Taso bought us all burek (traditional Balkan pastry filled with meat or cheese usually, it's very good) in the morning to celebrate the end of the season. There were only 4 people in the hostel that night and I guess he just decided that it wasn't busy enough to keep running, so he's shut down for the winter. I've heard whisperings from other people that this is going to be increasingly common, especially in smaller cities, now that we're truly into the off season and not the shoulder. I think capital cities should be fine, but it might get more challenging to stay anywhere outside huge metropolises.

The bus ride was, as predicted, beautiful. I actually could see the train tracks almost the whole way and I don't feel like we missed anything from being on the road. Bosnia is incredibly mountainous and the terrain reminded me more of New Zealand than anything else. I didn't get a window seat so I don't have any great photos, but you'll have to take my word for it. A few hours later we arrived in Sarajevo. It lies at the end of a long valley nestled in the mountains and generally gets more pleasant the further east you go. The western edges are fairly depressing in their layout and architecture, but once you get into the old town things get better. I couldn't help but notice a fair amount of rather suspicious fog - I looked it up and it turns out that Sarajevo is randomly one of the most air polluted cities on earth. Currently we're ranking slightly below Cairo in terms of AQI, but at least we're beating out Kinshasa, Beijing, and Lahore. The tram system here seems to be pretty terrible since it would have hardly shaved off any time at all from my long walk to the hostel, and then we all got kicked off anyway because there was some problem with the tracks. I ended up walking with all my bags for a while.

So the west is depressing, the middle is actually rather impressively built up with skyscrapers, and the east is the real charm. There are distinct neighborhoods even here - it's obvious when you go from a region built by the Ottomans to one that was built by the Austrians. There's a real sense of diversity to the regions of the city that appreciated, and it has some of that grunge which I think can add a lot to the vibes of a city. I visited the Genocide Museum they have regarding the Serbian attacks on Bosniaks from the 90s and found it to be a predictably somber, blurry eyed affair. It's strange to me that we never learn about this anywhere, since while not as dramatic in scale as some of the 20th century's greatest tragedies, it's much more proximal to modern Western culture in a lot of ways than anything else. Knowing that so many Serbs deny everything that's happened here is going to make my visit to Belgrade on Sunday tough.

Back at the hostel I hung out with some of the other guests and volunteers. I really liked everyone here, especially a Welsh volunteer and a guy from Maine. Lots of silly conversations and I ultimately went out to a bar with a Canadian guy and a Swedish student. Beer is still extremely cheap, though I was disappointed to learn that the terrible beer I had was actually just Budweiser. If I'm going to drink something terrible, at least let it be local. Bosnians LOVE smoking and I now smell like a cigarette since they let people smoke inside. Not something I'll miss when I leave here, especially since the outdoor air quality is bad enough. We got kicked out at 1:45 or so and that seems to be when more or less everything around here shuts down; Sarajevo's nightlife doesn't seem to be much to write home about.

I've been on the road for about 2 months now and there's still so much I want to see. People keep talking about getting tired of their travels and in some ways, I absolutely get it - this trip has been exhausting in ways and to a degree that I'm not used to. But they also talk about how cities begin to blend together, and on that, I couldn't disagree more. Each city I've been to feels so distinct from every other, perhaps because of the diversity of experiences that I have in each one, but also because no two places that I see are truly that much alike. I can't imagine not being able to separate my memories of one location from another. I have a month and some change to continue to see Europe, and in some ways it doesn't feel like nearly enough. I doubt it ever will, honestly. That's not to say that I won't be thrilled to return to the US - this sort of travel is not without its difficulties - but as tired as I am in some ways, my curiosity and desire to explore has consistently outpaced that fatigue. While on busses or trains I've found myself almost subconsciously murmuring the words to Tolkien's travel poems:

The Road goes ever on and on

Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the Road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say.

The breadth of my experiences thus far is immense, and yet I'm struck by how limited a selection it is in the broader, global scope of things. Perhaps I'll have to do a trip like this on another continent someday. The Road goes there, as well.