Old Bridge - Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Two hours and four border crossings later, we had just about arrived at our destination, Mostar. As we drove farther away from the Adriatic, the Southern Herzegovina scenery started looking vaguely familiar with hints of Southern California style landscape. The dusty brown hillsides were a canvas of mossy greens desert scrub and not much else. As we approached the outskirts of Mostar, the skyline was peppered with minarets to the left and a Catholic Church spire to the right.

Prior to the war in the early 1990s, Mostar was probably best known for its Turkish style architecture and its 16th century single-arch bridge, the Old Bridge, also known as Stari Most.

However, in 1992 Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence from Yugoslavia and Mostar quickly became famous for being one of the main front lines of the Bosnian War. The war divided the city in half and the bridge acted as a natural barrier between the two fighting ethnic groups, the Muslims and the Croats. Sadly, in 1993 the Old Bridge was destroyed by shells and much of the stone from this historic structure fell into the Neretva River below, where it stayed until rebuilding efforts began in 1998.

Photo courtesy of Smithsonian.com

After nearly six years of construction, using the same materials and Turkish style architecture, the Old Bridge was reopened in the summer of 2004 with great fanfare. The rebuilding of the Old Bridge was thought to be highly symbolic and was done with the hopes of reuniting the two ethnics groups that had remained divided still nearly a decade after the end of the war.

Sadly, seven years after the resurrection of the Old Bridge, the division between the Muslims and the Croats is much the same as it was during the war. The two ethnic groups keep to their respective sides of the bridge, only interacting as needed.

Like the citizens of Mostar, the city itself is still patching its war wounds. Shell scarred buildings mingle alongside rebuilt structures housing shops and markets acting as a powerful visual reminder of the struggles that this great city has endured.

If you get the chance to visit this pocket of the world, make the day trip to view the Old Bridge and see firsthand Mostar's beauty which has survived tremendous turmoil and heartache.