Travel Talk

Soaking in the Scenes of Zlatibor, Serbia

August 1, 2014July 20, 2019 by SHABL

zlatibor_serbia_back_country

Good day,

I’m writing this from a hotel room in Zlatibor, Serbia – wow, what a beautiful place. I caught an early bus this morning from Belgrade and wasn’t sure what to expect as I dozed in and out for most of the four hour ride here. Upon arrival, I was pleasantly surprised when I met up with a new friend and we jumped in a car and started to explore the countryside surrounding this small town in the mountains in the west of Serbia not far from the border. People typically come here to relax and get in touch with nature; after an afternoon here, I can see why.

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First thing we did was explore Kings Square as I was having an issue with my cell phone, go figure? It’s kind of like the core of the town from what I gathered and I say town as it has ~3-3500 full-time residents but during the summer months, that number can mushroom to ~20,000 or so. It’s a popular place for hiking, mountain biking, swimming, outdoor sports of any kind, quad biking and more. In the winter it has a ski hill perfect for families looking to teach their kids the ropes as well as only ~9km from Tornik which is considerably larger.

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Upon leaving the town we visited a local tennis club as tennis is quite big here. It wasn’t the nicest of days for tennis but the place was still quite packed. I liked how not only were lots of people playing but still lots others were watching as it had chairs setup strategically to be able to enjoy any match. Afterward we made our way to Sirogojno which is a little village with an open-air museum explaining how life was here back in the day. We explored that under a light drizzle before heading back to town.

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I hit up a late lunch and the sky started to clear, yes! We drove to Tornik Ski Center and there were more people there than I expected as well, it’s summer. You can rent mountain bikes and it has a few other facilities for those so inclined. After that my new friend suggested we go on a little adventure and that is when things really got interesting. We drove through these random side streets until we were literally in the middle of “somewhere” I’d never find if I wasn’t with someone from the area. I saw an old wooden church, all sorts of small villages perched on the hills. It was quite an experience and can’t believe we made it up and down some of those roads without an SUV.

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From there we drove back to town and over a hill until we were surrounded with nature at every turn. We picked strawberries or what was left as the season has ended and saw herds of sheep, snapped lots of shots and had a few laughs along the way. I really liked the feeling of this place and can without a doubt see why people come here to relax. It’s only a ~4 hour ride from Belgrade by bus so can picture ambitious drivers making it 3.5 hours or less should they not make any stops or get caught up in traffic.

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