Mostar, Bosnia & Herzegovina
Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina - a city I never imagined I’d visit but certainly will never forget. Stari Most, the ‘Old Bridge’ (depicted here), was built by the Ottomans in the 16th century and stood for 427 years as an exemplary piece of Balkan Islamic architecture. The bridge was destroyed in 1993 by Croat paramilitary forces during the Croat-Bosniak War, taking more than 60 shell hits before collapsing.
Reconstructed in 2004, Stari Most is now renowned for a traditional summer diving competition into the cold Neretva River below, and since 2015 it has been a tour stop in the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series. Unfortunately we missed the Red Bull event by only a few days, but we were still able to watch a member of the Mostar Diving Club make the 24m jump using traditional technique.