Walking through Savamala and towards the decadence of the Belgrade Waterfront project, I meandered by the roofless remains of Španska kuća, or the Spanish House, near the Sava and beneath Branko’s Bridge. I’m interested in derelict buildings such as this and this one has been in a state of, well, disrepair, for over thirty years. Built in around 1880 as an impressive academic-style palace, it was once among the grandest buildings in this part of Belgrade and subsequently served as a customs office, a warehouse, base for the Serbian Shipping Society and the Museum of River Shipping.
Someone then had a good idea to turn it into a hotel and started work on stripping away some peripheral parts, namely the interiors and the roof. They got into financial problems and managed to leave the building in a much worse state than they actually found it. The building’s name is traditionally linked to the Spanish flu pandemic, when it is said to have been used as a quarantine station for passengers arriving at the nearby river port. There are no surviving official records confirming this account, although the story was passed down by the son of a man reportedly treated there, so it may or may not be true. They do hold some cultural projects here, but at the moment, there are some legal arguments about its future so it might well stay derelict for some time to come.
Walking beside the River Sava in Belgrade in extreme heat, I noticed what a sign helpfully told me was the river monitor Sava, a heavily armed warship which began life in the Austro-Hungarian Navy as SMS Bodrog. Shortly after 01:00 on 29 July 1914, the day after Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Bodrog and two other monitors opened fire on Serbian positions around Belgrade. These are generally regarded as the first shots of the First World War, so it is reasonable to say that the conflict rather noisily began from this boat. I’d note that the first shot was really the killing of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, a location I might be visiting later on this trip, although I’ll add that this isn’t entirely a tour of the origins of global conflict.
After the war, the vessel passed to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes and was renamed Sava in 1920 which feels nicer to me than Bodrog. Its subsequent career was perhaps a little sub-optimal as the crew scuttled it near Belgrade during the Axis invasion in April 1941, it was raised and placed in Croatian service, then scuttled again in September 1944 when its crew defected to the Yugoslav Partisans. It was raised once more, returned to Yugoslav naval service between 1952 and 1962 and later endured the less glamorous role of a gravel barge. Following two deliberate sinkings, several reconstructions and a substantial modern restoration, it is difficult to know precisely how much of this vessel remains from 1914, making it something of a heavily armed Ship of Theseus.
That complicated survival is precisely what gives Sava such heritage importance. It is one of only two surviving Austro-Hungarian river monitors known to have served during the First World War and the only surviving vessel from the group involved in the opening bombardment of Belgrade. Serbia’s Ministry of Defence and Military Museum acquired it in 2015, restored it and opened it as a floating museum in 2021. Visitors can now go aboard, which I might do on another visit although for the moment, I was content to admire it from the scorching hot riverside near to Belgrade Fortress.
Safely in Belgrade on a sunny Wednesday morning meant just one thing, it was time to be annoyed that it was too hot.
The Gate of the Balkans and Central Europe and this sounds like a reasonable claim as Belgrade sits between the two regions and has spent centuries being approached, occupied, liberated, rebuilt and approached again, so it has certainly accumulated the necessary gatekeeping experience.
The decadent external area at the airport with limited seating and a roof that looked like it might fall down. Oh, and too many people smoking, but I don’t want to sound that I’m complaining again.
But they have some modern art and the panel next to it states “the sun does not distinguish whom it warms” which felt appropriate as I was already annoyed about the heat and the sun had definitely already located me.
Bus 72 is the one that goes to the transportation hub of Zeleni Venac in the city centre and after reading up on these, this means there’s one in 16 minutes that’s three stops away and a second which is 17 minutes away and five stops away.
And here’s the bus sweeping majestically to the stop. The bus was relatively busy, but there’s an advantage about Belgrade public transport which is that it is now entirely free. More about that in future posts, but this surprised and delighted me and it was introduced in January 2025, a few weeks after I was last in Belgrade. There was also limited luggage storage on board which hardly impacted me personally, other than several passengers struggled to fit their ridiculously sized bags anywhere convenient.
The journey took around 45 minutes to get to the city centre and although the bus had wi-fi, it didn’t have much air conditioning so it was a little hotter than I would have ideally liked. Nonetheless, the journey was convenient, straightforward and completely free, leaving very little room for genuine complaint beyond the temperature, although I was willing to make the necessary effort in that regard.
Staying at the Ibis hotel in Luton meant that it was only a ten minute early morning walk to the main terminal, although it was all quite a bit busier than I expected at that time.
All was though calm in the airport terminal.
Mine was the sixteenth departure of the day. I’m not entirely sure why I counted them, but having completed the research it would seem wasteful not to publish the findings.
The security process was fast, indeed so fast that I was seated inside Big Smoke restaurant within twenty minutes of having left the hotel. All very efficient.
I had £18 credit to use at Big Smoke with my Priority Pass card so went for the smashed avocado and latte, which handily came to £18.
Nicely presented and although I know that hot honey is a bit too ubiquitous at the moment, it added to the flavour here and the chilli flakes added to the taste. The eggs were slightly firmer than I would like, but the avocado was vibrant, the pickled pink onions added texture and I thought that this was really rather good.
The latte tasted of coffee which seemed positive and was brought over by a young waiter who was positively flirting with just about every customer. This worked better for some than others, he got an annoyed look from one older woman but another younger woman seems to be falling for his charms.
This remains a busy airport and there’s rarely much seating in the main areas, with many of the restaurants looking like they were reaching capacity as well.
The gate was called and all was efficient as ever, although three lads were spotted by Wizz Air staff with an extra bag and they each found themselves surcharged around £60 each. This seemed to be something of a body blow to them, although in general the staff were letting some slightly larger bags just go through without checking.
There’s something rather nice about morning flights and the airport waking up.
Boarding the flight after the usual ten minute wait standing on the stairs inside the terminal.
The aircraft was G-WUKN which appears to be yet another new one for me. I still diligently record which aircraft I’ve been on, although I’m not always entirely sure why. Future historians may be grateful, assuming they have first exhausted every other available source of information.
The seating Gods had given me an aisle seat and there was inevitably going to be extra entertainment as there’s the empty emergency exit row seat in front. Passengers can pay £20 to upgrade to sit there and crew members are very alert to those self-upgrading without paying, so I was hoping for drama.
The flight was relatively busy, at about 80% occupancy and the crew on this flight seemed particularly alert, although I think that the Wizz Air standard is pretty high in this regard anyway. The flight was relaxing enough so I got a little nap and there were no disturbances or random sales of lottery tickets. The crew announcements were clear, the pilot said sensible things and it was all reassuringly undramatic. Incidentally, the cabin crew chased three passengers out of the emergency exit rows seats so I was pleased for that extra entertainment.
We had arrived into Belgrade 25 minutes earlier than expected, although that’s more due to padded schedules than anything else.
This was another really rather lovely flight from Wizz Air, in my usual fan boy style of finding little to ever criticise them for, with the cost of the ticket being just £8.99. Reliable, consistent and back in Belgrade so this blog post series has finally now hit the Balkans.
The delights of check-in started with having to queue up to get a printed boarded pass, as this is one of the airports where I couldn’t check-in using the app. There was a 25 minute queue here, but it was worth it when the staff member at the desk noticed a queue dodger and sent them back to the end of the line. As a British citizen, I obviously rely on people in power to enforce the queueing system as it’s simultaneously important not to see society collapse into a heap, whilst also not being brave enough to mention anything to the individual directly who might be responsible for civilisation falling by not respecting the queue.
The flight was on time, always a delight. The airport is in two bits, the rickety old bit and the more shinier bit which they’ve constructed. They call it Terminal 2, but it’s all joined together, but the budget airlines go from the more rickety bit of Terminal 1.
And another queue to board. But, a golden opportunity to stare at my phone, something I always try and take advantage of. I’m not one for monitoring my screen time, other than to sometimes ponder that it isn’t enough. However, I digress.
If you boarded from the front half of the aircraft you could use the air bridge. If you were in the back half of the aircraft you were despatched outside to walk up the rear steps. I was randomly given a decent seat once again, this time an aisle seat near the front. I don’t pay for seat reservations, but if I did, then I’d go for an aisle arrangement. I boarded the aircraft and some old woman was in my seat in what appeared like a bid to sit next to her friend. I suspect they were about to ask me to swap seats, but since they didn’t speak English and I didn’t speak Serbian, I was sitting where my boarding pass told me to. Without sounding middle aged and grumpy, of which I’m only one as frankly I still identify as a millennial, if it’s important enough to sit next to someone then just pay the bloody seat reservation fee. The woman spent the entire journey with her head in her hands propped on the tray table. The guy by the window seat looked as confused as me as to how that appeared to be comfortable. However, each to their own. The fare was again around £10, ridiculous value for money and I had no complaints about any part of the service. Wizz Air don’t have a great reputation in some quarters, but as yet I’ve not experienced any problems. Although, give it time….
This was after landing at Luton Airport, it’s a bit blurry unfortunately but it’s important to show willing….. The aircraft was an Airbus A321, registration code G-WUKV, which had already been to Istanbul and back earlier on during the day. They certainly work these aircraft hard, but it’s not yet a year old as it was delivered to Wizz Air on 29 September 2023.
With that, I just had the expedition to get home and that didn’t allow much time for sleeping.
With some time at the airport given my penchant for early arrivals, I thought I’d use my new Priority Pass card to pop into the airport lounge. There is a more decadent lounge next door which is operated by Air Serbia, but this is the general lounge that anyone with a lounge card type thing can get into.
The staff member at entry was polite and efficient with me, but she was having altercations with several other entrants to the lounge who asked questions. She spent most of the time talking loudly to people on the phone and I’m not sure she realised just how many lounge customers she was evidently annoying judging by their reactions when they entered. One customer already in the lounge told her to shut up, not in a way that was intended to be heard by the receptionist, but I think it cheered the soul of the lady who said it.
The bulk of the food choices were the cold meats and salad items. They were passable, but I was amused by the plastic plates provided that don’t hold the weight of more than about three slices of cucumber. I suspect this is deliberate to avoid piling up of food, there are reviews stretching back some time about this matter.
The drinks selection in the fridges. There were plenty of signs warning customers not to take anything from the lounge.
The coffee machines and the quality of the espresso was decent.
The signage said these were ham, but it transpired to be tuna which I was convinced that I wouldn’t like. However, after trying it rather than wasting it, it wasn’t entirely disagreeable.
Beer. It’s not exactly a wide selection of craft beers, but it could have been worse. It wasn’t the cleanest lounge and there was the air of despair about the whole proceedings, not helped by the lack of natural light. I suspect that at some stage in the near future that it might be wise to update and modernise this lounge.
The lounge was basic, and it’s badly reviewed by any real measure. For my purposes, this was a handy lounge with plenty of power points, snacks and drinks, so it worked well. If I had paid £25 or so for the visit, I think that I might have been rather less surprised and delighted. Anyway, after two hours of excitement of listening to the receptionist tutting at customers, it was time to board the Wizz Air express back to London Luton Airport.
Drawing this ‘fascinating’ series of posts to an earlier close than I anticipated as I need to start getting on wittering on about with this week, it was time after three days in Belgrade to head back to the airport. I worked out that I didn’t have to worry too much about Internet connection during the bus journey, as I could get the bus ticket QR code emailed to me rather than relying on the screen staying open. Given my lack of roaming options, I did though have to find public wi-fi to buy the ticket and luckily that was available not far from the bus stop. It was far too bloody hot again, but I didn’t dare sit in the shade in case my airport bus came and immediately drove off. The buses are only around every 40 minutes and I wasn’t risking sitting in the sun for any longer than necessary. It’s not that I moan about the heat a lot, but…… Incidentally, the bus ticket cost around 30p, so I couldn’t complain too much – or at least, no more than normal.
On the inwards journey it was dark and so I hadn’t seen anything, but it’s a rather picturesque view on the approach to and from the city.
And safely at the airport. One little problem with the bus is that it wasn’t air conditioned, so at least three people were struggling with the heat (I know this by their desperate attempts to fan themselves) and I can’t say that I was overly enjoying it. One person fell over which I suppose added to the excitement of proceedings, but it still seemed sub-optimal for all concerned. But, I’m always pleased to arrive back at the airport and I had cut this one very fine and arrived just four and a half hours before the flight. Once again, my caution of missing a flight does lead to some considerable sitting around airports, but I think that I might have mentioned that before.
Hopefully I won’t publish a post before I’ve finished it like yesterday, but this is short and sweet so I might manage to avoid such incompetence. Anyway, I liked the German Embassy’s unsubtle way of showing support for Ukraine by having this outside. I mention this as the link between Serbia and Germany seems fascinating to me, the latter is the former’s largest trade partner and Germany is supporting the Serbian bid to join the European Union. However, Germany recognises Kosovo and that has caused tension, although there seems to be an air of inevitability about that now, without my getting involved with international border disputes (which I accept are beyond the remit of this blog). The German Foreign Office web-site mentions the disagreement on the Serbian page, but the Serbian web-site makes no mention of the issue on their German page.
Oops, in my enthusiasm I published an unfinished version of this post. My two loyal blog readers must have thought I had very little to say.
The reception area of the hotel, which is a grand 1920s affair which is an Accor hotels franchise. It has just celebrated its 100th birthday as it first opened on 15 March 1924, having been planned as a clinic but changed to a hotel during the building process. It was seized by the Nazis during the Second World War and used by the German General Staff, then it returned to a hotel in 1948 and it was owned by the employees. Privatised in 2008, it fits nicely into the Mercure branding and I like that they’ve retained its heritage.
The welcome at reception was immediate, friendly and engaging, which was handy after my little expedition to get to the place. The staff member excited and delighted me by telling me that I had been upgraded to a better room, which was very optimal.
Before I reached my room, I knew it would be just a little decadent as there was a seating area outside the room in case I needed a rest before arrival.
The room, which I admit looks a little drab in the photo, but it was dark outside and I hadn’t turned all the ambient lighting on. It was quite sizeable, with a large bathroom and it felt well building as I didn’t hear any noise from inside the hotel.
I had a balcony that I didn’t want to fall off as it looked a little low to me.
And the view of the Serbian Parliament building. I accept there are quite a few trees in front of it, but it’s definitely there.
The exterior of the hotel, my room was the second floor balcony room on the right hand side.
There were welcome snacks provided. I like welcome snacks.
And welcome drinks as well, all for free. As can be guessed, I like welcome drinks too.
I treated myself to breakfast in the mornings, and although I didn’t try any of the hot options, here they are as I have a sense of completeness…. Note the pastries, I tested those and was pleased.
They also had a fruit selection, which of course I could hardly keep my hands off.
Woooo, food photos from across the three mornings. I like continental breakfasts and mounds of bread, cold cuts and random cakes. The sauce in the penultimate photo is Ajvar and I suspect the hotel staff wondered where it kept going, but I got slightly obsessed with it. It’s a roasted pepper sauce with some chilli added, and I think some tomatoes and herbs. The breakfast room wasn’t very large, but it was a sedate experience that was all calm and comfortable.
And my welcome drink, which I actually had on the last evening. It’s a generic European lager, but it was free and the bar area was rather relaxing. I should have brought a book to read, but I didn’t, so once again I stared at my phone for thirty minutes.
I really liked this hotel, it wasn’t cheap, but the value for money was excellent and with the upgrade I was very pleased. The staff members were friendly, the room was spotlessly clean and I really rather liked my little balcony. If I return to Belgrade, I think I’ll come here again.
Having once again faffed about just a little, I’d better speed up my riveting thoughts on Belgrade as I’m now off on another expedition and so I’m in danger of never quite catching up with these blog posts.
I was aware that Belgrade Waterfront was controversial, it has been a substantial urban project and has been something of a joint partnership between the Belgrade authorities and the United Arab Emirates. It is a major reconstruction of part of the city, involving the demolition of tens of residential and commercial units and even the permanent closure of the city’s mail railway station. They had to resolve problems beyond this as well, moving shipwrecks from the River Danube, moving water pipes, electricity cables and rail lines. Parks have been created and there has been an increase in the amount of space available for pedestrians. The Government has given them 30 years to complete the project and we’re just under 10 years into it.
At the heart of the project is Kula Belgrade, or Belgrade Tower, which is 168 metres in height. It has now nearly reached completion and will consist of a hotel, serviced apartments and residential units.
A whole new waterfront pathway has been constructed.
In all fairness, it looks good and some considerable effort has gone into the design. It feels a little odd walking along the glass bits to the side, but I was very brave as usual.
The entrance to the shopping centre. Spot the two subtle international food brands.
And the ‘understated’ interior of the Galerija shopping centre. I’m writing this next to the Galleria shopping centre in Hatfield, there’s not always a huge creativity with naming. The shopping centre has over 300 shops, numerous dining areas, a cinema and thousands of car parking spaces. And free wi-fi, which proved handy as I don’t have any free data roaming in Serbia. On which point, it felt like travelling back ten years having to keep my phone off, it does nothing for my stress levels not being able to receive e-mails and check the news every eight minutes. I’m not into digital detox, but I digress.
I’m not sure that the pedestrian areas would be quite like this in the UK for fear of a child running down to explore them.
And that’s what it looks like from afar, all modern and shiny. The properties to the left are the new residential buildings that have been constructed as part of the whole project. And at least this part of the River Danube is accessible, as some other stretches really aren’t easy to walk down, but this one has seating, bins and even exercise equipment by it.
One of the public spaces that has been created by some of the new residential properties. There are tensions it seems, there is a very modern and expensive area of the city being created for the wealthy, almost separate from that of the actual city of Belgrade. Although, perhaps, it was ever thus. Amidst all of this, there have been sustained allegations of corruption and a misuse of money, but perhaps such thoughts are inevitable for any expensive project.
Something that I think is interesting is that looking back to the 1950s and 1960s, large-scale projects such as this seemed a marvellous idea in city centres. Street lines were swept away, heritage entirely destroyed and people moved out of areas they’ve lived for decades. All new shiny things are positive for urban renewal and the well-being of residents, but I wonder whether in 50 years they’ll look back and talk about the destruction of a large area by the river. For me, I thought it was all rather lovely, although little thought had been given as to how pedestrians were supposed to cross roads that they were working on. The solution seemed to be for pedestrians to barge their way into the road and make the cars stop, all slightly ironic given that this development is meant to be good news for walkers and cyclists.
