Tragedy struck on a hilltop in Pecs in southern Hungary when I stupidly left a film canister behind. The film carried a couple of dozen stunning photographs from Dubrovnik, Montenegro & Bosnia, so to lose them was particularly annoying. Trust me they would have looked great! The five murky looking ones attached are unfortunately all I have left.

In short then, just to provide literary-only detail on those two brilliant countries I missed, they were magnificent.

Montenegro

Wow what a surprise this place turned out to be! I only stayed in Montenegro two days but enjoyed it immensely in places I'd never heard of - Kotor with a great old town and fortifications rising dramatically on its hilltop (which made for a top morning hike), and Budva with its nice beach (finally got to swim in the Adriatic - locals thought we were nuts but it wasn't too cold).

Good Kiwi bloke Craig and I ended up whiling much of the day in Kotor away with the incredibly friendly locals. One feller Milan told us he expected another war to come in around three years because 'that's what we do - we fight', but he would have good cause for being pessimistic after being imprisoned for five years for refusing to fight for Serbia in the war/s. Anyway, two years on and Monetenegro has had a peaceful shift toward independence.

There was also a three-tier high tech disco in Kotor, which was hard to believe, and the way the sounds of tinkling pianos ricocheted off the marble streets was mesmerising and made for a great experience for a music lover. Kotor and many other towns throughout the Balkans have piano music trickling out of the old walls and in many ways it is one of the unsung wonders of the region.

In Budva too, the locals were extremely good value, the guitar player at the restaurant played all the songs my Dad plays and proceeded to show us all the quirky magic tricks he picked up in his time with the Cabaret shows in Germany.

So in short Montenegro was sensational. No tourists, great weather, greater people, and some interesting sights. It remains to be seen if this jewel stays the same way as undoubtedly now that it has separated from Yugoslavia the property developers will flood in.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

It amazed me that the war was over five years ago when I visited because the place looked like it had only just ended. All uninhabited houses were pitted with mortar, gunshot and artillery hits, and many inhabited houses were the same. It was particularly bad in the region around Mostar.

Again there were very friendly people in Bosnia, and Sarajevo was jumping ahead in its economic recovery. I had the best meal of my trip in Sarajevo - the local Bosniak stew was briliant. It was in this great place overlooking the Miljacka river and opposite the grand National Library. Its called the Spite House because the government made the original owner shift it piece by piece across the river so that the Library could be built. Nice one.

Whilst in an internet shop in Sarajevo a huge thump shuddered the ground and I got up to check what car had hit the wall, but it turned out to be an earthquake - apparently tremors hit the region regularly, which can't be good for the nerves of the people who recall the bombs during the war.

On the whole the journey through Bosnia was fascinating and I'd recommend it.

Hungary

My trip to Hungary was a fleeting one. An overnight train ride from Sarajevo to Pecs was punctuated by stops for my passport to stamped as I had to transit through Croatia.

Pecs itself was pretty but soured by the loss of the film as previously mentioned. Budapest was one of the few places in Eastern Europe I had already visited so I made a cursory stay - taking in a bath and a show, before heading around the Danube Elbow at the beautiful and historic village of Visegrad. It was worth the feeling of simple solitude in the forest to take random paths up the hill to scale toward the castle rather than following the busloads of tourists up the asphalt option. Once ticked off it was off by train through the more industrial Gyor and on to Slovakia.