Vukovar-Osijek

Today we were in Vukovar, Croatia, once a part of the communist state of Yugoslavia. On our walk around the town centre we were able to see that the place had taken quite a beating in the Civil War in 1991. Some buildings are still in disrepair, evident by the gaping windows and bullet holes in the many crumbling walls, but then other houses have been renovated and are looking quite good. The town has around 30,000 people, and is situated on the Danube River. There is a huge unemployment rate here, 35% in this area and 25% in the country itself. That’s a big sad! The City’s  fruit and vegie market seemed to be the place to be today as people bustled about scanning for the best bargain. Flowers markets are also very popular in most of the places we have visited since staring the River Cruise and they have some lovely ones.  Guess they need something to cheer themselves up with. Not sure if it’s just that these people are a little different to us and have had a hard life, but most of them look quite dour, we get the occasional smile, but they don’t exude warmth really.  We have been entertained by a local group of 4 young men playing some interesting and incredibly different musical instruments around lunchtime today. They were great. One particular instrument, the Bisernica Prima sounded like a violin but looked like a very small guitar or Ukelele, a lovely sound.

 Water Tower attacked in war

After lunch the boat moved upstream about 40 kms to the city of Osijek, still in Croatia. This place has 100,000 people and looks totally different to Vukovar. Although this town also took a bit of a beating in the Civil War only 30% of the place was wiped out. The town is quite vibrant and the River’s edge has been enhanced with bicycle paths and pleasant Restaurants lining the banks. Lots of people out and about riding bikes, rowing on the River Drava and generally enjoying themselves. A totally different feel to this morning’s visit. We walked all around the town for nearly 2 hours and discovered nice parks and some interesting shops. Tennis is a BIG thing over here too, all the tennis courts we passed were full of people having a game. All these little places we’ve visited seem to have a Macca’s in their towns and they are usually housed in grand old buildings and are much larger than our Macca’s. As with all the towns we have visited so far, there are a couple of lovely Churches here in Osijek, a tram system and trolley buses, but riding bikes is certainly a favourite mode of transport. I guess it helps that the countryside is fairly flat.