River Rafters Test Yugoslav Method

Below, glinting in the sunlight, flowed the blue-green Tara River where, if all went well, we would soon be rafting. This is what we had come to Yugoslavia for.

Ivo stopped the bus and let us out at the edge of the mountain road in what seemed to be dense forest, but Stevan, our guide, knew a footpath through the underbrush and led us to an open bluff above the river.

Although most of our party of 22 friends had experienced river rafting in the United States, we eagerly looked forward to a float down this remote wild river, expecting both adventure and to learn something of a country new to us.

As we stood on the bluff, a log the diameter of a telephone pole hurtled down the muddy slope to the water. Zahler, a sturdy woodsman we would soon know well, picked out another log and sent it splashing after the first. In the river Milo, Zahler’s partner, was rapidly fastening the logs together with huge nails and iron hasps.

Old Methods Obsolete

For generations woodsmen have cut trees in these forests in the Durmitor Mountains of Montenegro, made rafts of the logs and floated them down the Tara to be sold. Now good roads and modern lumber trucks make the old methods obsolete, but a few woodsmen like Zahler and Milo still make the rafts in the old way.

As part of a government program to encourage tourism they take groups of passengers down through the rapids to Foca, a city where the rafts are broken up and the timber marketed.

From our put-in site in Montenegro to Foca in Bosnia-Herzegovina is about 70 miles as the crow flies. On the river the trip takes 3 1/2 days. We added two layover days in camp.

From the bluff we watched a raft take shape. Milo split branches into boards from which he fashioned a rudder and two long sweeps. At the upstream end of the 10 logs he had fastened together he attached the rudder and one sweep, the other sweep at the opposite end.

Zahler returned to the river and together the men built a superstructure: four stanchions, each about three feet high, set in a square on the raft with a railing of rough boards extending between them.

The square was big enough to enclose half of our gear; the structure would be bench, handhold, cabin and locker for our journey.

The New Bridge

When the men began building our second raft, Stevan shepherded us back to the bus. He wanted to show us the new Burdevica Bridge which, except for a dilapidated footbridge in the woods, is the only bridge over the Tara.

It was worth seeing. Stretching across one of the world’s deepest gorges (3,400 feet from river to rim), this 1,200-foot span is a good example of modern engineering.

On the bridge we witnessed a little scene that came to epitomize Yugoslavia for me. A young woman approached from the village of Burdevica on foot, driving a diminutive horse burdened with bulging sacks. She wore a black head scarf and a long black dress and carried a thin switch to guide her horse.

Obviously confused by our presence, she dropped the switch as she passed us, but ignored it and held her head high as she walked on, a proud country woman and her animal straight out of centuries past. As she reached the other end of the bridge a diesel truck roared by.

This was a microcosm of the Yugoslavia we experienced thereafter: a peculiar mixture of old ways proudly continued and a vigorous new technology, a land of contradictions.

22 Americans

By mid-morning next day our two rafts were loaded and we set off down river: We were 22 Americans perched on the railings or standing; Stevan, our guide; Andric, our cook, and four boatmen. Our gear, sketchily covered with plastic sheets, was lashed down in the square frames along with two inflatable paddle boats; provisions (unwrapped bread, cheese, a box of pears) were piled on top.

Zahler, head boatman, and Milo, his second, had as helpers their teen-age sons, both anxious to show their fathers that they could do men’s work.

We swept under the Burdevica Bridge and into white water swirling over and around a fall of boulders that from the parapet the day before had looked impassable. Here Zahler and Milo showed us their mettle. With shouting and groaning and wrenching pulls on the sweeps, we skimmed through the rapids without bumping a log.

After that it seemed only appropriate for Zahler to break out the slivovitz. This plum brandy with its clean, stinging taste was, we discovered, a staple of Tara River travel. Locally made and bottled in whatever containers were handy (old 7-Up bottles were favorites), slivovitz would be a morning pickup and noon tipple on the rafts, an evening cocktail and cordial in camp.

Close Look

Moving downstream, we had a close look at the great gorge we had seen from the bridge. The river was emerald green, deep and flowing swiftly but so clear that we could see the rocks that dappled the sandy bottom.

Larches grew to the water’s edge. Waterfalls disappeared into the mountainside above. When we passed one the air was deliciously cool for a few minutes, although the August sun on our backs was burning.

We had the river and its banks to ourselves: no other travelers, no people or homes visible in the mountains. The blessed quiet of wilderness continued unbroken except by the cries of birds in the pine trees.

Our campsite that night was a meadow above the river. I could hardly have imagined a more peaceful scene--rich green grass bordered by green brush where goats were browsing quietly. Later I learned that bears had killed two dozen sheep in the meadow only a year ago.

Next day, a layover, we had time for a hike. We followed Stevan up a steep trail to a mountain village, a cluster of stone houses and a church, far removed from any motor road or airfield.

We talked, through Stevan, with the mother, grandmother and two children of one of the families. Friendly and bright, they nevertheless were like figures out of the past, dressed in clothes of the women’s weaving and receiving us in a room where the spinning wheel in the corner was, as they showed us, an object of accustomed use.

The men were away working the farms; families here produce almost all their own food.

Serious Privations

I would have felt more of a time warp in all this if it had not been for the TV set opposite the spinning wheel and the electric light over the stove. Yet there were still serious privations. One was the lack of any health services; the nearest doctor was a three-hour walk.

Around our campfire that night the slivovitz again flowed, there was singing and picture taking and the extending of invitations to visit us in California. In the flickering light, the velvety darkness behind them, the Yugoslavs looked strong and handsome; their voices were deep and sweet with the emotion of old songs and they radiated a sense of healthy self-confidence.

In the morning we soon got into rapids that demanded all our attention and all the boatmen’s skill. By the time white water was behind us, everyone was soaked from feet to knees, and Don, the professor in our midst, was dripping wet from having taken an involuntary swim in the river when the rubber boat he was paddling beside the raft had flipped.

But no matter. This was part of river travel, and we were now in one of the most beautiful stretches of the Tara. Ferns and wild rhubarb grew profusely along the banks and in little grottoes where elves almost certainly dwelt. Wherever the sun reached were miniature yellow flowers, bluebells and a species of Queen Anne’s lace.

Regional Fairy Tales

Here toads must be princes in disguise and fairy tales many and true. Stevan said yes, there were fairy tales from this region, but none had been translated into English.

At noon we saw other travelers for the first time. A party of Italians on a raft passed us while, with our rafts tied up, we ate lunch. A shepherd wandered down to our shady mooring and Andric bought a sheep for the next day’s dinner.

In a clearing we met an aged shepherd with his flock. Dressed for any weather--a coat over his sweater and white shirt, woolen pants, two pairs of socks--he sat outside a cave smoking his pipe and placidly observing us. It must have surprised him to see a troop of Americans marching through his remote pasture, but for a man of 92, it was nothing to get excited about.

We had a good rafting run but late in the afternoon we left the high mountains and our beautiful Tara. Joined by the Piva, the Tara formed a major river, the Drina, and thereafter we were in murky water. A fairly heavy rain began and continued while we put up the tents at our campsite, an apple and plum orchard belonging to Zahler’s father.

Dignified Old Man

He was a dignified old man, also a shepherd, who came to greet us and, holding an open umbrella over his head, shook hands formally with each of us. He had been with the Partisans in World War II and had lost an eye, but his remaining eye, bright blue, looked at us keenly.

A country woman brought us freshly baked bread for breakfast. She was colorful in a pink blouse and purple demije , the billowing Turkish trousers traditional for women in the region of Foca where Turkish influence, once dominant, is still strong.

As we neared Foca the river darkened, poisoned by waste from the mills and factories whose chimneys’ smoke drifted above us.

Yet when we arrived, it was too soon. I was not ready for buzzing motorbikes and the blare of American rock.

But after a hot bath and good night’s sleep in a modern hotel, tolerance of civilization set in, and I could face the drive by bus back to Dubrovnik where most of our party would board a plane to return to the States.

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The best source of information about 1986 Tara River trips is Unis Turist-Sarajevo, the Yugoslav agency that operates these tours. Information and brochures are available from its American office at 875 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1860, Chicago, Ill. 60611, phone (800) 541-0625.

In 1985 the cost of a 15-day Yugoslav tour offered by ARTA including six days on the river was $1,550 per person exclusive of air fare. Through Unis a group tour that includes four days on the rafts and 10 days touring lower Yugoslavia can be arranged for $1,000 per person exclusive of air fare. Rates may vary, depending on the size of the group.

All camping gear for the river trip such as tents and sleeping bags are furnished in Yugoslavia as part of the price, and rafting can be done from early June until late September.