3 things you need to know about Bosnia and Herzegovina

I spent the first days of June 2019 exploring Bosnia and Herzegovina. I’d never really known much about the country until I started planning my trip there. Yes, I do know a guy from Bosnia who I’d met in Egypt years ago, but we never talked about his home country. After spending 10 days traveling around, I decided to put up a list of top 3 things you need to know about Bosnia and Herzegovina. If you ever plan a trip to Bosnia, and you so should, you’ll have the most important information here in this post.

By the Crooked bridge in Mostar

3 things you need to know about Bosnia and Herzegovina

1. Only 1 beach town Neum

For quite a long time I did not know that Bosnia and Herzegovina has access to the Adriatic sea. I had no idea! Shame on me!

 

Just 20 km of Adriatic coast belong to Bosnia.

 

Bosnia has only 1 beach town, called Neum. It’s possible to get to Neum by car, or by bus, as I did. I took a bus from Sarajevo to Neum (approx. 5 to 6 hours) and then from Neum I took a 2 hour bus to Mostar.

Did you know that on the way to Neum the bus crosses through Croatia? Yes, the Croatian coast ends, then Bosnian coast starts, and then it continues to Croatia again. Very interesting, right? And yes, they do check passports at the borders there.

Some information about Neum:

• You can walk along the coast in Neum for approx. 6 km. The other 14 km of the Bosnian coast are from Neum towards the borders with Croatia on both sides, and also a peninsula South of Neum.
• From the city center it’s more or less 3 km to the North (going right) and 3 km to the South (left) along the coast.
• Neum has only around 5,000 inhabitants, and the similar number of beds for tourists.
• Neum is less expensive than the neighbouring Croatia which is making it quite popular recently. It’s located just 60 km from expenive, and very crowded Dubrovnik in Croatia.
• The whole town is very hilly and the roads are curvy (serpentines). There’s many stairs for pedestrians to cross the roads faster without having to go all around.
• The town is full of private villas and apartments, and also some hotels, even 4*.

Neum beach at sunset

1 of the Neum pebble beaches

on the beach in Neum

2. More religions

Bosnia and Herzegovina is a country of more religions.

We can speak of three main religions there:

1. Islam (approx. 50% of inhabitants)
2. Orthodox Christianity (30%)
3. Roman Catholicism (15%). 

Islam peaked in 1600 and it’s been the most important religion in the country ever since.

Another interesting fact is that most Bosniaks are Muslim, then Bosnian Croats are mostly Roman Catholics and Bosnian Serbs are usually Orthodox.

The mixture of 3 religions makes the country very unique for visitors and it’s one of the very important things you need to know about Bosnia and Herzegovina. You can hardly see anything similar anywhere else in Europe. 

Out of the three towns I visited in Bosnia (Sarajevo, Neum and Mostar), I’ve noticed most Muslims in Sarajevo and then in Mostar. But hardly any in Neum.

Sarajevo and Mostar are full of mosques where people pray 5 times a day. You can spot a mosque tower every few minutes of walking in both towns.

However, I have not seen any mosque in Neum. It’s maybe because the Muslim Bosniaks form the smallest group of Neum residents. Neum is inhabited mostly by the Catholic Croats which is why there is a big Roman Catholic church on the hill in the middle of town.

From my point-of-view, I have not experienced any hatred between religions while there in 2019. You just have to respect some rules when visiting mosques and churches, and dress properly. 

a church and a mosque in Mostar

Karagöz Bey Mosque in Mostar

Karagöz Bey Mosque, Mostar

a church in Mostar

3. Bosnian Civil war

The Bosnian civil war took place from 1992 to 1995 and it was part of the breakup of Yugoslavia. In those 3 years a couple of incidents happened between the Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats whic lead to death of hundreds of people. Even thinking about it makes me upset. I am not really into wars and history, but you can read more details about the Bosnian war in Wikipedia.

Even nowadays you can still spot some completely destroyed buildings and bullet holes in walls around Mostar and Sarajevo.

Despite of the war, I found all the locals to be very pleasant, helpful, smiling and nice to me. Personally, I’ve had almost no problems while dealing with them. Just one bus driver was kind of shouting at the passengers in his mother tongue when they were asking something in English.

However, the rest of my trip I really had just good experience with the locals. And they spoke more English than I thought they would. But the truth is, that I can also understand some Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian as some words are similar to my mother tongue Slovak.

a ruined building, Mostar

bullet holes, Mostar

a demolished building in Mostar

TIP 1: Keep reading… I wrote about 3 reasons why my trip to Bosnia was different.

TIP 2: Thinking what other places to visit in the Balkan area? What about Nis in Serbia? Or Budva Riviera in Montenegro? I truly enjoyed both places.

Did you know all the things about Bosnia and Herzegovina I mentioned in this post?

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