends, I wasn't too sure what the rest of the night held in store. I ended up sticking around to the end of the night, helping the girl's friend load up his drums into her car (as he was the guest drummer for the club) and then, basically figuring out what was going to happen. She told me she lived 60 km outside of Ljubljana and that it would be difficult for me to get back into town the next day as there weren't any buses, so she said she would just grab my contact info and be in touch....so that was it...left all alone, damn!

So I wander around to find some late night pizza, and stumble back to the hostel, and get some sleep. I awoke the next day, and wasn't really too sure what to do for the day, so mostly just caught up blogging and shared some laughs with the Canadians over our ridiculous night out. The one Canadian girl had fallen while walking home drunk, and sprained her ankle, so I was a good guy and went and got her some food and beers for the evening so she wouldn't have to leave the room and walk. So after blogging for awhile, I decided I would likely spend another night or two, since the weekend was now upon us, and I was having a fair bit of fun. So I sent out a few messages to my local contacts to see what was up for the evening, meanwhile I was talking to the Dutch girls a bit, and they were heading off to Belgrade on the night train, so there was one less group of people to wander around the city with that night...meanwhile, the girl from the previous night had added me onto facebook, so I was quite curious about it and checked out her profile...it was a tad bit shocking to say the least, as it clearly stated she was in a relationship with some guy, and showed several pictures of her and him, plus a few with a baby....yikes.....then the kicker for me was her status...which said "and in the heat of the moment.....I'm not a saint, no, not that at all ! But what I did, that wasn't cool...Nobody's perfect !!! ;) ) ha ha ha wtf!! so now I'm getting kind of worried that her b/f might come to Ljubljana and track me down, so I figured I may as well have an exit strategy....so after not hearing back from a few of my Slovenian contacts, I figured I haven't made a spontaneous decision in quite sometime, so I decided to join the Dutch girls on the night train to Belgrade...of course I made this decision about 15 minutes before they were leaving, so I quickly packed my bags and we were off!

The Cube and my Bird chilling for the last time in Slovenia

So we're off and running to the train station, grab a quick snack, and get to the platform...the Dutch girls are pretty hilarious, and they decide to try and sweet talk one of the train employees into giving them a couchette for free or for a cheap price, telling him how he's such a nice man and that he will go to heaven if he's kind enough to help them out, and so he ends up agreeing to a reduced price for the couchette! So we get on the train, but then we found out that the couchettes smelled really bad, and didn't have any bedding, so we just decided to grab a normal bench cabin...my first overnight Eastern European train since the infamous Krakow express several years earlier when I was robbed of basically all my belongings...so I was ready to give it another go!

So we get on the train, the girls put their bags in a different compartment and we settle into the one I've got my bags in, play some games, and chat for a few hours, until border patrols start coming onto the train...now Eastern European police...in particular Balkan police, definitely have this reputation as being very cold and tough, so they chastise the girls for being in a compartment that is different from the one where their bags are....and then the Slovenian guy starts looking through my passport, and informs me that I'm over my Schengen Visa (I was about 12 days or so over, which I knew but was hoping it wouldn't be a big deal)....so he had miscounted and told me that I was only 3 days over, but that it was a 400 euro fine for overstaying...yikes...so I kind of plead innocence, and then he asks me if I ever want to return to the EU, which of course I do at some point....so then he tells me that he will let me go without the fine since I'm only a few days over, but to be very careful with my future travels, and walks off in a cold soldier like fashion....phew! So I managed to avoid 500 euros in fines in one week of Slovenia...lucky duck!

So anyways, the girls stay in their cabin, and I am starting to lay down and have a sleep, when some older Serb or Croat man enters the cabin, and starts speaking to me in Croatian or Serbian..and I tell him I only speak English, but he just continues on talking for quite sometime, so I just smile or shake my head based on his facial expressions ha ha....interesting fellow and conversation, or one sided conversation I should say...so I try and catch some sleep, but of course kept getting woken up by police officers and border control agents, since there's so many crossings when traveling through Eastern Europe...of course all the officers are just as cold and unfriendly as the next batch...welcome to Eastern Europe!

So we finally arrive in the early morning, and the girls realized they hadn't written down the directions to their hostel, so we stopped at a coffeeshop at the train station that said they had wireless internet....which they did, but we weren't able to connect....welcome to Eastern Europe and their lack of good internet connection ha ha! So after hanging out there for quite awhile, and trying to stay awake, we finally find a desktop computer with internet, jot down the directions and make our way to the hostel. So we arrive there, and the girls told me it was only 5 euros a night for the place, so I figured that seemed like a pretty decent price for a night's accomodations....so upon arrival I find out that the 5 euro a night deal is only through booking with hostelworld.com.....if you just arrive without a booking, it's actually 17 euro a nighit...what the hell! So I hop on the net and see if there's any rooms available on hostelworld but of course there isn't, so I begrudgingly fork over the 17 euros for my first night, and book another two nights on the net for the 5 euro price....very strange indeed....

So after getting sorted out, we wander down for our first meal in Serbia to some nearby restaurant, and the food was quite delicious! After a nice meal, we head back to the hostel, and fatigue takes over and I ended up just crashing on the couch for a few hours. So after crashing there, we just wandered around for a bit and went with some German guy for another Serbian meal, and then got ready for a big night out since Belgrade is meant to have some of the best nightlife in Europe, or so we were told. So the Dutch girls were a bit slow getting ready, as they aren't used to going out until at least 12 am or 1 am...so we headed down to this nightclub that a local from couchsurfing had recommended we go check out...and upon arrival, we were told we needed reservations to get in.....now, this would begin an awful trend for the rest of the night was extremely frustrating! So we hop in a cab and ask him to take us down to some other nightclubs, and he drops us off on the Sava riverfront, where there's a bunch of old warehouses that have been converted in restaurants and nightclubs....so we start wandering around and try 3 more nightclubs, and they all say we require reservations...wtf!! How are you supposed to get into a place on a Saturday night in this town without reserving! What ever happened to allowing a customer willing to pay into an establishment....to me, I can see that there has to be at least 3 or 4 people per night that wouldn't show up for their reservation per night, so why turn down 3 paying customers!! ahhhh....So after trying 4 clubs in total, some girl told me to try the old town and a place called Cinema, so back in a taxi over to that place...and we show up and guess what...reservation required!! So we ask them if there is any place that doesn't require reservation, and he points us down the block to another place, so we walk there, and....reservation required!!! 6 clubs, 6 reservations required, oh my god!!! So at this point, I'm going to go ahead and say that Belgrade has the shittiest nightlife ever!! Of course, this is just one bad night out, but still very frustrating....so anyways, we walk by some small pub, and end up wandering in there and find that it's salsa night and that we can actually get in without reservation, so we end up there for several hours, watching these very talented salsa dancers strut their stuff....I must say, I was very very impressed with their skills, and am quite jealous.

Pregame drinks with Steffi the Dutchie...not enjoying her local spirit

It wasn't so bad for me...a bit rough around the edges

So anyways, we hung out there for awhile, and one of the Dutch girls was approached by some local guy and chatted for quite awhile, and I guess he offered to take her on a walking tour of the city...well she could also tell he was into her and hitting on her a bit, and she wasn't so interested, so she told him that she would go with him if myself and the other Dutch girl could go as well, so he agreed.

So we wandered back to the hostel, and that was it for our somewhat disappointed Saturday night out.
So the next day, after sleeping in a bit of course, we woke up and headed down to meet up with Ogi, the Serbian dude....he took us on a cool walking tour for several hours, and was very knowledgeable guide....Belgrade is a fairly scenic and history filled city, as there are still quite a few remnants from the NATO bombings from the 90s during the Death of Yugoslavia, where Serbia kind of orchestrated war all over the country...there's also a few touching memorials to the dead children and innocent civilians during the war. We wandered by a few churches (Serbia is mostly Orthodox Christian) so there's some noticeable differences from the Roman Catholic and Lutheran churches I'm used to visiting.....also, since there's still the Orthodox influence, there is Cyrillic as well as Roman alphabets so it's quite challenging at times, especially when trying to find the street name you're looking for! We also wandered around the old Fortress area which overlooks both the Danube and Sava rivers...quite lovely. At one point we stumbled across some ridiculous crazy street performance that was quite eccentric I must say....here is some of the footage...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdIpJ21TGHc

After visiting a few churches, we stopped for a well warranted hot coffee since it was a particularly cold day in Belgrade (8 degrees) considering the temperatures over the past several weeks had been in the high 20s everywhere I went! So after our coffee, we stopped by a park for a bit, and I witnessed a rather odd sight...there was this child who appeared to be a bit handicapped and he was rolling down what appeared to be a paved walkway and seemed to have no parent or guardian in sight....I thought it a bit odd to roll down pavement, rather than roll on the soft grassy hill, and started commenting on it to the girls, who were giving me a pretty hard time about how he should be allowed to do what he's done. It was quite an interesting argument considering the girls were actually Social Workers, so I was telling them they should take care of the situation....anyways, I eventually went over to the "paved" walkway, and found out it was actually the soft spongy material they use for running paths...so I guess the child was actually rolling on a somewhat comfortable surface....anyways very side tracked here! So we continued on, and checked out the parliament and castle, when we stumbled upon the filming for a Russian commercial, where we were asked to be extras ha ha...so we wandered around during the filming for a bit, but then when I started following a bunch of cast members, when the director said no no, we're done with you and pushed me away gently ha ha....oh those Russians....so yeah, after that commercial we headed on to another Serbian restaurant, and had some really tasty food there...I tried a Serbian salad for the first time, and wow it was so good, highly recommended if you ever get a chance...it's called Sjopska I believe in Serbian :) I also had Escalope Kjordiji style...which was also very tasty...I've got to give the Serbs credit, they really have great tasting food and for a great price!

Revolution Square

Inside an Orthodox Church

Belgrade Palace...?? not much of a palace

View of the Sava

4 Wisemen?

Meeting point of the Danube and Sava

Apparently "You Risk Your LIfe" by walking past that sign..

Nice Cannons!

A Museum of Allergies....probably don't want to visit if you have Allergies ha ha

Still incomplete Orthodox church...with the Cube

Inside the church

Memorial to dead children from NATO bombings

Hanging with the group on a bench

Cyrillic letters everywhere!

Parliament

Horse kicking some dude's ass!

Fountain at night

So Ogi had to run off to his house, but agreed to come out with us that night, so after dinner we just headed back to the hostel, chilled out for a bit. I had been in contact with a couchsurfing girl, and she had said she would probably be up for heading out that night as well, but then got back to me and said she was too tired and had a new roommate move in so she was going to stay in for the night. So it was just me, the Dutch girls, and Ogi heading out for the night. We waited for Ogi to show up at our hostel, and then headed on out...We went and met up with some Couchsurfers that the girls had talked with, and ended up heading with an Italian and Serbian girl to a cool pub, that was an apartment. Back in the Communist days, there wasn't any actual pubs, so people had to open their pubs in their homes, and keep it somewhat secretive. We hung out there for awhile, had some good stories and share some insight, as the Italian guy was a very very interesting character, who had been traveling and living around the world since he was 12. He had to work early the next morning, so they had to have an early night, but we continued on trying to find the next place. We ended up going to some nightclub called Plastic, which of course, ended up being closed since it's only a winter club...ah well!

So we ended up heading to the nightclub called Stefan Braun, which was the first nightclub that we had tried on the Saturday night that required a reservation...and we were able to get in without one, but had to pay the equivalent of 20 euros to get in for myself and Ogi, but we got a 20 euro bar tab...which didn't really cover much..maybe 4 drinks but oh well. So the bar was a pretty sweet place, with very very loud music, so it was pretty much impossible to actually talk to anyone....although I thought I was clever by writing things on my ipod touch and showing them to women at the bar...although the general vibe of the place was one of very high class and/or drug dealers...so needless to say, we didn't really make any new friends...especially since Serbs aren't exactly the friendliest of people, but ah well.....Anyways, Ogi kept trying to hit on and kiss the one Dutch girl, but she wasn't having any of it, so having been shut down, he got fairly pouty and sat in the corner...so eventually the girls decided we should leave since he was no longer having fun, and so Ogi made his one last attempt with the Dutch girl, but she said no no no! So we hopped in the taxi and were back to the hostel for the night.

The next day I wanted to go check out the Tesla museum, but it was closed according to the internet, so I ended up getting in touch with the couchsurfing girl again, and she invited me to come hang out at her place for a bit, so I went and checked it out and hung out for a few hours. Unfortunately she had a movie night planned with some other friends, so I had to leave and head back to my hostel and hang out there, but I received a good recommendation on a place to eat from her one roommate. So after getting back to the hostel, hanging with the Dutch girls for a bit, and then seeing them off to the train station and saying our goodbyes. I then went to find this Iguana restaurant. Well it actually ended up being one of the clubs that we needed a reservation to get to, although it was actually a jazz bar/restaurant. So I sat there and had some amazing food.....soooo good, and then made my way back to the hostel for the night, as I didn't really feel like wandering out by myself for the night.

So after sleeping in again, and realizing how sore I was getting from not having had a massage in quite sometime, I figured why not book a massage at this spa and fitness club that the couchsurfing girl from the previous day had recommended to me. So I looked up their website and found quite a few different selections of massages, but there wasn't really any descriptions of them, other than very basic cryptic sayings like "you will feel like you're walking on clouds after this massage" or "this massage is for those on a diet but who love chocolate"....yeah very descriptive indeed....so I look through the list and figure that the walking on clouds one might be alright (at this point I'm imagining a full body massage that will limber me up and make me feel like I'm walking on cloud 9) so I book into that, and decided to head down a bit early to enjoy the spa for a bit beforehand. So after arriving and chilling out for 25 minutes, I get summoned by the masseuse and taken upstairs for the massage. So we started out with me having my feet in some tub of oranges and water and having a bit of a food massage, good start right? So then she tells me that since my shorts are wet from having been in the hot tub, that I should put on these little underwear things they give you...soooo I take a look at them and say yeah whatever, now I wish I had taken a photo, because they were basically the equivalent of a very very tiny woman's g-string...so here I am trying to put this damn thing on and looking at myself thinking, oh god this looks so ridiculous! So I get on the massage table and throw on my bathrobe and wait.

She eventually enters back in, and starts massaging my feet...and continues....and continues....and after about 30 minutes, I begin to realize that the whole "walking on clouds" thing, meant that it was only a foot massage! So yeah...60 some minutes of foot massage...which I will admit felt really nice, but it was definitely not what I was looking for since my back and neck are still stiff! So after the massage, I lingered about for a bit more in the hot tub and sauna, before finally paying and getting out of there....and somewhat walking on cloud nine...ha ha oh well!

So I didn't really have any other plans, and waited to hear back from the couchsurfing girl as she said she would probably be up for going out that night, so I wandered back down to the Iguana restaurant for another great meal and some jazz and then waited to hear back from the girl, but then around 10:30 pm she let me know she was too tired again, so I was thinking, well I don't really feel like going out by myself again (as the hostel was empty and no one to meet), so I just hung out for the rest of the night, doing f*** all.

So the next day I wasn't too sure what I was going to do, so I went and checked out the Tesla museum, which was super cool. They had several of his famous inventions there that were working models, so we got to see things like Tesla coils in action, as well as the first remote control system....we were given fluorescent bulbs and held them close to the tesla coil and they would light up. I was also given a 10,000 volt shock from the remote control device. Fun times. So after the museum I was just sorting out what the hell to do, and looked through the train schedule, and found that I could go to Montenegro that afternoon, so I decided on a trip down there, so I started my walk down to the train station to make my reservation. Now, up to this point, I had tried speaking to several Serbian people in the streets and clubs, and the general attitude was that they didn't want to be spoken to, and were quite unhappy....I had been walking two days earlier and noticed that everyone has a sour look on their face, and no one is smiling, so I even commented to one girl while giving her a huge smile, and asking what makes Serbs happy and makes them smile, and she just glared at me and started playing with her phone.

So during my walk to the train station, I wanted to try and talk to one more Serb and do a little test. I was about 400 m from the train station (and obviously knew where it was), and it was in clear visible sight, so I turned to a nice looking girl beside me on the street, and asked her very politely if she knew where the train station was, and she actually glared at me and said "No I have no idea!"....and she then proceeds to walk up another 200 m and go into an apartment that is literally a 2 minute walk away from the train station!! Oh my god, Serbs are so difficult and cold!!! So anyways, I get to the station, make my reservation, and chill out for a few hours, enjoying the one good thing about Serbia (the food), and then off to Podgorica I go! Goodbye Belgrade and your crappy attitude!!

The chicken and the cube hanging in Belgrade

Remnants of the Nato bombings

Thought of Bonkowski when I saw this giant watermelon

Oh Nicko, you follow me everywhere!

I walked by the guys painting this the night before...cool artistic creation

Pack of random dogs that were chilling out, chasing people ha ha

Still room for Alchemists in Eastern Europe apparently!

Being zapped by the Tesla coil and lighting up the light in my hand!

Amazing Serbian salad...try it if you ever get a chance, so good!

So I catch the night train and find that my reservation didn't even get me a couchette, so I was forced to sit in a regular train seat....and the only seat available was across from some older man, so I settle in there. I watch some tv to keep myself occupied, and kill some time, while having my bag on the seat next to me...Eventually the older man motions to me to move my bag off the seat so he can put his feet up on it and stretch out to sleep, so he takes off his shoes and puts the most awful smelling feet right up on the seat next to me...the odour was just terrible!! And then to make matters worse, he decides to lay sideways across the seat next to him, while still keeping his feet on the chair next to me, so I now have nowhere to put my feet up...oh great. So after dealing with this shitty situation for awhile, some older ladies in the seats across the aisle get off the train, so I quickly switch over to their spot to get away from the foot odour, and to be able to kick back and sleep myself. Unfortunately I'm a bit too tall to properly lay sideways on the seats, so I had a fairly uncomfortable time trying to find a position where I could sleep, and thus I didn't sleep much, but it was still okay I guess..

Montenegro from the train at 7 am

So I arrive in Podgorica Montenegro in the early morning, and find my hostel with relative ease. I get inside and meet some French Canadian girl, who informs me that Podgorica is the most boring place she's visited, and that I should stay one night at the most ha ha. I also realize that the staff member who works there is nowhere to be found, and she tells me that he is frequently gone, so I just leave my bags there and we head out for a nice breakfast and hang out for awhile. As we walk around, I do realize that the city is in fact quite small and sleepy. So back to the hostel, to properly check in, and just linger around for awhile. I ended up just falling asleep on the couch for awhile since I was quite exhausted, and then just hung out. The French Canadian was kind enough to leave me some of her food since she didn't want to take it with her, so I even managed to cook my own dinner for a change! . Eventually it was getting to be late in the evening, and two Swiss guys mentioned they were heading out for a beer, and I figured I would join them since I wasn't doing anything really. A Welshman also joined us, and we started walking to a pub near our hostel, when a police van came flying up and stopped in front of us and started yelling things in Montenegrin....we had no clue what was going on, and they heard us speak English and got back in the van and drove off, squeeling their tires...interesting indeed...

So we continue walking and find this super small pub and are about to go in it, when another police vehicle comes flying around the corner, screeches to a halt and starts yelling at us in Montenegrin again, so now we're really thinking what the hell is going on here! So this time they respond in English after we say we don't know what they're saying, and tell us all to give them our ID....so of course I'm not carrying my passport with me (and I was somewhat intrigued about whether I was even legally in Montenegro since passport control on the train asked me to get out my passport and then never came back and looked at it or stamped it), so I give them my driver's licence and hope they don't tell me to go get my passport from the hostel in case I could be in some trouble. They look at all our ID, get on the radio for a bit, and then give us our stuff back and say have a good night, and drive off squeeling their tires again...ha ha ha....this is within our first 7 minutes of being outside and walking from the hostel I might add! So we wander into this little bar, which is basically two tables, one filled with a bunch of old smoking men, and one free table, and have a seat.

We have a few beers, and one of the older guys from the other group happens to speak some English so he starts asking us questions, and then one of the guys in his group says something in Montenegrin, and all of a sudden they are buying us rounds of beers and shots, and we have no clue why! Then one of the other guys comes over to our table and we chat for a bit, although he spoke very very little English, but from what I understood he was an engineer, and was a nice enough guy. Eventually after receiving all these rounds and shots, we clear up our tab, which ended up being like 4 euros each...win! And myself and the Welshman wander outside to try and find the toilet, which actually just ends up being a giant garden behind the little shack this was this pub....ha ha very interesting place indeed! So we wander back around the front, and I find that there's a broken stone stairway to a little watch tower above the pub so I climb up there, and while the Swiss are outside smoking and talking to the old men, trying to say goodbye, I start throwing little pebbles of rocks down at them, and they can't figure out for the life of them what is going on ha ha...eventually they looked up and saw me and had a laugh. So anyways, we wander back to the hostel and that was it for the night! I receive a late email from a girl in Podgorica that I had messaged on couchsurfing, so I got in touch with her via text, and she replied back to me that she was up for meeting the next day, so we agreed on that and it was off to bed.

The only "fluent" English speaker of the old man group

New Montenegrin Engineering friend!

Dodgy stairs going up here

Chilling in my Guard Tower

So the next day after taking awhile to get up and sorted, I called the girl on the number she had messaged me from, and then heard an older person's voice answer in Montenegrin, so I said hey it's Reilly from couchsurfing, is this Andrijana? and then I just hear a bunch more Montenegrin in return and then she hangs up ha ha...so I'm thinking okay?? Maybe she only can write in English but not speak in English, so this is going to be very difficult to meet up in that case. Then shortly after, this girl calls me back from a different number, and tells me that she had run out of credit on her phone the night before, and was using her mom's phone, and that was who I was actually speaking to ha ha ha....so she agrees to meet up that afternoon. So met up, went for a coffee and lunch (which she paid for against my wishes), and then we went for a nice 2 hour wander around the city, which basically covers the whole city as it is really really small!

Orthodox Church

The most interesting sight of Podgorica...a Bridge ha ha

A Helluva good Whisky I assume :)

After our walk, she had to head home but said she would message me if she was up to anything that night, but unfortunately she ended up being too tired to do anything. So I did what I sometimes do, and decided to wander out on the town by myself! I had been given a recommendation on a pub to check out by Andrijana called Pug's Head, so I tried to find that place, although in her text message she had said Mug's, so when I tried google mapping it, I ended up not being able to find it, so I just went wandering around. I eventually picked some pub which seemed like quite a lot of fun, and popped in there, and met some nice Albanian dudes at the bar who spoke good English, and ended up chilling out with them for quite awhile, until they were ready to leave. I then tried to meet some local girls, but they were pulling the whole "I don't speak much English" thing....apparently I look like a creep or something, because I'm sure they probably do ha ha, but oh well.

So I was about to leave but then figured I'd do one more walk around the bar trying to meet some more people, and ran into two more Albanian dudes who were going to school with the other two, so I hung out with them for awhile, and then they were leaving, but told me to come to their hometown at the Albanian-Montenegro border, as they were going to be there for a week or so, so I said I would think about it, and hung out for a bit longer then decided to bail since the crowd was clearing out. On my walk back to the hostel, I ran into the guys again, and they told me they were going to some nightclub and told me to come with them if I had no plans, so we walked over there. Now the one guy walked right in, and I was behind the other guy when the bouncer grabbed him and me and pushed us back outside and was saying something in Montenegrin, and couldn't speak any English....so I was pretty confused over this, and thought that maybe we weren't let in because of the leis we were wearing from the previous bar, so I asked some girl who was smoking outside if that was the issue, and she asked the bouncer something and she told me that wasn't the issue...so I was fairly confused at this point. Eventually the other dude came back outside and spoke the bouncer, then the guys told me that the second guy was a bit drunk and stepped on his foot, and because of that, the bouncer was mad and thought he was too drunk....so I was kind of banished due to guilt by association ha ha ha....so the guys wanted to go to the casino next, but then that was closed so it was looking like a bleak evening since most places were closed by that point.

We wandered down to one last pub and found it still open and playing some live Serbian music, so we chilled out there..the only thing that really stood out there (other than not having a clue about what the lyrics meant) was that there was only one bathroom for the pub and about 100 people or so...and there was this huge line as someone was taking a really really long time in there ha ha...then this little girl came out finally and was fairly embarrassed....ha ha oh well...so anyways, hung out there and then wandered back to the hostel eventually for the night.

So upon waking the next day, I was meant to check out, and was contemplating heading off to Kotor or somewhere else on the Montenegrin coast, since Podgorica was a pretty quiet and boring city. So I was pretty much ready to head out when the local girl messaged me and said she wanted to hang out again that day...so I had a bit of a dilemma as I still wasn't entirely sure if there was something with her or not, so I decided to stick around for a few more hours and take a night bus if necessary, so we arranged to meet up and head to some concert thing with her friend. So I got to the designated meeting spot and waited and waited, and then she finally called to let me know that she was running late and would just pick me up in a taxi, so she finally arrived and we got to the concert hall, but had to wait for her friend who was running late....and then she started complaining about him being late ha ha, what a hypocrite! But it was all good, and I gave her a bit of a hard time over it. So we get into the concert hall, and it was a really great show. It was a history of music basically covered the evolution of musical styles from the ancient greeks right up to modern age. My personal favourite was the Baroque period, where there were some really great string sessions.....the organizer of the whole thing was this cute little Japanese woman, who spoke no Montenegrin, and not very much English, so she was struggling at times on the mic, but it was all good and the audience appreciated her.

So the concert thing went on for 2 hours, and when it was all finished up, the 3 of us went to find some cheap food and then a pub for a beer. Andrijana's friend had exams so he had to go home early, so it was just her and I that went out. At this point I figured out that she did in fact have a b/f (bummer), so it was just a casual hang out session, and I even found out it was their 6 month anniversary, so she had plans to hang out with him that night, but he chose to go hang out with some other friends ha ha...so it was just her and I chilling out. After the pub, we went down to the local mall to a dart board pub, and hung out there for quite awhile...eventually I guess she convinced her bf to come down and join us and he ended up being a pretty cool guy. So we just hung out all together for awhile, then it was time to head back for the night, and at this point I had already missed the last night bus, so I figured I would just crash at the hostel for one last night.

So I get back, and the guy who works there is a bit surprised to see me, thinking I had left, and I tell him that I need to stay another night, but then he lets me know the place is full! Damn, so I tell him I will just sleep on the couch, but he said no ha ha...so I was in a jam as it was midnight by this point, so he tells me of another hostel and calls over there to see if there's a bed, and there is. So he calls me a taxi and tells the dispatch where to take me so that driver knows when he arrives...and so he arrives and of course he doesn't know where I need to go, and he doesn't speak English...so fortunately I had a map and was able to point the address out to him, but still a bit of a battle. I arrive at the place, the cabby short changed me 1 euro, and I found what was probably the shittiest hostel ever ha ha ha.....it was just a room with bunk beds with no blankets or anything, it was a cold room, and it was full of mosquitos....and the guy wanted 15 euro a night, but since the cabby short changed me I only had 13 euros on me. The guy was in a rush to get out of the hostel, and said he was going to a wedding the next day and wouldn't be back until the next night, so I told him I would just leave the remainder on the table or something. I also tried to fill up a glass of water to drink, and found the water to be all brown and dodgy looking ha ha...what a dump!

So I fortunately had a sleeping bag to keep warm, and had to lather myself up with mosquito repellent to protect myself for the night, and hit the hay. When I woke up the next day, I was just ready to get out of that place, and decided it was so shitty that I wasn't going to leave the remainder of my bill since the guy wouldn't be able to track me down anyways..so I hastily packed up my things, and found a cab to the bus station, although the driver didn't understand where I wanted to go, so I just did the typical train station, "choo choo" noise to tell him roughly where I wanted to go, since the train and bus station were beside each other. So I get down there, find a bus and am off to Kotor, as a few mates had recommended it.

Couldn't turn the damn flash off since my camera screen is broken! This is Budva

So off to the lovely coastline of Montenegro, albeit with some random and very long breaks for the bus driver....at one point, there was a 45 minute wait just outside of Budva since there were some wildfires going on and the fire department was blocking off the already small highway to fight it. Since my camera screen is broken, I wasn't able to get the greatest photos of Budva, but it sure is a very amazing looking place, too bad I didn't end up stopping there. So I arrive in Kotor, and find my hostel, where the girls there try and take my hat at first, and then threaten to kill me if I don't pay my bill by 10 am the next day since I didn't have enough cash on me...ha ha interesting staff. So I head out for an awesome pasta where I meet a really nice American couple who worked for Apple and a small startup company offering an iPhone app called Klik I believe They also asked me to count the steps up to the top of the fortress behind the old city walls during my walk up there the next day. After having a nice chat with them, I asked the staff member if he could direct me towards a pub called the Dock bar, where they carried a bunch of sports channels in hopes of watching some NFL. Well the staff didn't really speak much English, but seeing as how I was the only paying customer, eventually I was able to get them to switch off the Italian Football match, and find me some American Football (which they curiously called Rugby) ha ha ha....so I was able to at least watch one half of a game.

At one point, the guy from the other restaurant came over and started talking to the girls there, and I guess the older woman was telling me I should try and marry her cute coworker ha ha...unfortunately the girl didn't speak any English, so it just wouldn't have worked out, but it was a funny experience nevertheless hearing them talk about me, but of course not understanding what they were saying. So after the game ended, it was back to the hostel for the night.

The next morning, around 7:30 am, I was woken by one of the people leaving the room, and to my shock, he was the very last person in the 6 person dorm to leave....now in all my years of hosteling, I have never seen an entire room gone by 7:30 am....it was such a weird occurrence to me. So anyways, after sleeping in as per usual, I decided to do something productive for the day, so I began the hike up to the old fortress, and the views were absolutely amazing! I was counting the steps on my way up, which was rather difficult considering quite a few of the steps had eroded so my count was probably fairly inaccurate, plus while counting I met some American dude who kept asking me questions as messing up my count ha ha....but for what it's worth, Assana Fard and Dan Waylonis, I counted 1273 steps...but yeah that's obviously fairly different from what others counted, although I may have taken a different path starting point too ha ha. So yeah after getting to the top in a relatively short time period, it was time to trek back down and grab some nice beers with the American dude. We chilled out for awhile, and then found some awesome pizza place in the shopping centre outside the old city walls, and then wandered down to another pub for one last beer before he had to head back to Budva, where he was staying.

The Chicken and the Cube

Kotor Old City (UNESCO Heritage Site)

At the top

Nice walk

At the top of the Fortress, chilling out

After those beers, I was pretty tired so I just retired back to the hostel for a bit, chatted with a few people, and obtained an interesting video about the Death of Yugoslavia from some nice Portuguese dude (which would later lead to an interesting incident on a bus ha ha). Then I just crashed for the night, keeping it low key for a change.

So the next day was my last day in Kotor, which also coincided with....Karaoke night at Club Maximus!! But yeah anyways, I hung out at the hostel for awhile, while helping people check in, since the staff always seemed to be out of the building somewhere, so I would keep calling them on their phones to let them know that new people had arrived. So after doing this with several groups of people, people started to think I really did work at the hostel ha ha, so the staff rewarded me by giving me a chocolate bar for my hard work...nice! So after hanging around there for quite awhile, and meeting some new people, I just wandered around the old town for a few hours, looking for a new camera, but with no luck, so I returned, blogged a bit, and then convinced a few people to come to the pasta restaurant for another meal. I had already recommended it to a Chilean guy named Alfredo, as well as to a South African/American dude, and then convinced an Aussie and American to come with me to that place as well, I'm basically like a tourist guide now! So we get there, and also find this cute Brazilian girl from the hostel who was there as well, so we all sit together. Now, I have to laugh a bit at the Brazilian girl, as she's quite petite and probably has the biggest backpack I have ever seen! She couldn't even fit through the hostel door when she arrived, so I had to open the second door for her so she could fit in, so of course I took the piss out of her a fair bit over that ha ha.

But anyways, we had a nice dinner, shared some local wine, and many travel stories over a few hours. Eventually Alfredo and I decided to head to the pub next door to watch a football match, as he's a huge Real Madrid fan, so we wandered over there, with the American/Saffer dude in tow, and then the one Aussie and Brazilian chick ended up joining us as well. Meanwhile, when back at the hostel for a bit, I had talked up karaoke night to everyone, so I had recruited 2 more Brazilians, 2 Swedes, and 3 Aussies to come with, so it was shaping up to be a goooood night! So after hanging at the pub until the game was finished, it was time to get ready to get our Karaoke on! Club Maximus is one of the largest clubs in Montenegro, and it certainly didn't disappoint. We arrived and found the place was packed with young people, which was really quite shocking considering I had seen very few young people over the previous few days wandering around Kotor! But we were in for a bit of a surprise when we found that the karaoke was all in Serbian ha ha ha...so we all had a good laugh trying to sing along with the Serbian lyrics and had a pretty good time there. At one point I convinced one of the Aussie girls to go skinny dipping in the sea around 3 am, and she was totally keen, but at some point she snuck out because she was too drunk and didn't hold up her end of the offer! But alas, it was all in all a great fun night, and the last of us didn't get out of there until 3:15 am or so.

Hard to see, but it's in Serbian!

some of the group

Alfredo, me, and Swedish girl!

So on the way back to the hostel with the two Swedish girls, I was saying how disappointed I was in the Aussie for not holding up on her skinny dipping agreement, so the Swedish girls being...well...Swedish...said that they were totally up for it, so we wandered back down towards the docks to find a spot to go for a swim, unfortunately the area was well lit and close to the main highway, so I was somewhat concerned that the police might show up...so we wandered around a bit more and around a fence into what ended up being the international port, so as we were getting ready to hop in there, a security guard came running over and yelling stuff in Montenegrin, so I asked him where we could go swimming but he didn't speak any English ha ha...so we were forced to leave that area, and things were looking bleak so we just went back to the hostel.

So the next day we all had a huge breakfast together, shared some laughs, and then starting saying our goodbyes. The two Brazilians and 3 Aussie girls were all going to try and pack into this ridiculously tiny car and drive down to the next spot, meanwhile myself and Alfredo were heading up to Dubrovnik on the bus in the afternoon, so we walked over to the car to take some photos and have some laughs. They all managed to fit into that car, but it literally was like a clown car with all these people and bags packed everywhere...good times! So after saying our goodbyes, Alfredo and I just walked around a bit more, took some photos, and then got ready to head out on the bus. And we were off to Croatia, where I'll continue my story in the next blog session :)