xeberus' VirtualTourist Home Page

I think that this area is terribly overlooked by tourists, which is sad. The Balkans are full of rich cultrual traditions and a history that goes much farther than the wars that have plagued the region through the centuries. I lived in Belgrade for a year in 1993 and did some traveling in the region in that period. I have since returned and I will be back again in December 2004.

With only 2,000,000 inhabitants, this tiny country is a gem of Alps, lakes, caves, a charming capital Ljubljana, and a short but pleasant Adriatic sea coast. Slovenia changes from Austrian in character to Italian dipending on which border you approach. Slovenia was always the most economically advanced republic of the former Yugoslavia and was the first to join the E.U.

Serbia has a long and troubled history, which is hard to understand as everyone has a different version of the events of the past. But it is clear that Serbia has been (and in some cases, still is ) home not only to Slavs, but also to Celts, Romans, Romani, Albanians, Hungarians, Turks, Ayvars and a multitude of others. Each group has left it's mark on the landscape and the culture of this small but tough country.

One of Europes smaller countries, Croatia is a country of great contrasts. On the Adriatic coast one finds cities with palm-lined avenues, ancient marble streets, and Venitian style architecture. If sun bathing is your thing, the chrystal waters of Dalmatia and Istria call your name. Feel free to leave your bathing suite behind as FKK (nudist) beaches abound. The interior of Croatia ranges from rocky mountains to fertile planes and hills with castles from the country's Austrian and Hungarian past.

Or Bosna i Hercegovina in local language (whatever you wish to call it - Bosanski, Srpski, Hrvatski) is really two different places. Bosnia is a green, forested, mountainous rolling continental region. Herzegovina is a rough, rocky zone with a generally more Mediterranian climate. The entire country is filled with valleys, mountains, and rivers. More than anyplace else in the region, the Ottoman occupation of the Balkans can be felt in Bosnia with it's large Slavic Muslim population (though many are secular Muslims, if that makes sense, they mostly now prefer the term Bosnjak to Muslim as a cultural designation). Sadly, the ethnic cleansing of the Bosnian war of the 90s has left the country largely divided and many cultural monuments have been destroyed by primative forces trying to eliminate the history of the "enemy". However, many are still standing or have been restored, such as the old bridge in the Herzegovine city of Mostar, which was recently reopened.

The Hungarians are a world apart from all of their neighbors. Their culture is unique in Europe and their musical language is 100% different from it's neighboring Slavic, Germanic, and Romance neighbors. However, their capital city is the epitome of Europe with grande palaces, statues everywhere, and monuments almost as common as the pidgeons that roost on them. There is also the influence of the Ottoman Turks to be felt here though, maybe most noteably by the abundance of public baths. With Buda on one side of the (not so blue) Danube and Pest on the other, there are actually two cities here to explore. If you're energetic, as I was, you can cover a lot of ground on foot, but be sure to stop once in a while at a caffe to rest your feet and energize with some local coffee.

Portland is my home on this side of the Atlantic (or the Pacific, depending on which way you go). Portland is the largest city in the state of Oregon with about 1.7 million people in the metro area, with a proud liberal bend (and we like it that way, damned it!) It's a lovely city of trees and flowers surrounded by hills and mountains. The city straddles the Willamette River (rhymes with dammit) and is bordered by the mighty Columbia to the north. Portland is a city of parks, gardens, and pleasant neighborhoods. With plenty of rain and a temperate climate, flora trives here. As lovely as our city is, the real treasure of our area is the nature around us, the forests (please save them from the evil timber industry and our #@*% president!), the beautiful Cascade and Costal mountain ranges, the dramatic Columbia River Gorge and the cold but majestic Pacific Ocean.