I hit the road for my final leg to Kosovo around 9am. I thought I might be an hour or two late for meeting Holly and Garth at their 1:30pm arrival at the Pristina airport but at least it would be close...oh, how naive. The countryside south of the capital of Bosnia consisted of small, partially tree covered, rocky hills with the odd conglomeration of houses sprinkled about. I eventually turned onto a secondary road which actually was a better road for the first half an hour and then it began a hilly climb filled with switchbacks. Surprisingly a lot of the road was freshly paved and I couldn’t help but think of how wonderful it would be to rollerblade it. After finishing one big climb I admired a cluster of farmhouses with people of all ages out raking up the cut hay...there must be a more efficient way to do that! My original thought of making it into Pristina around their landing time was soon dismissed with the thoughts of making it by dinner time and then eventually with hoping to get into the capital before it got dark.
The main street of Sarajevo:
A cemetery in the middle of a highway offramp in Sarajevo:
I crossed the border into Montenegro at a tiny bridge spanning a river after driving a crazy one lane windy road for over half an hour, cruising at a max speed of 20 km/hr. I later found out that most driving in Montenegro is quite slow, but beautiful. I passed over a large dam that must supply a lot of this little country's electricity. The lake must have been 10-15 kilometers long and I passed through numerous tunnels bore into the rocky shoreline, it was quite a pretty drive.
Dam in Montenegro:
The lake created by that dam:
Hills of Montenegro:
After one climb up a mountain, I expected the reciprocal descent but was surprised when it opened up to a large, grassy plateau. The asphalt road snaked along the open countryside and I soon arrived at a town called Zabljak ("zab-lee-yak"). The houses had steep, colorful roofs and the area felt like it could have been in Norway or the Canadian north. It was a ski town in the winter and seemed to have many hikers visiting in the summer. Nice place.
To get to the border to Kosovo, between a town called Rozaje and Pec required a big climb through a windy coniferous forested road. I arrived at the border of Kosovo on a two lane road that was blocked by a bunch of parked trucks carting raw logs and gravel. I parked and walked to see what was up and realized that passenger vehicles were allowed to press ahead, provided no one was coming the other way. The cute little border had a little log house building where I needed to provide my passport to the local police. I was fairly quickly waved on and thought I was in Kosovo. Having driven fairly non-stop since the morning I was feeling quite peckish and decided to stop at a pullout on the side of the road that had a magnificent view of the level ground of Kosovo below. I was excited that I may be close to the end of the incessant turns and switchbacks that had proliferated my last numerous hours of driving. One more hill to descend and I can actually drive straight for a while! A border cop car passed by and saw me taking a photograph. I thought nothing of it but after 20 minutes of hanging out there, they passed by again, at a very slow speed. Little did I know but I wasn’t actually all the way through into Kosovo. Down the hill there was another stop and it was here that I was informed that my European Green Card insurance was not valid and that I would have to purchase some insurance. I walked back up to the white building and presented my papers. The guy gave me a bit of a hassle that my ownership documentation didn’t actually say that I was in a campervan. I tried to explain that a “motor caravan” was the same thing but in the end he made it seem that he was doing me a favour by letting me go...as a teenage girl would say, “Whatever”. I descended the hill and was elated to drive straight for a while. As I crossed the Kosovian countryside a lightning storm broke out which I enjoyed watching (as much as I could while driving Betty). Just 30 kilometers outside of Pristina, the road turned from nasty potholes to a dirt road that was being prepared for a massive upgrade. The problem was that one could only drive between 25-30 km/h (if you cared about your vehicle). I was impressed with Betty’s performance yet it did take close to 45 minutes to return to asphalt.
Dusk was settling in as I reached the outskirts of the capital. My plan was to find a cab, ask him where the big hotel (Ambassador Hotel) that Louise, Garth’s friend, recommended as a landmark was. I wasn’t actually sure if I was in the capital so I stopped, asked a woman in a pizzeria and she told me in sign language (not the one for the deaf...but the one for when you don’t speak the same language as someone) that I wasn’t quite there. I approached a roundabout that was massively backed up, gridlocked in fact. Betty and I fought through it and eventually got into the core of Pristina. Thankfully I located a taxi stand and a friendly cap driver agreed to lead me to the hotel for the meagre cost of 3 Euros. I forgot to tell him that my van is a bit slow and had to really gun it to keep up. We found the hotel and I went inside hoping to telephone Louise. Sadly there was no answer on both her mobile and her home line...hmm, what to do. I opted to hike up the hilly road, Bedri Shala, and tried to locate her place, number 70. I knew from a previous email from Garth that even the cab drivers had a hard time locating her home but I pressed on. Sadly, for some reason almost all houses don’t have house numbers on them. I wondered whether one could make a killing here selling house numbers. I asked in a few shops what their address was and occasionally got befuddled looks as if “Address, what would you need an address for?” A store at the end of the street claimed to be #58...so where on earth could 70 be? I headed back towards the hotel and Betty, and started to consider my options. I had seen some flat, vacant parking spots near Rugova Park, a park in memory of a recent president Ibrahim Rugova who was instrumental in gaining Kosovo’s tacit independence. It’s times like these that yes, a cell phone would be handy. Perhaps I could find an Internet cafe and there might be an email update or I could call them via Skype. Lo and behold, within 100 meters of my vehicle was just such a place! I sat down at a terminal and then tried to log into my email...and tried and tried. In addition to the computer being super slow, the keys were all in different spots and my password is more of a pattern of typing and some of the symbols I couldn’t even get to work on the keyboard. Eventually I got in and there was an email from Garth that they had safely arrived and that they had gone out for dinner. Now it was just a matter of getting a hold of them on the phone.
An hour later, around 11pm, I tried skyping Louise one more time and did get through. Turns out they were returning and only a couple of blocks away from me...sweet! We headed up to Louise’s place, a spacious two bedroom apartment on the top floor of a lovely building. A visiting Austrian friend of hers Judith was already sleeping so we just had a drink in the living room and I retired to Betty allowing Garth and Holly to have the living room to themselves. I was happy to have been able to find them and looked forward to a big hike that Louise had planned for us.
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