On the Road Again

As the title would suggest, yesterday the YES Abroad crew took another group trip out of town. This time around our destinations included Gradačac, Srebrenik, and Tuzla. It was an exhausting trip, but only because it was tons of fun.

First we went to Gradačac where we went to a fortress known as "Kula Zamja od Bosne" or "The Tower of the Dragon of Bosnia." The Dragon of Bosnia refers to a Bosniak general who found against the Ottoman Empire and the new reforms implemented by the Sultan in the early 1800s named Husein-kapetan Gradaščević. The tower was very cool and it probably would’ve offered us a great view but it was so foggy that it you couldn’t see anything more than 10 feet in front of you. The setting still made for some good photos though.

This is the group dynamic in a nutshell

Next we piled back into the van and drove to our next destination, the Srebrenik Fortress. This was honestly one of the coolest places I have ever been in my entire life. The fortress was first mentioned in a charter in 1333, which means that this fortress was over 3 times older than the United States of America. Europe, man, they have a lot old stuff. The fortress looked like something straight out of Lord of the Rings, it was insane. When we got there it was bright and sunny so we spent some time walking around the ruins, but when we turned around to leave fog started to roll in, and when I say roll in I mean you could actually see it approaching, we were that high up. By the time we were walking back to our car there was so much fog that you couldn’t even see the castle anymore, it was like it was never there. Craziness.

 Before, when it was sunny

 It's going...it's going

It's gone

Our final stop of the day was the Northeastern city of Tuzla. After Banja Luka and Sarajevo it’s the third largest city in Bosnia and Herzegovina and its known for its salt mines. It even has a salt lake that you can swim in during the summertime. In Tuzla we went to a portrait gallery that had works from local painters including the famous Tuzlan painter Izmet Mujezinović. I’m not usually someone who can properly appreciate art, but I really loved all of the pieces that hung in this gallery. Once our visit to the museum was over we stopped for some tea and started on the road back to Sarajevo. 

I love any trip out of the city we take because even though Bosnia and Herzegovina is a much smaller country it's landscape can feel just as varied as that of the United States. Granted, you're not going to find any deserts but you'll find salt lakes, palm trees, mountains, fields, and more.

Well there are only 9 days left until Christmas so I'm sure I can go back to posting more often soon!