Well, from our last blog who has guessed the reason for our visit to Sarajevo?

Was it to visit the place in Sarajevo where Jane Torvil and Christopher Dean won their historic Olympic gold medal in ice dancing to the music of Bolero in 1984? Was it to check out an ancient Roman road that ran through this area? Was it to examine the cultural diversity of the region? Or was it to find out more about the longest seige of a capital city in the history of modern warfare during the Bosnian War? Although finding the answers to all of these questions would have made for an interesting visit, none of them was the reason we were in Sarajevo.

Read on and all will be revealed.

Our ride today was only about 130km and the scenery was spectacular. We travelled between a light torquoise coloured river and heavily wooded mountains for most of the way. Small towns were scattered along the way and arched railway bridges connected the valleys. Tunnels were frequent but some were short, unlit with rough and bumpy tarmac and quite scarey to ride through. When we arrived in Sarajevo we had to travel 6km from one side of the town to the other to reach our hotel.

Being a former high school history teacher Greg always has a special place or two of historical significance that he wants to visit on our trips to Europe. Today it was to check out one of the most significant events in modern times, an event that changed the world forever and cost almost 20 million lives.

On 28th June 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand heir to the throne of Austria was assassinated, along with his wife Sophie while on a visit to Sarajevo. This was the event that sparked World War 1.

We were in Sarajevo to visit the location of where this historical event took place. We walked from our hotel accommodation about 500m from the Latin Bridge and the street adjacent to where the Archduke and his wife were shot by Gavrilo Princip, a 19 year old dissident Bosnian Serb. We visited the Museum on the corner of the assassination site, the Latin Bridge and the Town Hall where the Archduke had been received prior to the assassination.

When in Vienna in 2015 we visited the Military Museum where we saw on display the limosine the Archduke was travelling in, his blood-stained uniform, Sophie's blood stained dress and the pistol used by Princep for the assassination.

Circle complete, job done.

We found Sarajevo to be a real melting pot of religious and ethnic diversity and is one of a few European cities which has a Mosque, Catholic church, Orthodox church and synagogue in the same neighbourhood. We wandered by each of the religious sites and up and down the narrow alleys of shops - or tourist traps as Greg calls them. Once again we were surprised by the Turkish influence in the market stalls.

We finally stopped for our afternoon beer only to discover that the cafe we had chosen did not serve beer - it was Muslim operated, so we had to go next door. Lucky we did as we settled in for a lovely lamb dinner - and another beer before returning to our hotel to plan the next stop on our holiday.