Journal / Balkans / 2014-05-13

Last Day

Our last full day in The Balkans was an early one. We left by about 8am to head down to the old city where we took a cable car to the top of the mountain overlooking Dubrovnik. The view at the top was pretty awesome. There was also a small military structure at the top of the hill which has since been turned into a museum. The museum outlined the military attacks that caused major destruction to the city back in 1991.

After getting a bunch of photos from the top of the mountain, a few of us decided it would be a good idea to walk down the hill via a sidewinder path. Looking back on it, it was worth the walk, but it definitely took longer than we had originally anticipated — it took over an hour when all was said and done.

After the trek back down the hill, we got some food in the old city which included another round of gelato. We walked around to shop for a little bit and eventually made our way to the “secret cafe” that we were told about. It turned out to be past a hole in the wall that led out to a terraced rocky cliff with tables and a cafe that sold drinks. We didn’t actually get anything, but we had some fun taking pictures on a set of stairs that basically descended into the water.

Eventually we made our way back to the hotel before departing for Bosnia where we would have the last concert. We stopped at a small church at the hill overlooking some beautiful mountains before making our way to the actual church in which the concert would be in held. Interestingly, we arrived at the church in the middle of a wedding which we were invited to watch the end of. It was a pretty cool experience — definitely a different tradition than what I’m used to.

The church was beautiful — the paintings all over the walls were so vibrant. Apparently some of them were recently restored. Rehearsal was relatively quick due to people finishing up with the wedding and whatnot. We got a quick bite to eat (pizza again) before the concert. The town of Trebinje was small, but it seemed pretty cool. Like most towns on this tour, I wish we would have had some more time to explore.

The concert was incredible. And really emotional for everyone involved. As one of Mr. Goldsmith’s brothers said at the end of the night: “It’s the end of an era.” I actually have an audio recording of the last concert in its entirety. It’s just an iPhone recording, so I’m sure the quality is not ideal, but its better than nothing. I’ll try to post a link or something in the next couple days.

After the concert, we had a farewell dinner at a really good restaurant in Bosnia. We didn’t get back to the hotel until probably 12:30am. After packing, I got to bed maybe an hour later for a quick snooze before waking up around 4am for a 5am departure to the airport.

I’m writing this post with some sporadic sleep here-and-there. I’m currently on a bus back to Pittsburgh from DC. I would like to write up a post that summarizes this trip, but I definitely don’t have that in me at the moment. Its close to midnight in Europe at the moment, and I’ve been up for some twenty hours.

Overall though this trip has been incredible. I have met some great people, heard some beautiful music and I am forever grateful that I was given this opportunity.