We stopped at the venue and loaded out the gear, then had some breakfast and club-mates, mmm.
We're off to Sarajevo today, another place we've never been.
--
We start our day off with leisurely drive through the Serbian countryside...in the wrong direction, for almost an hour. When we finally get to the border crossing into Bosnia.
On the other side of the border (entering Bosnia), they stop us again and basically just waste our time while they do their jobs poorly. We had a great view while waiting though.
We then proceeded to get lost in the Bosnian countryside.
There were thin winding roads, large cliff drop offs, and we barely had a gps. Our regular gps wants receiving a signal, and Eric's phone only had limited service to get directions. Eventually Julia (Mike's co-pilot), at great possible cost to her, turned on her roaming data on to activate her gps and find our way through.
At one point we even passed a group of gentlemen having a picnic on the side of a dirt road we made a wrong turn on.
One thing we were not immedietly aware of, and eventually semi-freaked out about later, was that the dirt roads we made wrong turns on could have possibly had left over active land mines.
After backroad mine filled sand winding country roads, passing sheep, cows, chickens, and all manner of old looking country things, we finally, and quite suddenly, arrive in Sarajevo. We then lose gps signal (though it was spotty the entire time driving through the Bosnian canyons) and have to call the promoter and tell him where we are and ask for directions.
Once we roll up in front of the venue, it looks a bit shabby, and we have to load it a bit of a ways from where we could stop the van, but once we got inside, the place was spectacular looking, and fairly clean too.
We were running pretty late, so we loaded in as quickly as possible and the show started. There was food backstage similar to the breakfast we had, but just in smaller portions.
--
The hostel we were booked at apparently got overbooked, and our beds were given away. We are now on our way to the promoters house to sleep on his floor.
--
We went for breakfast out in town, and got to wander around the city for a bit. It's crazy to believe that when I was 8 years old, most people here were being forced to leave their country, or being bombed, shot, and having grenaded dropped on them, friends, and family. This area of the world we're in has seriously seen some s**t that most probably, and hopefully will never have to endure.
Driving through the Bosnian countryside again on our way to Croatia.
--
We got to Croatia, and the drive was absolutely beautiful.
Needless to say, the experience is quite surreal, and supremely impressive. We don't play till midnight, so we're just hanging around sightseeing. We don't have to leave till later on in the day tomorrow, so we might get some swimming in too.
--
On the main stage opening up was a band called 'Merchandise.' Eric said he had played with them before in Florida with City of Ships, and I dig them.
The band before us on the main stage 'of Montreal' played two encores, cutting into our set by almost a half hour. Despite this, the people were excited and energetic to see us. The power went out once during the set, but they quickly had it up and running in a minute.
We were asked for an encore, and had one more song we could play, but unfortunately we were out of time.
--
The hotel we're staying at 'Hotel Jadran' is quite impressive, at least on the exterior. It has a marina for a parking lot out front, and a great view of the sea. However, it does not have any air conditioning in the rooms, and no ventilation other than a single oscillating fan. The accommodations are still very sweet, I just would have liked to not start sweating immedietly after stepping out of the shower.
--
Today we're off to Cakovec.
No comments:
Post a Comment