SERBIA: RAVANICA & MANASIJA

Posted July 27, 2009 by David McGuinness

Today started with Rakija, a homemade plum brandy that is traditionally taken first thing the morning. It tasted pretty good but I didn’t really buy into the first thing in the morning thing.

After a quick breakfast we drove out to visit two monasteries, Ravanica and Manasija. Ravanica, founded in the 14th century Prince Lazar today houses his remains though they took a round about route having been originally buried here his remains were moved to Hungary, then Belgrade before doing a monastery tour in 1987 before finally coming back to Ravanica. The monastery is surrounded by forests and pastures and encircled by a huge fortress wall. The main church is beautiful but unfortunately little remains of the original frescoes, having mostly been destroyed by the Turks.

Manasija looks more like a Byzantine castle than a monastery due to its very heavy fortifications. Built by Lazar’s son Stefan, its construction is widely regarded as the final act of Serbian’s golden age before they were dominated by the Turks for almost five hundred years. When we arrived there was a gypsy wedding starting which added a lot of colour and spice to the visit.

At both monasteries there were no other tourists around, In the gift shop afterwards I thought I heard an Irish voice and looked around and there were just three nuns so I assumed my mind was playing tricks on me. Then I heard it again so I asked one of the nuns if she was Irish and indeed she was from Dublin and had been at the monastery for a couple of years. Is there anywhere you don’t find Irish people?!

I ended up spending most of the evening drinking beer in the village café with Mirko. His English isn’t great and my Serbian very basic but somehow it worked, mostly through speaking the language of beer, however. Tomorrow my driver Mikica arrives and we will head South...

This blog is part of an Off-The-Beaten-Track Travel Diary. Click on the links below to navigate through this journey.