The drive from Split to Mostar was beautiful. We started off making our way along the Croatian coast and then followed the gorgeous Neretva river in-land. We were very happy that we made the trip in the daylight so that we could enjoy the scenery.
Mostar is the home of Stari Most bridge, a replica of the original that stood for 427 years before it was destroyed in 1993 during the war in Bosnia & Herzegovina.
Diving off the bridge (20m high) has been a popular activity with Australians ever since two Australian comedians did it for their show. While we were there three Australians jumped off it. All three of them managed to hurt themselves one way or another although the one that paid for technique lessons from the divers club was definitely better off for the lessons.
The thing that made Mostar interesting was the combination of different cultures. Both church bells and muslim prayers could be heard at the same time. A few people mentioned that before the war, Muslims, Catholics, and Orthodox Christians were living together happily. Unfortunately this wasn’t the case anymore.
Our favorite statue here was the Bruce Lee statue created by a Croatian sculptor Ivan Fijolic in 2005, intended to be a symbol of peace as it was thought that everyone liked Bruce Lee regardless of their ethnic background.
Evidence of the Bosnian war remains visible in Mostar. Bullet ridden buildings can still be seen while walking around the streets. This was a sad element to our trip here and made us thankful that we had never had to experience the things that the people of Mostar went through. We went to an excellent war photo exhibition by a New Zealander who had captured some moving images.
