The south end of the beach at Hua Hin, Thailand.
Where are Kevin and Ruth now? Hua Hin, Thailand.

Where are Kevin and Ruth going next? Maldives on March 23rd.

Wednesday, November 3, 2021

Stopped by the police in Bosnia

Monday, we left Sarajevo at about 9:30am, and headed south through the hills towards Montenegro. But first, we had to fill up with diesel and top up the propane. I found a station that sold both, and both at good prices. The diesel worked out to €1.18 ($1.70 CAD) per liter which is the cheapest we have paid since we've owned Max.

Then the LPG. Again, it turned out to be an easy experience topping up our refillable tanks. The station attendant had never done one in a motorhome before, so I kind of had to show him how! But we got it done no problem. The LPG worked out to €0.75 ($1.08 CAD) per liter.

And then we were off. Again, a fairly narrow curvy road that mostly followed a river gorge. We ended up going through eleven different tunnels!

It was a really scenic drive.

But pretty slow going.

We went through a small town.

So we're going through this small town. As we enter the town, I slow down to the posted 50 km/h (30 mph) speed limit. I know to pay attention to the speed limit because we have seen police with radar, and many signs advertising the fact that there might be police with radar.

As we go through town, there is a sign saying it was a school zone and the speed is 30 km/h (18 mph). So that's what I do.

As we exit town, there is a police car pulled to the side, and two cops who are outside the car. One of them motions for me to pull over.

I put down the window and say hello in my best Bosnian, but I say that we are from Canada and speak English. He shrugs, and says he speaks a little English. He asks for my drivers licence and the vehicle papers. He's looking at my drivers licence, and says that there was a radar going through town, and it was a 30 km/h zone. But his English isn't very good, and we think he's trying to tell us that we were going faster than that. But I pointed at my phone with the maps program on it and told him yes, we were going 30 km/h. 

Of course I also noticed that there was no radar gun in sight. So we're really not sure what he was trying to get at. 

He says, "you know the speed limit was not 50, it was 30", to which we agreed and said "yes, we know... that's what we were going".

He then asked if we were going to Montenegro, and I said yes. He handed me back my licence and paperwork and smiled and said "go slowly".

And that was that. 




Scenery along the way.

Another tunnel.


And another.

And another.

Notice that it was raining on and off.


But by the time we arrived in Foca, the skies had cleared and it was warming up. In fact, yesterday afternoon was probably the nicest day we've had since we arrived in Europe October 1st! Sunny, and with a high around 20C. Very pleasant.

Foca (pop 18,500) is kind of an odd little city. It's in the middle of nowhere, and the main industry seems to be lumber. And yet it seems very modern. Lots of shops and cafe's, and we both notice that the women dress very fashionably. 

It's also hard to find parking. We think there are more cars than there are parking spots for them. Eventually, we found a place on the outskirts beside what we thought was a hospital. We were sitting there having some lunch when a very official looking guy in uniform comes up and very sternly tells us that we can't park there! He didn't speak English, but we definitely understood what he was saying. It turns out we were parked outside a prison!!

We finally found the main public parking lot, and managed to get a decent spot. In fact, we decided it was good enough to spend the night.

We went and did some grocery shopping, and then wandered around town. 

This Serbian Orthodox church is fairly new, holding it's first service in 2013.

A depiction of what it was going to look like.

It turns out that it took a long time to build this church. The foundation was laid in 1994, but then of course there was a war going on. The Foca people suffered greatly during the war, with genocide and mass rapes. Nasty business. It seems almost amazing that the town has rebounded back from that.

The mosque is also fairly new.

One of the main streets.
We had a time change last weekend, and now it starts to get dark around 4:30pm.

The Drina River at the small city of Foča.
You can just barely see Max parked at the base of that unfinished apartment building by the river.

Totally peaceful night.

Today, we are off to Montenegro... the border is only 26 kms (16 miles) away!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Record low deal on this Greenworks Electric Pressure Washer.

And in Canada...



12 comments:

  1. Somehow, this part looked spooky???!!! Maybe the tunnels or police? But the changing color was pretty.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lol, we didn't find any of it spooky. We loved the drive as it was very scenic and hardly any traffic. Although the road was twisty and winding we found the drive overall to be very relaxing, even with having been pulled over. The police guy was very nice to us and we were nice and friendly back to him, thankfully it all worked out well. :-)

      Delete
  2. I agree with Luci & Loree, the area looked ominous...maybe it was the tunnels or the closed in feeling. I was thinking with rain, it seems they might have rock slides. Yikes, maybe the police do like they do in Mexico...looking for payment. Safe travels.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As I said in my comment above we found it to be anything but ominous. We really love these kinds of drives. It wasn't raining hard enough to think about there being rock slides but that did cross my mind,

      It is possible that that is what they may have been trying to do but not once did he mention anything about a fine or money. We think that they were bored and wanted something to do and if they felt they might get money out of us then maybe they would have tried but I think he knew right away that we knew what the speed limit was and that we were very firm about the fact that we were going the correct speed.

      Delete
  3. I read that there is possible unrest and civil discord coming again to Bosnia. Maybe it is good to get out now...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, it does sound like there is a bit of unrest happening but hopefully it will all be talked out, I don't think anyone there wants another war!

      Delete
  4. I guess you have had enough experience with police in other places not to be too afraid of them and stand your ground. Would suck to be in a country where there is a language barrier and fighting the law.. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's not a matter of not being afraid of them, if we had been speeding than we would owned up to it and paid a fine if he had said there was one but we knew that we were going the correct speed so if there was any kind of issue with it we would have stood our ground even with the language barrier. We think this cop knew right away that we were totally aware of the speed and we dealt with him in a nice friendly manner as he did with us.

      Delete
  5. Never had any huge desire to go to Bosnia. T.C. had to go to Serbia for business, but that's somewhat different, as they tend to "look after you".
    I meant to tell a little story about one of our former neighbours who came to Canada from Sarajevo some 25+ years ago. We had a two hour power outage (this is a few years ago) and at one point we were out chatting on the street, asd the lady said, "You know, we lived in Sarajevo for TWO YEARS without power, and were able to manage. Here, we lose power for two hours, and I'm almost beside myself...." Funny what we get used to. Safe travels. Cheers,...B.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We really enjoyed Bosnia and look forward to returning again some time in the future. There is still stuff there that we want to see but we want to do it in better weather.

      Lol, yep isn't life funny! When you have the conveniences of life at your fingertips you get used to it so when they aren't there even for a short time, it is difficult to live without them. We can't even begin to imagine what she must have lived through back then!

      Delete
  6. We like this part of the trip, it looks like our kind of places.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We are enjoying this part of the trip as well. It sort of reminds us of what it is like in Mexico in many ways. :-)

      Delete

There are more comments on our facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/TravelwithKevinAndRuth

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.