This relaxing yet visually exhilarating video of cycling in Bosnia & Herzegovina comes from two tours: a pioneering ride from Dubrovnik to Sarajevo in 2018 and Cycling the Western Balkan Triangle in 2019.
The opening scene is from the balcony of a small bed and breakfast in an ancient stone village where BikeTours.com founder and president Jim Johnson spent the night. Like many places in Bosnia, this centuries-old village of perhaps five families is greatly intact as nearly all structures were built of stone. After a stunning sunrise in the morning, a thick fog moved into the lush Popovo Polje Valley obscuring our view of the Trebisnjica River.
Much of the video is of the Ciro, a wonderful rail-trail that will eventually travel from Dubrovnik to Sarajevo. It winds through quiet countryside and remote villages, passing the occasional train station from the early 20th century when the rail line was built by the Austro-Hungarian Empire. While many stations remain greatly damaged from the 1990s warfare, some have been converted to charming hotels and restaurants–a positive sign of the impact of bicycle tourism on the area.
Some of the most stunning scenes are from routes across the hills and plateaus of Herzegovina, where sheep outnumber people by perhaps a 100-to-1 ratio. Along the way, the group met a man whose family had lived on the same property for more than eight centuries, as chronicled in our blog post, Encounter in Bosnia & Herzegovina!
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