On the Bosnian Seaside: Visiting Neum

Bosnia and Herzegovina is a maritime country. Even though, the stretch of coastline is very short, there is one prominent city there worth exploring: Neum. The city of Neum, lies on the Adriatic Sea, and is a very popular tourist spot, not only visited by travelers from all over the world, but also by a lot of Bosnians. I visited Neum with a couple of friends this past weekend, and in this post I want to share some impressions from the Bosnian and Herzegovian seaside.

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Arrival

You can get to Neum by car, driving down the Adriatic coastline from Metkovic. Neum is very close to Mostar, as well as Dubrovnik, which makes both cities a nice destination for a day trip, or Neum the other way around. Neum is located on hillsides, and you will have to get used to streets constantly going downhill and up again. There are many hotels here, most of them new or renovated. Of course private accommodation can be found at every turn. We stayed in the Vila Mirela.

The Blue of the Sea

We arrived about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and there was already nicer light in the surroundings. This was my first visit to the seaside this year, and I really missed the blue color of the sea. We went for a swim immediately. The apartment is a bit away from the city (only 5 minutes walking though), which is actually nice, since you don't have crowded beaches. Mostly you have the sea here for yourself.

In the shot above you can see Neum, as the sun is slowly setting. The beaches still had some visitors, and if you don't like these stone beaches, you can walk a couple of minutes towards the city and visit one of the usual ones.

A Nightly Stroll through Neum

As the night set, we we went out for a walk in the city. I brought my tripod with me, so that I could take some long exposure shots of city at night. The two coming up were taking from the balcony of our apartments.

I went for a pitch black look of the dock at night. The Canon 6D is very good at low light, and I think it really shows in this next shot. You can see hints of deep dark green on the bottom of the sea, and the boat blurred out by the motion of the water. Exposure was 30 seconds, f 5.6, 50 mm.

Some of the houses on the far west end of the city. This was taken around midnight. There were some people out in the streets, but not many. The reason for that is, that the swimming season hasn't really started yet. Most people are still work bound until July. You can expect more visitors in the peak of the summer season.

I love long exposure shots of water. This next one was 20 seconds, and I love the milky water effect you can achieve. When you add the surrounding lights to that, you can almost get a painting-like result.

The Next Morning

After a good nights sleep in our apartments, we woke up to a beautiful day outside, The sea is so clear and blue here, and with the house we stayed in, being so close to it, you could catch glimpses of the turquoise waters from a lot of spots. We had a great weekend here, swam a lot, grilled, walked, until eventually returning home...

I hope you enjoyed this little excursion to Neum, and that you give it a chance if you happen to visit Bosnia and Herzegovina.

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