Iron Gate photos

 

Winery photos

 

Photos 7 October

 Dinner at Portobellos

Thursday 10 October

 This morning is bright and sunny as we wake up in Novi Sad, still in Serbia. We are expecting 26 degrees today!

Our morning tour is to Sremski Karlovic. and we travel over one of the new bridges as all their bridges were destroyed by NATO in the war with Kosovo. We visit the small town which was very pretty. We then head on to our honey and wine tasting. The history of the place was fascinating as the original as a young man was suffering from an illness that the doctors said was incurable and that he should go back to his home and spend his remaining time with his family. He got stung by bees a few time and became fascinated with them. He recovered and had a large family and became an expert in honey making. He changed the method of collecting honey where in the past they would kill all the bees to collect the honey now they have the bee “houses” where the bees dwell and honey is collected humanely.

We then have a wine tasting and honey tasting. I liked the honey but the wines were ordinary. 

After lunch we had free time and we went for a walk in the second biggest town of Serbia. It was a beautiful stroll through a park and a large pedestrian mall. We could not believe the amount of eateries and people who were about. It is 2.30 in the afternoon and the place is pumping. It puts Melbourne to shame. Another thing that stood out was the number of young women with babies walking about. It is a beautiful sunny afternoon with a temperature of 26 degrees. Time to head back to the ship for a rose on the sun deck.

After dinner there is a show on but we are feeling tired so we head to bed at 9 pm.

Lemon tart dessert 

Catholic Church in Novi Sad

School break in Sremski Karlovic

Tiger mural 

Creative bee hive

Wednesday evening

 This evening we have a special concert at the Temple of St Sava. Without going into detail St Sava was an important figure in Serbian history. The temple is magnificent and spectacularly lit up. It is a huge Orthodox Church with marble flooring and magnificent mosaics on the walls and ceilings.

The concert will take place in the crypt below the church. As we descend the stairs we are faced with another spectacular sight every bit as good as above.

There are 9 singers plus the a conductress who also sang. Most of the songs were acapella. The sound was incredible and the voices fantastic. One of the singers a counter tenor, sang memory from cats, it was awesome

It finished of a great day. Hopefully I will be able to upload some photos soon.

Wednesday 9 October

 This morning we wake up in Belgrade on the Sava river a tributary of the Danube. It is overcast and light rain but 18 degrees. We are expecting a high of 24 degrees.

After breakfast we head off on a bus and walking tour of the city. Belgrade is very cosmopolitan but with a mix of Communist brutalism, particular in the new town. The old town is a mix of old French and sometimes Turkish influence with modern buildings interspersed. We have a walk around the Fortress and learn that this where the first shot was fired by an Austrian/Hungarin gunboat that started the First World War. The gunboat is now a floating museum moored near our ship. After the fort visit we have a walk through the Main Street of the city which is a pedestrian mall. The light drizzle has stopped and the sun is trying to break through. Back on the bus and we have a drive through the new town.

Just over the bridge crossing the Sava river is new town and on the waterfront is a lot of building and construction going on. The project will see 50 high rise buildings all financed by the Arabian money. As we move further away from the riverfront there are administration buildings, including one that was bombed by NATO during Miloschovic brutal reign. Half of the building is missing and it looks like it is being demolished. Our guide tells us that the site has recently been approved for redevelopment. We then see the apartment buildings built by the communists, they are very much like the old high rise commission flats. Our guide tells us they could be one, two or three bedroom apartments. They were built during Tito’s rule. Without going into too much of Tito’s history, he was a reformer and was either liked or hated by the populace. Anyone who wanted a job was given one, if they needed a place to live they were given one, but there was no private property, everyone was supposed to be equal, but some were more equal than others, particularly those in the party and of course Tito. Our guide tells us his grandfather hated Tito while his parents loved him, he himself went with his grandfather’s view. Anyone who opposed him were either jailed or murdered and over 100,000 were killed. Tito was a master manipulator as all the west pandered to him because although he was a communist, he was much more liberal than other communist nations.

We visited his summer house and where he was buried in his House of Flowers. Over the years he had been gifted over 20,000 items by nations and those seeking his favour. With his death, Yugoslavia reverted to its previous group of nations with many seeking independence and led to Slobodan Milosevic beginning his murderous ethnic cleansing wars. Serbia has been involved in many wars with and against its neighbours, but its war with Kosovo reached new lows. We learnt so much more, but I do not want to bore you.

Our guide repeated what most of the other guides have told us, they value their independence and freedom, but lament the amount of corruption throughout the government bodies. He is hopeful by the next generation the governments will do more for the people than themselves. Interesting fact, government employees must show a copy of their vote to their bosses and if they vote against the current member they lose their jobs, dead people can still vote and citizens from neighbouring countries are bussed given a meal and told who to vote for!

Tuesday 8 October

 Overnight we had to put our clocks back an hour as we are to enter Serbia. Our tour director told us to delete automatic time zone, as while travelling on the Danube, we have Romania on the starboard side and Serbia on the port side and the time will switch back and forth depending on which signal is the strongest!

It is cool this morning around 8 degrees but clear and sunny. After breakfast we head up on deck for our sailing through the Iron Gates.  The Gorge is the meeting of the Balkan mountains and the Carpathian and at its deepest point it is 83 metres in the narrowest part of the gorge. Just before we enter the Iron Gates there is a large rock sculpture of King Decebalus, the last king of Dacia who reigned AD 87-106. He fought against the Roman emperors to maintain the independence of what is now Romania. The sculpture was commissioned by a Romanian businessman and took 10 years to build from 1994 to 2004. By 10 am it is 18 degrees. 

We spend the rest of the morning in the lounge enjoying the scenery.

After lunch we head off for our tour which includes a hike to a viewpoint from Djerdap National Park and then on to Golubac Fortress. It is a 30 minute bus ride with a lot of turns to the top of the Park and then another nearly 2 kilometres of hiking to the viewpoint. There were a few steep descents and rises which got the heart pumping. The track was smooth though with no steps. Once at the top we had a spectacular sight of the gorge and the Danube and our ship sailing to the next docking. The weather is clear and temperature around 20 degrees. To get back to the bus we had to retrace our steps - more good exercise.

 Now we drive back down and then on to Golubac fortress. It is a lovely drive along the Danube with some great scenery and we pass our ship on its way to the fortress. We learn that at its narrowest point it is only 134 metres wide but 6 kilometres at its widest point at Golubac. It takes about 50 minutes to reach the fortress. It is a spectacular sight. It consists of 9 towers and has a mountain at its back and sits by the river. Our guide tells us it has never been conquered. All the towers are separated from each other so an enemy would have to conquer them one at a time! One of the towers isn now 50% below the waterline as when the hydro dam was built all the area was flooded with the water height increasing quite a few metres. 

We have some free time to wander around and then our ship arrives and it is a short walk back to the dock.

Trivia was family feud and we end up with 37 out of 60 and finish third. You got 3 points for the answer most said and then 2 and 1.