Pliva -Kulen Vakuf

Sun 15/9/24

Since we slept early yesterday due to tiredness from the flight journey, we woke up at 3.30am. Subuh (dawn) prayer would only start at 4.50am and the hotel breakfast would only start at 7am. I peered out the window to the view of Travnik fort, and checked the temperature, it was cold at 7C. As we couldn't sleep anymore, we just took our bath and packed our bags as we would be travelling to the next stop today to Kulen Vakuf. 

At 7am we went downstairs to have our buffet breakfast with quite a variety of spread and all the meals are halal (we checked with the waiter). It was still raining this morning, and heavier than yesterday. 

breakfast at Travnik

I decided to stop by the Pliva watermill (Mlinčići) today instead of tomorrow as we had plenty of time today. After breakfast and checking out, we headed to Mlinčići, located 74km away and drove for about 1 hour and 20 mins, enjoying the scenic views along the way. 

The watermill is free of charge, we only paid for parking at 1 BAM per hour. It was still raining when we arrived, but we decided to proceed anyway. The watermills are no longer in use, and the house covering the watermills are locked, so we could only see them from the outside. It is located next to Pliva lake where the water from the lake flows through the watermills. A short walk from the watermills is Pliva lake where you could also rent a boat to tour the lake. Since it was raining, there was no one on the lake and not many other tourists at the watermill. In the summer, you could also swim at the lake at a designated area.

Plica watermill

Pliva watermill

Pliva waterfall

Pliva lake

From Pliva lake, we crossed the border of Republika Sprska (this is still under Bosnia and Herzegovina, or BiH in short, no need for immigration stop) where we could see the flag (which is different from BiH flag). We drove for about 2 hours and 15 mins covering about 150km towards the village of Kulen Vakuf in Una National Park, near the border to Croatia.

We reached our accommodation Unaqua apartments at around 2.30pm (EUR 37 or RM 172 per night) booked through Booking.com which we paid by cash. We were greeted by the house owner's dog Janna. Although our house is located inside the Una national park, there is no entrance fee to enter Kulen Vakuf. It was still cloudy and raining when we arrived. 

view of Una river from our home in Kulen Vakuf

After refreshing a bit, we walked to the nearby restaurant Restoran DžisriKebir to have lunch. We ordered trout fish and cevapi with chai and coffee which cost BAM 29.50. The trout fish was fresh and juicy and served with spinach and fries.  It didn't really look enticing, but it tasted good. Or maybe we were hungry too.

trout fish

After having a hearty lunch, we walked to the bridge across the Una river to take some pictures, then stopped by a local groceries store to buy water and then walked back to our home to take some pictures there too. Since it was still raining, we decided to try to fly the drone tomorrow morning instead with the hope that the rain would have stopped.

Kulen vakuf bridge

We enjoyed walking by the river which is accessible from our house and spent some time there just enjoying nature until sunset at 7pm, but of course, there was no sun visible as it was cloudy. We then retired for the day and made our way back to our room.

Una river at our Kulen Vakuf home

Una river, Kulen Vakuf bridge and Ostrovica old town up the hill

another view of Una river