Senj, Croatia - Banja Luka, Bosnia Herzegovina

Up the mountain road leaving Senj.

We said goodbye to our Adriatic adventure today and crossed Eastwards across Croatia to Bosnia Herzegovina.  We have heard from my Aunty and my cousin's husband that it is a top spot so we have decided to check it out. 

The bongo van.

For some reason our Tom-Tom GPS and Google maps has very limited information on Bosnia and only the main roads are shown on the maps.  This was making things difficult as I could see on the GPS we were making a huge 'U' shape to get to Banja Luka and I found it hard to believe there wasn't a quicker way.  

Bosnian border.

Then we spied a sign showing 'Banja Luka' which left the main road and seemingly headed in the right direction.  As they say 'if you come to a fork in the road, take it', so we did.  

The next thing you know we are driving through some beautiful undulating countryside on a fairly good road.  All good until I saw a massive blue, red and white flag.  
I said to Nicki 'that looks like the Serbian flag' which to me meant we maybe weren't in the right place.  

Too far committed to go back we drove further and then we saw another flag and then another and then we drove past a military base and a huge 'Republic of Srpska' sign.

Started to get a bit worried now so I pulled over and in my best Serbian asked the fellow by the side of the road whether this was the way to Banja Luka and he said yes so we kept going.

We kept going on our road, cut an hour off our journey and arrived in Banja Luka.  The capital of the Republic of Srpska.    

Long story short I think that although we are in technically in Bosnia we are in an area with a Serb majority and therefore for all intents and purposes we are in a country within a country.  Maybe.  

Here's an excerpt from wikipedia below. (Maybe you can tell me.)

Church in Banja Luka.

Bosnia and Herzegovina has a bicameral legislature and a three-member Presidency composed of a member of each major ethnic group. However, the central government's power is highly limited, as the country is largely decentralized and comprises two autonomous entities: the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska, with a third region, the Brčko District, governed under local government. The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is itself complex and consists of 10 federal units - cantons. etc.....

To summarise.  The country is beautiful, the politics is a mess.

Found the tourist agency who were wonderful and sorted out our accommodation for about €52 a night.  Under our budget but surprisingly pricey as everything else is a bargain basement price here.