Bosnia or Bust!

Lovely Zadar, on the Adriatic Sea

I'm off to Sarajevo, capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Sarajevo was the most affordable destination landing me within a reasonable traveling distance of Zadar, Croatia (winner, European Best Destination 2016), where my wonderful husband will be teaching this spring at the University of Zadar. The general plan is to arrive safely (that's on you, Turkish Airlines!), stay a few nights to explore Sarajevo, then make my way solo to Croatia, stopping in Mostar and Split on the way, and up the coast to Zadar to an eventual happy reunion with Rob at our AirBnB apartment in the center of the old city.

They said I could bring a backpack..

I'm a little nervous about this trip. Not that I'm going solo; I've done plenty of solo trips before. It's silly, but I have never flown Turkish Airlines and I made the mistake of googling and reading some scathing reviews from travelers who have had the misfortune of having things go wrong. Now, most people have wonderful things to say about Turkish, but the unfortunate souls who get bumped, have luggage misdirected (permanently), or get stuck in the Istanbul airport overnight tell piteous tales of woe, describing a supremely uncaring customer service culture that apparently hasn't changed much since the Seljuk Empire. 

Due to the scary reviews and my tight connection time in Istanbul (barely 90 minutes to catch the last flight of the day to Sarajevo), I'm once again going carry on only. The carry on limit for Turkish Airlines is 1 overhead item at 8 kilos, roughly 17.6 pounds. My carry on bag weighs at least 5 pounds.

This should be interesting...
Next post, Sarajevo!

Budva: Mega-Yachts and Madonna

Lonely Planet gives an excellent introduction to Budva:

Hotel Meridian on the Budva Riviera

The poster child of Montenegrin tourism, Budva – with its atmospheric Stari Grad (Old Town) and numerous beaches – certainly has a lot to offer. Yet the child has moved into a difficult adolescence, fuelled by rampant development that has leeched much of the charm from the place. In the height of the season the sands are blanketed with package holidaymakers from Russia and Ukraine, while the nouveau riche park their multimillion-dollar yachts in the town’s guarded marina. By night you’ll run a gauntlet of scantily clad women attempting to cajole you into the beachside bars. It’s the buzziest place on the coast so if you’re in the mood to party, this is the place to be.

Read more: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/montenegro/coastal-montenegro/budva#ixzz3w15uzEDE

Budva itself is functional, plain and uninteresting. The real draws are the lovely walled Old Town (Stari Grad, worth a half day) and the beaches of the Budva Riviera, which stretches for 22 miles along Montenegro's Adriatic coast. We decided to splurge on a reservation for 2 nights at Hotel Meridian, located at the far southern end of the Riviera on Bečići beach. At $50 a night, it was an affordable luxury.


The biggest hotel on Bečići beach is the Hotel Splendid, a luxurious five-star resort that cost 70 million euros to build. It was the choice of The Rolling Stones and Madonna as well as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie during their stay in Montenegro.


There are numerous cafes, bars, and restaurants along the extensive beachfront promenade. We had a lovely swim off the beach and a delicious fresh seafood lunch at Tri Ribari (the 3 Fishermen). Afterward we enjoyed a long stroll south along the walkway past some interesting people (most were Russian tourists from Moscow, an easy 3-hour flight away) and some interesting geologic formations - highly folded and warped layers of light and dark metamorphic rock are exposed by weathering along the coast here.

Lunch at Tri Ribari (Three Fishermen), Bečići

Bevare!

Motor Yacht A

Gazing out at the Adriatic, we couldn't help but notice a large, strange-looking vessel several hundred meters offshore. It looked like an evil genius' submarine, something out of a James Bond movie. It was pure white, and more than anything else resembled an intergallatic battle cruiser. Asking around, we were told it was "Motor Yacht A", the ultra-luxurious mega-yacht built by French designer Phillipe Starck and owned by Russian businessman Andrey Melnichenko, who spent over $300 million on the ship's construction. This is the same guy who had both Whitney Houston and Christina Aguillera perform at his wedding to Serbian model Aleksandra Nikolic in 2005. His other yacht, also designed by Phillipe Starck, is nearing completion and will be the largest sailing yacht in the world -- "Sailing Yacht A," nicknamed "The White Pearl".

Seriously, these mega-yachts are ridiculously lavish. Once I started researching them it was hard to stop. The technology going into these ships is quite impressive, perhaps justifying some of the outlandish amount of money involved. The article below gives a good sneak-peak. Or, just Google "white pearl sailing yacht":

"Baccarat Meets Bomb-Proof Glass on the High Seas" - WSJ story on Motor Yacht A, w/ photos