Day 17 14 Sep - Morning in Pristina, then home to Bristol

Photo above - at Pristina airport, Kosovo, at the start of the journey home.

Reflections on the Balkans

Today is our last day in the Balkans. We spent a lazy morning in the hotel, before at 11.30am, catching a cab to the airport about 30 minutes away.

Before this trip, I had only been to the Balkans once before in 1990, when I visited northern Yugoslavia just before it started breaking up. Like a lot of people, I remember the names of places like Sarajevo, Mostar, and Kosovo from the news stories about the wars that took place during the 90s. To come here and see how the various countries are managing since gaining independence has been very interesting. 

Unfortunately, when visiting any of the countries, you cannot escape the impact and talk of those times, and how the war impacted both the country and the people, and various different ethnic groups. Different countries are at different stages of development. Some, especially those on the Adriatic coast, have embraced tourism, and the wars seem a distant memory, whereas other are still struggling with the fallout, and still have difficult relationships with their neighbours.

Above all though, the people we have met have been extremely friendly on the whole, English is spoken widely, many countries have some lovely scenery, and the road networks are good for travelling around, with distances being fairly manageable. Kosovo is probably the country that is most under developed as far as tourism goes, and Croatia is now a common travel destination, but I would recommend anywhere in the region for a visit.

Final stretch 

Once at the airport we had to wait to go through security as we were too early for our 4.30pm flight. It is not a big airport, and there were only five planes on the tarmac when we arrived. Our flight should take about two hours, which will take us to Basel, where we transfer to a flight to Bristol. Despite having to enter Europe (Switzerland) and then leave Europe 15 minutes later via EES, the transfer went smoothly. Basel is strange as they have no transfer channel, so you have to leave the airport, and then go back in to departures. Even stranger, because the airport is actually situated in France, although jointly operated by Switzerland and France, you decide which country to leave into! Our plane to Bristol left slightly late, but it was not an issue, and eventually got home tired but safe at about 11.30pm

I now have a few days break before I head off again to South America! That trip will appear on the blog as it unfolds starting 23rd September.

Leaving Kosovo

Nearing Switzerland