Belgrade Serbia: The White City

Belgrade sits in the crook made when the Sava River and the Danube River come together.  Last night our cruise director, Sonja cautioned us to be sure that our balcony doors were securely closed if we did not want to be awakened by the loud music from the party boats when we made the turn into the Sava and docked.  When I went out before six a.m., I found what she was talking about.  The party boats lined up on the other side of the river were full of revelers and the music bounced across the river to where I was standing.

At eight-thirty, we were loaded on the bus with our local guide Sofia and headed to the Belgrade Fortress.

The ancient fortress overlooks where the two major rivers come together.  It was started in the third century BC by a Celtic tribe and conquered by the Romans who fortified it.  It was repeatedly destroyed by the Goths and the Huns and then the Byzantines rebuilt it in 535.  In the twentieth century the emerging Serbian state got it.  In 1404, this collapsed and it became a capital of another kingdom and they added to it.  This sort of thing continued until the Ottoman Empire conquered it and held it into close to the nineteenth century when the empire collapsed.  It was damaged further in the first and second world wars.  It is now a park and we enjoyed seeing lots of dogs being walked there.  Now it houses tennis courts and basketball courts within the battlement walls.

Legend says that Attila Hun is buried at the confluence of the Danube and the Sava River. 

Belgrade is actually two cities in one; the old and the new.  Tito was the benevolent dictator of this country for many years and his name is still revered.  We passed the Park of Friendship where when important visitors come to the city, they bring a tree from their country and plant it in the park.  This is the home of a very large outdoor music venue.

The section New Belgrade was begun after the destruction of World War 2 when the country was part of the Soviet Bloc.  It was designed with ten to fifteen large multistoried apartment buildings in each block surrounded by large tree lined boulevards.  The blocks were numbered in the order they were built which is somewhat confusing for the non native.

Now, an apartment in the older buildings cost about $75,000 which doesn't sound like that much until you consider that the average salary per month.  This has lead to children living with parents with multi generations in an apartment.

Flea markets and outdoor bazaars proliferate with a shopped being able to find just about anything they want there during the weekend.

As we traveled over the new bridge, we could see the hills for the beginning of the Balkans as we neared the exclusive area where the wealthy live.  We passed the Prince Milosh Park, popular for wedding receptions where the Prince lived with his mistress before he murdered her.  His wife lived up the hill in a villa.

We stopped at St Peter and Paul Church which has been in construction since 1935.  It is built on the site where the Ottomans burned the bones of the patron Saint Kavos.  Construction came to a halt in the second world war and did not continue until the mid eighties  when the Soviet Era ended.

The crypt is now complete.

Belgrade is a historical city, a university city, and a huge shopping city as well as being the city where the party never stops.  We drove past a long exhibit in front of the parliament building where the pictures of hundreds of Serbs, victims of Kosovo terrorist (they disappeared during the conflict) on our way to debus in front of the Opera house.  We walked through a bustling square to one of the major shopping streets.

After shopping, we enjoyed the street café before boarding the bus and returning to the Embla.