The Pindos mountains of Greece are one of the most breathtaking landscapes of the Balkans. Dynamic and picturesque like the Alps, and free to roam and camp just like any other area in the Balkans, they cover a huge territory from the border with Albania, to the Peloponese in the south. And our Trails of Gods tour covers them all along the way, featuring the most beautiful ridgeways, lakes, riverbeds and tons of places of interest.

This tour was conducted in early August 2023 by rustikatravel.com in the Balkan, Sredna Gora and Rhodopean mountains of Bulgaria. In 2024 the tour will remain in the calendar, but under a different name, Rhodopean Dream (and will feature double as much of the Rhodopeans).

The magnificent, extremely picturesque landscape of Montenegro has made this one of our most popular tours. These are the images from the 2023 tour.

The best 100 images from the 2023 edition of our most famous tour.

This was our best rain tour by far. 10 out of 10 rainy days, but loaded with impressions from the great trails and unforgettable wild campsites of central and western Serbia.

This premiere 2023 tour is intended to be a camping season opener tour, featuring the lower of the serbian Carpathian mountains (Homolje, Gornjane mountains, Kučaj), where everything is already strikingly green and full of life in May. This gallery contains images from the tour, and a few from the pretour scouting round in the area.

Although it was intended to be a spring tour (as the name says), a sudden outburst of winter in the first week of April made it a more winter tour than the one we've had in January. Happening in the mountains of western Serbia, from Divčibare, over Tara, to Zlatibor and Zlatar, except for the splendid scenery it also featured first class hotel accomodation. In the gallery some of the images from the scouting round are also included, to show the contrast between what the tour was supposed to be, and what it actually was.

Images from the winter tour organized in the Kučaj mountains (part of the serbian Carpathians) in January 2023.

Our legendary Montenegro Highlands overlanding tour has been carved to perfection over the years. In July 2022 we've had two small groups which enjoyed this incredible scenery for 10 days each. Some say Montenegro is simple to navigate, which may be true for the mainstream, well known trails and locations, but we will take you to many secret campspots and along hidden shortcuts to make the most out for the time you spend in Montenegro.

The participants of Ancient Trails 2022 experienced central and western Serbia in an incredible way - in a total wilderness tour taking them along long forgotten trails, following the mountain ranges. June, the greenest month of the year, has given us everything it's capable of - from perfect sunny weather, to some real mud challenges in days of pouring rain. It was definitely 10 days worth remembering!

After a two year break our Homolje Gold Rush tour took place in April 2022 - twice! April, as the month when you can expect just about everything when it comes to weather, gave us sun, rain, and even snow, delivering challenging tracks. The story of the goldmines and gold prospecting on the rivers of eastern Serbia was somehow overshadowed by the mine management not being interested to arrange tourist visits, but we experienced both, neverthless.

Making a winter tour is always a gamble, because the weather conditions can change overnight bringing inpassable snow drifts, and thrash all your previously made plans. But we were lucky enough to get everything in January 2022 - warm weather, cold weather, mud, snow, and five wonderful days, each one different from the others. This is a short photo report of the good times that the participants of the Balkans Snow Trails 2022 tour shared.

This album holds the images from three Secret Carpathians tours which we've made in 2021 - the main summer tour in July, a custom tour in August, and the (hotel accomodation) Indian Summer tour in October. The wilderness of eastern Serbia in it's full glory.

The idea of this tour is to run through the heart of the most beautiful mountains of Bulgaria, heading towards the Rhodopean highlands in the south. It starts in Stara planina (also known as the Balkan mountain, then crosses to Sredna gora, and finally reaches the Rhodopeans, with all it's lakes, deep canyons and ancient pine forests. The tour in 2021 took place in September.

This is probably our most picturesque tour, so we always have the problem to choose a limited number of images for the album. In 2021 it was by far our largest Montenegro tour, but a great one, where the team worked together as a charm.

Images from our Albanian tour in August 2021, lasting for 13 days and covering the best of Albanian wilderness, from the far north to south.

Why are these Carpathians "secret"? Simply because nobody thinks of them when you say "Carpathians"! They're hidden south of the Danube, in eastern Serbia, and make an enchanting, almost uninhabited wonder world, seamlessly continuing into the Balkan mountain. Beautiful forests, highlands, mountain ridges, river valleys, lakes, attractive cliffs, canyons... There's simply everything a true nature admirer longs for. It is by far our most popular overlanding tour, which is, in some seasons, performed even more than three times. If you want to take part in this unique experience, hurry up and go to https://www.rustikatravel.com/secret-carpathians/

Pictures from our premiere 2019 tour which happened from June 3rd to 17th. Due to participant's requests, it was a one of kind, customized tour, which added 4 days to the initial plan, and made quite a zig-zag pattern through Serbia, connecting the western, central and eastern parts. So the "standard" tour, which will take place again in May 2020, will have quite a different itinerary, but the highlights and overall scenery will remain the same. If you like what you see in these photos, hurry to reserve your place in the 2020 tour - https://www.rustikatravel.com/ancient-trails/

Images from the Homolje Gold Rush 2019 tour, organized in the Serbian Carpathians (northeast Serbia) as a joint venture of Expedicial Offroad Reisen and Rustika Expeditions between 14th and 20th April 2019. The story is centered around the ancient tradition of gold panning on the rivers in this area, with a visit to the biggest gold mine in Serbia, Majdanpek. If you would like to take part in the HGR 2020 tour, visit https://www.rustikatravel.com/gold-rush/

Balkans Wild Tracks is our traditional roundtrip tour starting in Igoumenitsa in Greece and circling Albania, Macedonia and Greece (Pindos mountains). It is one of the most striking and picturesque ways to experience the wilderness of the Balkans, and a true bestseller. The two 2018 tours were conducted in August and September/October.

Images from two Montenegro Highlands tours of 2018 - in July and August. This tour passes the most attractive highland areas of northern and central Montenegro before it turns eastwars and finishes with two days of northern Albania (the Albanian Alps). It's our tour with the highest average campsite altitude, ranging between 1400 and 1800 m. A first class adventure experience!

Our Secret Carpathians tour was introduced in 2018 as a unique way of presenting the wonderful landscape of the Serbian part of the Carpathian mountain range to the world. These are images from the three tours organized in July, September and October. Join us in 2019!

Again a great experience in the Serbian mountains for the Strongbol team. They drove the trails of Kopaonik and Golija in the first week of June 2018, for the third consecutive time in Serbia since 2016. These images show just a small part of all the excitement, mostly taken when hands are free from handling the steering wheel, winch and all the challenges of rough terrain 8-)

This was the first of our three Secret Carpathians tours this season. Contrary to most of our booked out tours in 2018, this tour had only two participating vehicles - a real pity that there wasn't more interest for it by prospective participants, considering the breathtakingly beautiful landscape and the mindshattering beautiful colour all around us. Even the traditionally unstable weather in May turned out to be mostly good, making the occasional rain showers practically unnoticable.

Why are these "secret" Carpathians? The answer is simple - everyone's talking about the Romanian Carpathians, or maybe the Ukrainian ones, neglecting the simple fact that river Danube isn't the end of Carpathian's southwards span. There are Carpathians south of Danube, and we're revealing their hidden beauty and all of their diversity to you with this tour.

2 meters of snow that the Serbian Carpathians have received in February and March made the third Homolje Gold Rush tour by far the most complicated one to carry out. Although springtime was already in full swing, those epic amounts of snow have left deep and impassable snowdrifts of hard packed, wet snow on virtually every north oriented mountain road, and many of our key points of the tour have proven to be inaccessible. So the plan was often changed on the move and we had to improvise a lot. Nevertheless, the tour participants had a fantastic time, and were more than satisfied with what they've seen and experienced. Take a look at the pictures, and judge for yourself if this tour was on par with the previous two or not!

2018 was a very strange winter in the Serbian Carpathians - with alternating strong snowfall and periods of extremely warm weather leading to rapid melting of the snow in the mountains, so it gave us extremely wet, hard and uneven snow conditions. It wasn't simple to conduct an offroad tour in such conditions, but we managed to get some dynamic, inspiring tracks for our visitors, featuring both serious mud and snow. These are the pictures of the 5 tour days.

It's never easy to recapitulate a fantastic overlanding season in pictures, but 2017 was particularly hard - of more than 1000 extraordinary shots in the first pick, we barely managed to decide which ones to discard in order to leave only 250 of the very best.

We've been all over the Balkans - Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia (FYROM), Albania, Greece - and we really can't pick out our favourite country. Each one of them is magnificent in it's own way, and they all add to the diversity and beauty of the last European oasis of unrestricted overland travel.

Enjoy the pictures just as we've enjoyed making them, and join us in living our dreams of freedom in the future.

Balkans Wild Tracks was our most popular tour in the last few seasons - obviously with a good reason! The landscapes featuring southern Balkans countries of Greece, Albania and Macedonia (FYROM) are a true overlanding heaven, that can only be "tasted" in the two weeks of the tour duration, but not nearly fully experienced. It wasn't easy to select the right images for this gallery from the few thousand we've shot, but you're sure to enjoy these. Where can you join Balkans Wild Tracks 2018? Here - https://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/balkans-wild-tracks/

In September 2017 the Montenegrian Highlands tour lasted for 10 days and covered all the most striking landscape of the Montegrian mountains, mostly camping above 1500 m altitude and rarely descending below 1000 m. This gallery shows that incredible landscape, which we tour again in August 2018

Another marvelous tour in southeast Serbia has taken place in mid-July 2017. Near perfect weather (six fantastic sunny days after the first night of rain) made it a mostly enjoyable seven days for the participants, who were a truly international company, coming from New Zeeland, Germany, Austria and Serbia. This was the last of "Serbian Nomad's Adventures", as starting in 2018 this series of tours will be included under our new "Secret Carpathians" name. For touring with Serbianoutdoor 4x4 / Rustika Travel, visit http://www.rustikatravel.com

A memorable 4-day overlanding (4x4) tour through the unbelievable scenery of southwest Serbia and north-central Montenegro, which took place between July 2nd and 5th 2017. Guided by Serbianoutdoor4x4 / Rustika Travel

Another epic adventure in the Serbian Carpathians is behind us. We had a small, but fantastic group, which had some memorable moments by the fire in the wilderness together, with a guitar giving this nomadic experience a special touch. The perfect summer weather we've had gave us an oportunity to make all of these pictures that you can see in this album, capturing some really special moments. From next year, all the Eastern Serbian programmes will be conducted under the name of Secret Carpathians, because that's what they truly are - the hidden mountainous world south of what people commonly know as the Carpathians. So, when choosing your Rustika Travel adventure for 2018, take note of what to look for - www.rustikatravel.com

Springtime is not a time of year for the high mountains which are still changing their winter "clothing" and can present a considerable risk with some remaining snowdrifts, but it's simply ideal for a camping tour through the Iron Gate gorge of the Danube, the mightiest European river. A combination of water and rainforest challenges, spectacular camping places on the riverbank and in the mountains, having both breathtaking scenic views and a cultural experience, and adding a unique detail - visit to the natural stone arches of eastern Serbia (which it is famous for) all make up a one of a kind overlanding tour in the Balkans!
To take part in the Iron Gate and the Stone Arches 2018 tour, visit http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/iron-gate/

A short tour, but packed with impressions, great trails and marvelous camping spots. The weather was mostly fair, so the members of Land Rover club Slovenia could enjoy this fairly unknown area of the Carpathians in northeastern Serbia to the fullest. For your own revelation of Carpathian Serbia, visit the 2017/2018 tour calendar on www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/

In 2017 Homolje Gold Rush was a great tour consisting of the first three days of the unofficial, camping part (which took place mostly in the Iron Gate national park), and the second, official part with hotel accomodation, which took place in the Homolje and Kučaj mountains of the serbian Carpathians range. We've encountered all seasons - from dry and warm, almost summer like weather, to snow blizzards and below zero temperature after a sudden severe weather front arrived on April 19th. So it was a tour with all kinds of challenges and adventure experiences, combining breathtaking nature, ancient historical heritage and culture, gold mining and panning traditions and offroading challenges.

This winter we've tried, and succeeded in doing what many people thought was impossible - getting to the heart of Serbian mountains in the season with the heaviest snowfall of the decade. The opening day went well, since we've conducted it in the bordering areas in the far west of Kučaj mountains, where the amount of snow is moderate, and already melting. We've also visited the Eco Farm Milanovic where we've had lunch. On day two we tried to get to the heart of the Kučaj mountains from two directions, only to find out that we're helpless wherever the snowplows didn't clear the forest roads - with or without snow chains. An average of 60 cm of snow, and not just any snow, but layered, hard packed snow (which would translate into some 2 metres of fluffy, powdery snow) is inpenetrable to anything but snowmobiles. Day three brought us some real deep snow offroad action, in the heart of the Kučaj highlands! On day four we've moved to western Serbia, to Golija mountain, Pešter and Zlatar, with a great base in Golijski konaci. Golija brought us the possibility to reach 1700+ m of altutude, but also overwhelming snow, which was no easier to master than the snow in Kučaj. After the roundtrip of Golija on day five, the grand finale of the tour was crossing from Golija to Javor, and then further to the famous Molitva scenic point above the Uvac river, ending the day in Zlatar mountain. In the aftermath of the tour, while some participants hurried to get back home, part of the group took an easy ride to Belgrade, to have a pleasent evening with an authentic cultural experience.

There's no smaller country with more concentrated wild beauty than Montenegro. Crinu Andanut called the endless plateau of Sinjajevina "the European Pamir", and our small, but diverse team of two Landcruisers, a Unimog and a Grand Cherokee spent marvelous 10 days in that exotic environment, enjoying some unbelievable places. We started from western Serbia, and continued throughout the most enchanting landscapes of northern and central Montenegro. And we're making it in 2017 again!

We've had a fabulous wilderness adventure year again! So many journeys throughout the Balkans, so many unforgettable moments... It really wasn't easy to choose 250 images to show it all from the thousands available. But we believe we've managed to make a selection that will make it hard to resist joining us in 2017 ;-) We've taken our visitors all over the place - to the most stunning wilderness camping spots and scenic viewpoints, taking the truly irresistable 4x4 trails in Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, Albania, Macedonia and Romania, proving once again that the Balkans is the part of Europe where a true overland adventurer will find what he's been looking for all his life without having to travel some 10.000 km first! All of these tours are in our schedule for 2017 again, so wait no longer to book your place -

http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/

We know YOUR way around the Balkans better than anyone! 8-)

It's the epic adventure that we always end our camping tour season with. Spanning 4 countries over two weeks, it traverses the Balkans, enabling the participants to experience all it's wild beauty. This year it also had a scouting part in the beginning, where we have been exploring the trails that we intend to take next year in Greece, on BWT 2017. The main part of the tour took us through Albania, Macedonia and Serbia, ending in Ždrelo spa in northeast Serbia. We've had everything during the tour - from the mediterranean warm autumn, to snow and below 0 temperatures as we progressed further north. And a sheer spectre of altitudes from 0 to 2600 m. Balkans Wild Tracks is always an adventure to remember.

It's been a fantastic tour, and a big guiding challenge - pack all the best of eastern Serbia for Lost World Adventures in only 10 days. Here are the complete pictures of the tour!

West Carpathians are surely any adventurer's dreamland. But for an unknown reason they're not very popular among offroaders. We decided to change that by organizing our "Transylvania 2016" tour there, with a highlight on the Apuseni mountains. Great group of mixed, but perfectly working together vehicles, and great weather made for a great tour, that is sure worth repeating. If you like these pictures, don't miss our next Classic Carpathians tour (http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/classic-carpathians/) in August next year. We do the Carpathians in small groups and in quite a unique, geographically oriented way, that you can't experience with other tour operators.

This was Strongbol's first tour in Serbia - according to the reactions of the participants, seems a very successful one. Six days of offroading, every day with some harder task where the boys could play a little bit :-) These are the images from the second part of the tour, featuring areas of Zlatibor and Zlatar mountains, Murtenica, the Uvac lakes and Jadovnik. For overland (4x4) touring Serbia, visit http://www.rustikatravel.com

After a memorable tour in 2015, the "No Jeep No Fun" team was in Serbia again this year! This time they've moved a little more eastwards,meeting the wonders of Kopaonik and Golija mountains. Great scenery and very comfortable accomodation led to a great tour again - see for yourself :-) For your 2017/2018 Balkans 4x4 tour, visit http://www.rustikatravel.com

These are images from our first tour of the springtime season 2016, that took place in the picturesque Homolje and Kučaj mountains of northeastern Serbia. Besides driving, we also experienced the tradition of gold panning on the golden rivers of eastern Serbia, as well as visited the gold and copper mine in Majdanpek. Although we've had good, true springtime weather for most of the time, rainy nights at the beginning of the tour gave us quite a few challenges, and lots of mud in the first three days.

As we lately have hectic and unpredictable winters with temperatures jumping between -20 and +20 all the time, the tour started as a "Serbian Snow Search", but in the end we've had loads of both snow and mud in fantastic landscapes of east and west Serbia.

So we've had everything - sun, rain, as well as snow blizzards, wet, as well as fluffy snow, breathtaking scenic views, enchanting caves, griffon vultures flying over our heads, some technically demanding passages, and we've enjoyed it all in the comfort of first class accomodation in small mountain hotels designed in a rustical ethno-style.

Photos by Wolfgang Sacher, Elisabeth Fasting, Friedrich Cox and Aleksandar Veljković

This tour was really the crown of our 2015 summer season - the marvelous landscape of southeastern Serbia revealed to us in all it's beauty, showed that it can stand up to any other popular offroading area in Europe. It was a discrete, small, two vehicle group, which granted us a relaxed atmosphere and lots of space for exploring and improvisations outside of a strict daily plan. From Suva to Stara planina, then further south over Ruj, Vlasina lake, Besna Kobila, Dukat ridge and Kukavica, the area has a huge potential for further improvements of the tour, which we'll use to make it an adventure extremely hard to resist in 2016! 8-)

The album contains asorted images from the 8 days of the tour.

In 2016 our South Serbian tour will be from September 25th to October 1st - http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/south-serbian/

Register NOW to reserve your place!

Our traditional 4×4 tour of the Carpathians lasted for 14 days this year, gathering 8(+1) participating vehicles. It was divided into two parts – the first week was (mostly) on known trails, while the second week was a scouting tour. It took place in the best 4×4 playground in the southern Carpathians, going over numerous 2000+ m peaks and including the Tarcu, Ruska, Surean, Lotrului, Latoricei, Kapacini and Fagaras mountain ranges. We had fantastic company on the tour consisting of great guys & gals coming from Germany, Austria, Romania, New Zeeland and Serbia, made up of both experienced offroad drivers and newcomers. All the vehicles (Jeeps, Mercedes G’s, and a Landy Discovery) were well equipped to fit the task. Like in previous tours, several cars had technical problems, but with the help of our Romanian friends we solved most of them very quickly and efficiently. A big, warm thanks goes to Achimoto Marius from Hunedoara (who helped us both with technical issues, and with accomodation), Paul Offroadadventure from Tirgu Jiu (who quickly provided some second hand tyres to replace the burst one), and to Ionut Pampu, who found out and informed us that Paul has the tyres in the right size available. If you like these images, join us for our 2017 Carpathian tour – http://www.rustikatravel.com/4×4/scheduled/classic-carpathians/ Thanks for the images goes to Neda, Jelena and Miro!

A group of our German Jeep friends had a great tour in western Serbia from June 22nd to 28th 2015. Great scenery, positive people, meeting a new cuture and ever changing weather all made up a very pleasant week. This is about what the participants of our Western Serbian tour (http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/western-serbia-autumn-tour/) can expect to experience too.

The great 4x4 camping adventure of Eastern Serbia took place between June 14th and 20th 2015. Here are the unforgettable moments that the participants have experienced while travelling through the last true European wilderness. The main focus of the tour were Kučaj and Stara planina mountains. The weather wasn't really perfect on all days, but that couldn't diminish the majestic landscapes - especially the Stara planina, which took everyone by surprise, no matter how many pictures of it they have seen. You just have to be there.
Join us for the adventure in 2016!
http://www.rustikatravel.com/4x4/scheduled/eastern-serbian-springtime/

Photos by: Alexandra Vlad, Aleksandar Veljkovic

It's been a hard winter for eastern Serbian wilderness, full of natural disasters - first the floods destroying every road along some river or stream, and then icy rain in December accumulating huge amounts of ice in the trees under which tree trunks broke like they were matches, leaving branches lying around all over the place. An inspection run was simply necessary in order to precisely assess the damage and responsibly plan itineraries for tours in eastern Serbia during the 2015 season.

From the very beginning, news were not good - we had to abandon tracing the trail over Svrljiške mountains, because the amount of debris on the ground was too much for one chainsaw, a winch and two pairs of hands. We continued over Devica mountain only to find out that the next, Slemen mountain, was among the worst hit. Fortunately, the forestry workers have done their job and cleared one road through the beautiful Slemen forests. At Zlot our friends joined us and helped clear the route to the Kovej campspot / scenic view - two chainsaws and several more pieces of tools, combined with 7 pairs of hands, was a mightier workforce to deal with the elements. But clearing the 4 km through the Polome rainforest was too much - it will be dealt with some other time.

Moving over to the Iron Gate national park brought us to another problem - almost no road following some river valley was any good to climb the ridges, since the catastrophic floods last September caused landslides which destroyed most of them.

Working in eastern Serbia, even in such conditions, brought us great pleasure, spending days and nights far from the madding crowds, overpopulated cities and traffic congestion. And that's priceless 8-)

Photos: Božidar Živanović, Gordana Atanasijević, Aleksandar Veljković

It was supposed to be our first "springtime" tour in 2015, but in April we encountered conditions that were rather extreme and looked more like Siberia in the middle of the winter. Sub zero temperatures, driving through blizzards, getting stuck in snowdrifts, enjoing being the first ones to venture in virgin snow... And a lot of rerouting in places where snow depth was much higher than anyone could master. Not much of a springtime, is it? :-) But the guys have really enjoyed it! It's not just about venturing to places where nobody dares to go in these conditions, it's a whole journey of discovering both Serbian landscape, history and culture, with a touch of authenticity given by the real life interaction with the locals. It was a 7-day journey of about 1.100 km through the most interesting places of western Serbia, on which the final route was strongly influenced by the weather conditions, giving it a special touch of adventure and uncertainlty that you can rarely experience so far into (at least official) springtime.

Crnu Goru pohodimo i odlično poznajemo decenijama unazad. Ovom turom smo želeli učesnicima da pokažemo tu fascinantnu divljinu na jedan način koji će dočarati njene razmere i udaljenost od svega urbanog dok prelazimo beskrajne planinske visoravni na kojima srećemo samo gorštake sa stokom u svojim katunima. Nakon što smo trećeg dana ujutro napustili poznati planinski centar Žabljak, do kraja ture nije bilo mogućnosti dopuniti gorivo, nabaviti namirnice, naći prenoćište pod krovom ili se negde priključiti na struju. Radi se o predelu gde je čovek prepušten sopstvenom umeću življenja u divljini i upućen na ono što je poneo sa sobom, gde je bilo kakva moguća vrsta pomoći često udaljena i više od 100 km. Predivna i zastrašujuća u isto vreme, Crna Gora ostavlja bez daha, naročito kada shvatite da onaj njen veći deo, koji se nalazi izvan nacionalnih parkova, nije ništa manje fascinantan i lep. (English inside)

Bila je ovo možda i naša najuzbudljivija i najživopisnija Karpatska ekspedicija do sada. Nabijena lepotom i osećajem monumentalnosti predela, adrenalinskim doživljajima i avanturom, osećajem neograničene slobode i plutanja po oblacima. Bilo je i rizičnih situacija, gde prostora za grešku nije bilo. Bilo je trenutaka gde ne možemo ni napred ni nazad, gde smo prepušteni sami sebi za pronalaženje rešenja. Ali nijednog trenutka nije bilo panike. Kroz sve smo prošli hladne glave, uvereni da nas ništa ne može zaustaviti.

Sve se to odigralo na najvećem 4x4 "igralištu" u Karpatima, ogromnoj planinskoj visoravni u centralnom delu južnih Karpata koji formiraju planinski lanci Šurean, Čindrel, Lotruluj, Latoricej i Kapačini, gde vas s jednog na drugi kraj od "civilizacije" deli i po dvestotinak kilometara, a kroz čiju očaravajuću diviljinu se prostire mreža sastavljena od hiljada zemaljanih puteva i puteljaka koji prosto vape da budu otkriveni. U svemu tome, kao kakav nakit, mame vas lednička jezera, zelene livade pune gljiva, guste četinarske šume s tepihom od mahovine i vrletni kanjoni. Sve u svemu, bilo je to bez sumnje najlepše i najintenzivnije potrošenih 8 dana u Karpatima uz 1446 prevezenih kilometara, gde smo ušli u jedan potpuno drugi svet, nedodirljivi za svakodnevicu. Oči nisu mogle da se nagledaju veličanstvenih predela i čuda, a zov za divljinom i daljinama se otkinuo s lanca i omamljujuće nas obuzeo. (English inside)

Od 11. do 13. jula 2014. otišli smo na Staru planinu sa 3 terenca u nameri da natenane obiđemo njene najlepše delove i u njima sve vreme boravimo - kampujući, jer je to jedini način da se taj fascinantan prostor raskošne divljine doživi u potpunosti. Kao što to obično leti biva, odziv članstva kluba je bio slab, ali to nije blia prepreka za nezaboravan vikend, čak naprotiv - mala, kompaktna družina disala je kao jedan i nikome se nigde nije žurilo. Proveli smo dve noći u vrletima na ivici najlepšeg rezervata Stare - prvu u Arbinju, gornjem toku Dojkinačke reke, i drugu pod prevojem Beleđe, između Vražje glave i Bratkove Strane, nadomak same Bugarske granice. Pritom su nas naše planinarske drugarice Dragana i Mira dočekale u subotu u svom domu u Dojkincima vrhunskom gozbom od domaće hrane. Ovoj nezaboravnoj, pravoj hedonističkoj akciji ne treba previše reči - slike dovoljno govore :-)

Fotografije: Dragana Jovanović, Kolet Kelić, Vilijam Ćirković, Aleksandar Veljković

(English inside)

Ovo nije bila tipična Jeep Club tura - vožnje je bilo malo, ali je zato lepote prirode bilo mnogo. Otišli smo do nacionalnog parka Cheile Nerei-Beusnita u Rumuniji, koji je udaljen samo nekih 130 km od Beograda i tu proveli vikend prepunjen utiscima. Vodopade i jezera u nacionalnom parku smo obišli pešice, zatim kampovali pored ribnjaka na reci Beu i na lokalitetu Cantonul Damian na Neri, dok su oni koji preferiraju komforan smeštaj bili smešteni u privatnim pansionima u Sasca Romani i Sasca Montani. Drugog dana smo nastavili time što je jedan deo grupe otišao na rafting Nerom, dok je drugi deo kroz opuštenu šetnju istražio kratak, ali vrlo živopisan kanjon Šušare, a zatim potražio 4x4 prečicu do Vražjeg jezera (Lacul Dracului). Sve u svemu, iako nismo išli na Neru vožnje radi, bio je ovo predivan vikend koji će sigurno ostati svima u lepoj uspomeni.

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Prava zima u nižim krajevima je gotovo u potpunosti izostala, ali u vrletima Dukat planine \"sibirski\" uslovi ne mogu da omanu nikada. Zato je Sretenjski karavan, koji se već tradicionalno krajem februara, kada je zima najljuća, dešava na krajnjem jugoistoku Srbije, najbolja prilika da priuštite sebi jedinstvenu avanturu zimskog 4x4 probijanja visokim grebenima. Da bi to postalo moguće, Mlađa Stojanović iz Srebrne glave ima nesebičnu podršku Vlade Zaharijeva, predsednika oštine Bosilegrad, čiji bageri danonoćno rade probijajući višemetarske smetove pred karavan, kako bi učesnici mogli da prođu. Ove godine, domaćini iz Trgovišta su ne samo pročistili svoju stranu puta, već organizovali i ručak za učesnike karavana, kojih je bilo više nego ikada do sada - čak četrdesetak terenaca najrazličitijeg stepena pripreme i sastava.

For English enter the gallery.

Ovo su fotografije sa našeg dočeka Nove 2013. u Lisinama, odakle smo se svakog dana upuštali u kraće i duže pešačke ili 4x4 avanture. Nije u pitanju zvanična Jeep Club akcija - bilo je to okupljanje prijatelja, bez obzira da li su članovi kluba ili vlasnici Jeep-a. Onima koji su oklevali da prihvate poziv upućen preko klupskog foruma plašeći se upozorenja da za bungalove u Lisinama treba poneti dodatnu električnu grejalicu, ili da će možda ono što ćemo raditi tamo biti previše za njihov Jeep, veoma su pogrešili :-) Doduše, bilo je vitlanja, lopatanja, guranja, montiranja lanaca, ali je sve to bilo krajnje opušteno, uz šampanjac i veliki vatromet u ponoć 31. decembra. Uostalom slike govore više od reči - pogledajte i pridružite nam se na proslavi 2014. na Kučaju!

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Monumentalni masiv Karpata je, pružajući se lučno kroz Rumuniju, 700 km dug, a većina grebena visoka je preko 2000 m. Brojna jezera (prirodna i veštačka), divlje planinske reke, najveće površine pod četinarskim šumama u Evropi, najveća populacija mrkih medveda na svetu, prepuno istorije, zamkova, mitova i legendi... A usred toga Transilvanija kao dom najpoznatijeg svetskog vampira :-). Za posetioca, ljubitelja prirode, Karpati su pre svega jedna bezgranična fascinacija, prilika da se oseti istinska pustolovina i sloboda istraživanja i kretanja kroz nešto što može da se percipira samo kao... čista poezija prirode. U trećoj sezoni obilaženja Karpata najduže smo se zadržali i najdalje stigli, postavili i neke rekorde, ali smo opet uspeli da pređemo samo mali deo tog nesagledivo ogromnog prostranstva. 300 fotografija i šest mapa koje se nalaze u ovoj galeriji jedva da su dovoljne da se nasluti lepota kojom smo bili okruženi tokom dve nedelje.

Gotovo da nema boljeg načina da se da svrha terenskim vozilima nego da se osmisli tura koja će njihovu sposobnost kretanja nepristupačnim terenima staviti u funkciju obilaska nekih lokacija daleko u divljini, za čije bi dostizanje bili potrebni dani mukotrpnog hoda sa brdom opreme i nadljudska kondicija. Upravo jedna od takvih tura je obilazak vidikovaca Lazarevog kanjona, najmonumentalnijeg prirodnog spomenika Srbije. Ova tura je plod naše višegodišnje fascinacije tim prostorom i pasioniranog istraživanja puteljaka i prečica koje nas mogu dovesti na tačke nedostupne turistima, a koje odlikuje vanvremenska lepota. Ovom turom smo učesnicima za dva dana praktično otkrili najdragocenije tajne ovog četvorokrakog, desetak kilometara dugog i 500 m dubokog kanjona. Ponor Demižloka, vidikovac na Strnjaku, Veliki vidikovac, Kovej, greben Malinika, vidikovac nad Demižlokom... Fotografije koje su pred nama samo su mali deo doživljaja koji su učesnici poneli sa sobom sa ove dvodnevne ofroud avanture.

Zahvaljujemo Jeleni Popović na ustupljenim fotografijama kojima je ova galerija obogaćena.

Želja nam je bila da ovom opuštenom, četvorodnevnom turom ljude što bolje upoznamo sa čarobnim prostorom Homoljskih planina i rečnih dolina, i ako je suditi po reakcijama učesnika, u nameri smo potpuno uspeli. Sa oko 330 km ofroud vožnje uspeli smo da pokrijemo sve četiri strane Homolja, polazeći svaki dan iz naše "baze" u bajkovitom vlaškom selu Debeli Lug. Neki su i kampovali na Todorovoj reci, a neki su na njoj samo učili ispirački zanat od ispirača Perice, legende ovog kraja. Obišli smo Valja Fundatu, Kununu, Stol, Zdravču, Jagnilo, Tisnicu, Rajkovu pećinu, Staricu, Železnik, Ceremošnju, Štubej, Trest... Jednom rečju prošli smo ono najbolje od Homolja i osetili njegov duh i ritam. Ali, daleko od toga da smo videli sve, jer je Homolje prostor koji nas svojom magičnom privlačnošću tera da mu se uvek iznova vraćamo, svaki put nas nagrađujući ponekom novom tajnom...

Snežni smetovi od po nekoliko metara ove godine su onemogućili održavanje Sretenjskog karavana na trasi gde se on uobičajeno odigrava - preko Dukat planine, od Trgovišta do Bosilegrada. Umesto toga, uz veliko požrtvovanje i trud domaćina, predsednika opštine Bosilegrad, Vlade Zaharijeva, učesnici karavana su, dve nedelje kasnije nego što je bilo prvobitno planirano, prošli istočnim obroncima Vardenika i Milevske planine. Ali, i to se izrodilo u vrlo zanimljivo iskustvo upoznavanja živopisnih predela na nešto manjim visinama oko Bosilegrada uz Bugarsku granicu, što ni tmurno vreme nije pokvarilo...

Vlada i Krste su odlučili da nam se oduže za nezaboravno druženje u Rumuniji dva meseca ranije tako što su nas pozvali u goste na svoje terene u Makedoniju. Pet septembarskih dana u Makedoniji bilo je do te mere napakovano sadržajima i utiscima, da bi se moglo rastegnuti na barem duplo. Izašli smo na čak tri vrha preko 2500 m (Solunsku Glavu 2540 m, Pelister 2601 m, Kajmakčalan 2521 m), videli i kupali se u prelepom Ohridskom jezeru, obišli grad Ohrid i manastir Sveti Naum, Salakova jezera, uživali u egzotičnim prizorima Pelagonije dok smo vozili kroz polja duvana, posetili manastir Zrze sa čijih se zidina vidi pola Pelagonije, pećinu u kojoj se nalazio dvorac sestre Kraljevića Marka, spavali u planinarskom domu pored Golemog ezera na 2200 m visine dok pod nama svetlucaju svetla Bitolja, i još puno, puno toga. Definitivno tura za pamćenje, i za ponavljanje!

Prošle godine, kada smo tek načeli Karpate, obećali smo sebi da ćemo se ove godine vratiti da nastavimo istraživanje ove monumentalne divljine. Iako smo istraživali neke potpuno nove puteve, iako smo se dobro potkovali GPS kartografijom da bismo bolje planirali svoje kretanje po potpuno nepoznatom terenu, opet nam je nedelju dana bilo jedva dovoljno da opet zagrebemo po nekom drugom ćošku ove 4x4 bajke. Ovoga puta smo se uspešno probili kroz nacionalni park Cheile-Nerei, pokušali da pređemo Semenic, prošli grebenom Munci Pojana Ruskaj čitavom dužinom do Hunedoare, zavukli se u šume jugoistočno od Sibišela i skoro uspeli grebenski da se dokopamo Šureana. Ovo je foto galerija koja, bolje od reči, dočarava magiju prostora kojim smo se probijali od 15. do 22. jula.

Istočna Srbija je područje sa najviše prerasti - prirodnih kamenih mostova, na svetu. One su tajnovite, skrivene od pogleda, teško dostupne i daleko od puteva, a u vlaškoj mitologiji i ritualima imaju posebno mesto. Malo ljudi može da ih nabroji, a još manje njih zna tačno gde se nalaze. Zato smo odlučili da ovu, jednu od najbolje čuvanih tajni istočne Srbije, podelimo sa vama. U ovoj galeriji možete da vidite šta smo obišli, videli i doživeli tokom vikenda 1-3. jula 2011. godine. Sem prerasti, obišli smo i Rajkovu pećinu, imali obuku u ispiranju zlata na zlatonosnim rekama Homolja i u jednoj opuštenoj vožnji kroz bezgranično zelenilo upoznali neke od lepših šumskih puteva Homolja.

During seven memorable days, from April 16th to 23rd 2011, 15 members of Jeep Club Belgium in 7 Wrangler Rubicons explored the most exciting off-road trails of western Serbia - the wild parts of Tara and Zlatibor mountains. Rocks, snow and wet meadows, deep forest mud, picturesque ridges, all dynamically passed in front of our visitor\'s eyes within each day. Up and down, across numerous streams and rivers, with a boat ride through Drina canyon, getting to know not only the picturesque scenery, but also the people and the tradition of this country - it was a mixture that most of the participants described as \"fantastic\", or \"never experienced before in 20 years of off-roading\". Relive through more than 200 selected images this exciting week on some of the best Jeep trails that Europe has to offer...

Sretenjski karavan svojevremeno je postavio standarde za organizaciju zimskih 4x4 karavana po visokim planinama Srbije. Pogledajte kako je to, po savršenom zimskom vremenu, izgledalo u februaru 2011. godine u vrletima Dukat planine...