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	<title>Balkan Bikers</title>
	<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers</link>
	<description>Just another irishtimes.com weblog</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Sat, 02 Aug 2008 18:22:47 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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		<title>The end of the road</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Sremska Mitrovica to Munich, over two days, via Banja Luka – 1,078 kms
Srem. Mitrovica, to give the version in common usage, turns out to be a lovely place. It’s much more than mere gateway to the Gulag Plaza, three star retro commie hotel plonked in the middle of a prison complex.
Srem. Mitrovica was once something [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/08/02/the-end-of-the-road/</link>
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		<title>A night in the Gulag Plaza</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Pristina to Sremska Mitrovica – 480 kms: There’s a ginormous queue at the border crossing from Kosovo to Serbia which we join for the 2.5 seconds it takes us to work out that if we stay where we are, it will take us at least an hour to get through. And then there’s the Serbian [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/08/01/a-night-in-the-gulag-plaza/</link>
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		<title>It’s Mad Max territory</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Ok. Memo to bikers: On balance lads, I’d say avoid this place. A few random thoughts and observations… 
We spend the night in the Palace Hotel in Mitrovica. Which is grand: good, clean room for half nothing (€30 if I remember right after a half-for-nothing steak to die for and a moderately decent bottle of [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/30/it%e2%80%99s-mad-max-territory/</link>
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		<title>Border crossings</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Srebrenica to Mitrovica in Kosovo – 328 kms: The Bosnian border guard at the crossing into Serbia is really friendly and wants to know all about the bikes. He and Tony and I chat as he waves other vehicles through with little more than a cursory check.
The bridge over the Drina river, the far side [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/28/border-crossings/</link>
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		<title>Worlds apart</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Sarajevo to Srebrenica, via Pale – 220 klms: Pale was the Serb capital during the siege of Sarajevo – the stronghold of Radovan Karadzic and his army general Ratko Mladic. The road out of the city rises towards it steeply up the mountains. Pale is around 20 kilometres away.
It’s odd, really. One is travelling between [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/27/worlds-apart/</link>
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		<title>An invite to &#8216;The Pudding Hall&#8217;</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Inside Sarajevo: A taxi ride to the UN Police Mission HQ produces an interesting aside. Amer (the driver) is a chatty bloke with decent English.
We go through the usual “where you from?” conversation.
“Ireland!” he exclaims. “My uncle live in Dublin.”
Amer looks to be in his late 30s/early 40s. He was a soldier in the Bosnian [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/25/an-invite-to-the-pudding-hall/</link>
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		<title>Skidding along in the wake of the Karadzic arrest</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Hrvace to Sarajevo – 267 Kms:  This is a day or three behind because, like, there is a certain amount of conventional hacking pressure this end… So bear with me, eh?
Woke Tuesday morning to a txt message from insomniac Cousin Derek to effect that Radovan Karadzic had been arrested in Belgrade. Jaz*s!
At this stage, Tony [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/25/11/</link>
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		<title>Musical interlude in Kijevo</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Sveti Rok to Hrvace – 130 Kms: The town of Knin sits on a plain in the middle of the mountains southwest of the Dinara range that separate Croatia and Bosnia. It’s a substantial place with a population of about 11,000.
Before the war that followed Croatia’s declaration of independence in 1991, some 80 per cent [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/24/musical-interlude-in-kijevo/</link>
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		<title>Why would you want to go there?</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Kremsbrücke to Sveti Rok – 464 kms: “Why you want go there?” the waiter in the quay-side café asked with a mixture of indifference and contempt for our plans. “Everything you want is here. There’s nothing up there. Nothing.”
The Adriatic along Croatia’s Dalmatian coast is certainly pretty. In places immediately south of Rijeka however, it [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/23/why-would-you-want-to-go-there/</link>
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		<title>On the road again &#8211; this time to the Balkans</title>
		<description><![CDATA[Munich to Kremsbrücke – 268 klms: This is the start of a journey that emerged out of a bike ride last summer from Vezeley in France to Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain. Then my biking mate, Tony Sullivan, and I rode two BMW 1200 Adventures weaving in and out of the medieval pilgrim route [...]]]></description>
		<link>http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/balkanbikers/2008/07/22/on-the-road-again-this-time-to-the-balkans/</link>
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