Skopje Macedonia to Kosovo to overnight in Berane Montenegro on the way to Ceptat, Croatia. Yes we did this in two days, with a number of border crossings. It was long, and through and over two mountain ranges. But, what a drive. Crossed into Kosovo first. We were struck by how undeveloped it was. It was very impoverished and still seemed to be getting on its feet. A few kilometres over the border and a convoy of army vehicles went past, with a soldier standing at a gun (machine???). A little unusual for us. The countryside here was dry and dusty and the one road was lined for ever with small commercial and construction supplies. However, as we got to the mountains the landscape was beautiful. We drove up the mountains for quite some time and arrived at the border crossing. Got past the Kosovo not, but got rejected at the Serbian part...we actually were supposed to be crossing at Montenegro. Luckily an English speaking police officer explained that we could not cross as it was municipality crossing and we had to go around and cross into Montenegro at the international border control. Damn. Another GPS stuff up. Drive back down the mountain...again a really nice drive. Got to the right border this time. Was able to exit Kosovo no probs. the guard at Montenegro was a different story. After passports and car papers checked, we had to open our boot. Luckily we did not have to pull our clothes out of our suitcases like some people, but he did want to know about our sculptures, that were wrapped in bubble wrap. He wanted to know if they were expensive....what is expensive? We said no, he wasn't too convinced. Picked up the lightest one thank god. I said it was a fish. He gave it a shake and BR reassured him it was not a real fish. I think I muttered souvenir from Poland. He then waved us through...not a happy man. In fact...most border security people are absolute fucksticks and I have to make BR promise not to loose his cool....don't want to be rejected...because they can. They grunt at you, ignore you, yell at you like that will make you understand. Romania were especially bad. The line was kms long and when we finally got to be served we were told to pull over and wait. BR cracked it at the guy when he handed our passports over. He eventually stormed off and asked me to deal with the officer. I waited and waited at the tiny window. People behind me were getting their passports stamped and leaving. He saw my frustration and picked up the passports. He grunted something about BR being angry. I said that he was processing people behind me in the queue and we didn't know why he refused to serve us (BR later told me that he told BR that he was processing Romanian passports first,regardless of where they were in the line. If I had know that I would have said more.) He arrogantly told me he had 20 USA passports to process and he was busy. I very nicely said that maybe he should do that instead of letting Romanian people queue jump. The Hungarian police officer nicely came and told him to process us. I'm sure the Romanian dude was not saying nice things as he unleashed a barrage of comments as he virtually threw our passports back.
Anyway, Kosovo was an interesting experience, we literally drove straight through it. The mountains are a magnificent drive and you couldn't help but imagine what it would have been like during the war. Into Montenegro and the dazzling countryside and mountains continued. The drive rivalled the Transfagarasan Road, twisting and turning at great heights. Came into Berane our overnight stop over. Supposedly 4 star, but although looked nice...worst bed ever, could only sleep on one side. Anyway, set our for Ceptat in Croatia...our locale for exploring Dubrovnik. Again the mountain drive brilliant. Coming down the mountain we were excited to see the Adriatic Sea. Driving along the coast I decided to check the Galaxy...as sometimes Car GPS sends us to random places and noticed that what we thought was a bridge was actually a car ferry crossing. Luckily this went very smoothly. I saw a ticket office, jumped out, got a ticket straight away and we drove on the ferry. Luck was with us with our timing. Finally got to our apartment. Heaps of steps, but view fab and a coffee shop below.
Note: we were desperate for a coffee and were passing through a small...2 pizza restaurant...Town. Decided to try our luck. We had no local money and we discovered no one took card after we were told cash only from the second pizza shop. As I was leaving, 3 young men running the shop called after me and said they would give us coffees on the house. Joe nice.,they even threw in a biscuit each.
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