Weather today – Mostly Cloudy, 62 F (17 C)

Today is a full day in Belgrade, Serbia, with available early morning, afternoon, and evening tours. The included tour is the Panoramic Belgrade (4 hours, easy, morning). Optional tours included:

• Nikola Tesla Museum (2 hours, easy, afternoon)
• Historic Belgrade on Foot (4.25 hours, demanding, morning)
• Kovačica Art Colony (3.5 hours, easy, afternoon)
• Belgrade by E-Bike (2.5 hours, moderate, afternoon)
• Dine in Belgrade’s Bohemian Quarter (2.5 hours, moderate, evening)
• Best of Belgrade (6 hours, moderate, morning-afternoon).

We registered for the Best of Belgrade tour with a potential plan to visit the Tesla Museum afterwards on our own.

Best of Belgrade Excursion

This tour is described as:

Explore the rich history and culture of Serbia’s capital and head underground for a lunch paired with wine.

Once the center of a civil war, Belgrade today is an exuberant, forward-looking city. Drive with your guide to the ancient Kalemegdan Fortress, the pinnacle of the city. Enjoy a guided walk through the surrounding park. Then, during a panoramic drive, see the imposing Town Hall, once home of the Obrenović dynasty and Republic Square, before stopping to visit the Church of St. Sava, one of the largest Orthodox churches in the world. You will also tour the Tito Memorial, a moving tribute dedicated to the “Father of Yugoslavia,” Marshal Josip Tito. Later, descend underground into a vast labyrinth owned by the wine-making Panajotović family. Within the cool walls of these fascinating Roman-era cellars, savor a delicious lunch paired with a selection of their wines.

This tour was scheduled to depart at 8:30am, so we got up and went to breakfast in plenty of time to come back to the room, brush our teeth, and get our passports (required to carry when off the ship in Serbia). However, as we started to walk out the door, I suddenly didn’t feel so well, not terrible, but decided I didn’t need to push it to go on a 6-hour tour. I sent Dave onwards without me and thought I’d just have a restful day and catch up on the blog. Restful, yes. Blog, no. I ended up sleeping about 4 of the 6 hours he was gone!

Dave’s report on the tour was that the guide was very knowledgeable, but she focused on too many names and dates that just weren’t familiar to the participants without adequately explaining the relevance of the people she was talking about. The excursion was good, but not as excellent as some of our prior excursions.

At the entrance to the park is the bust of Kosta Taušanović (1854-1902), a politician, minister and banker, who opposed the Serbian monarchy (Obrenović dynasty). The park contains many museums, monuments, the Belgrade Zoo, and many clay tennis courts – perhaps Novak Djokovic or Monica Seles played here?   

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Next, the group went to the Tito Memorial where the former Communist Dictator is buried. The mausoleum became known as the “House of Flowers” due to all the flowers laid around his tomb. There is a museum dedicated to his time ruling Yugoslavia (essentially from 1943-1980). Tito is known for standing up to and ruling independently of Stalin and the USSR.

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The Church of St. Sava has an interesting history. Originally conceived in the early 1900s, numerous competitions were held for the design, but none could be agreed upon. With various wars and governmental changes, a plan was finally selected in the 1930s and construction began in 1935 only to be interrupted yet again by WWII. After WWII, the Communist did not allow construction to restart despite numerous requests. Finally, in the mid-80s as communism was beginning to deteriorate, construction resumed. The exterior was finally completed in 2017. The interior is still being completed as of 2025. It is one of the largest churches in the world and was modeled on the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, originally an Eastern Orthodox Church.

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After seeing the sites of Belgrade, it was time to go underground for lunch and wine!

Afternoon in the Lounge

As we were docked right in the city, you could see lots of activity just from the ship. However, we were rafted with two other ships, so the view from our balcony was the adjacent ship. After Dave returned, I found a comfortable seat in the Lounge with a city view to start processing pictures from prior days and writing those blog entries.

Serbia Today – Guest Lecture

At 5pm, Viking brought aboard Belgrade-born historian and author Srdjan Ristic for his presentation entitled “Serbia Explained: A Country at the Crossroads of Worlds”. This talk was very engaging and informative in helping to further understand the region, its people, and why so much conflict has been here over the centuries. His book, Yugoslavia: Utopia or Inspiration?, is available on Amazon in Kindle/Hardcover/Paperback options. I’ve downloaded the Kindle version for future reading of course! Bringing aboard excellent live lecturers is one of the things I really like about Viking.

After Dinner on the Ullur

In addition to the guest lecturer onboard today, after dinner, we were entertained in the Lounge by the Talija Art Company. They performed a series of Serbian folk dances and musical selections from different regions of Serbia. The musicians accompanying the dancers and performing instrumental selections were an accordionist, violinist, and flutist. The lighting in the Lounge and our view didn’t allow for very good pictures, but we thoroughly enjoyed the show and the energy of the performers! You can find videos on their YouTube channel.

Even though I didn’t get off the ship in Belgrade, I felt I had an excellent experience here between Srdjan Ristic’s presentation and the Folklore Dance group this evening.

P.S. We are now back home in Houston, so I’m catching up on posting the second half of our trip.