We patterned our trip with Topdeck Travel's Balkan Itinerary but removed some places we did not want to see, and added a few more stops we are interested in. We are also inspired by Souvenir Chronicles about driving around the Balkans by car and they were very nice to answer our initial questions about driving a rental car around this area. 

When I started searching about this trip like - how the roads are, especially driving thru Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, appropriate visas, border crossings and checkpoints or other important parts of the road trip we wanted to know, there's only a few blogs that discusses it in detail how is it really like driving this region. Below is our Balkan road trip map, I deleted some of the stops we did, but only pinned the major cities of the countries we've had the pleasure of driving. We did the Balkans for at least 18 days and added Budapest and Krakow at the beginning and end of the trip (total of 25 days). 

Our Balkan Itinerary

Someday I will understand Auschwitz. This was a brave statement but innocently absurd. No one will ever understand Auschwitz. What I might have set down with more accuracy would have been: Someday I will write about Sophie's life and death, and thereby help demonstrate how absolute evil is never extinguished from the world. Auschwitz itself remains inexplicable. The most profound statement yet made about Auschwitz was not a statement at all, but a response. The query: "At Auschwitz, tell me, where was God?" And the answer: "Where was man?” 
- WIlliam Styron | Sophie's Choice

Auschwitz Birkenau in Oswiecim, Poland

Just in time for the 70th year anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp, I want to finally post and share our moving and emotional visit of Auschwitz last September 2014. We have heard stories about the Nazi concentration camps from survivors, studied it in school, watched documentaries and read books regarding this atrocity that happened in human history. Sometimes, there are no words or explanation how you feel about certain places. "Let us remember that we are on the site of the most gigantic cemetery in the world, a cemetery where there are no graves, no stones, but where the ashes of more than one million people lie." (Waldemar Dabrowski) 

We extended our Balkan road trip to Poland mainly because we wanted to experience and see this place first hand. We know its a horrible place to see but we are very interested in World War II and the Holocaust. It was a gloomy day when we visited, even the weather seems to know and feel what has yet to come, a very emotional journey of reliving the past. Despite watching documentaries and prior knowledge of what to expect here, nothing could really prepare anyone on this poignant experience - of actually seeing this place and witnessing where it actually happened.

We do not want to expound in full detail why this happened, what actually happened here and who are the victims or the perpetrators, because it would take us more than this blog post to explain something this sensitive and this big. That being said, we would like to share one most notable and overwhelming experience we had here. As soon as we stepped in, and walked inside the crematorium, it is such a powerful and moving experience - you can feel the melancholic atmosphere as soon as you enter, and you can't help but imagine the cruelty and monstrosity of what happened. We silently prayed for the souls, while we were inside (out of outmost respect of the victims, we do not have pictures of the gas chamber or the crematorium).

The cattle car that brought prisoners to Birkenau.

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We are very honored to be featured on Matador Network's Instagram account. If you are not familiar with Matador Network, they are the largest online travel magazine. The photos they feature are always high quality images that exhibit unique composition and/or content. When it comes to travel photography, Matador Network has a great eye for finding one of a kind images. 

We always wanted them to notice us, but never expected it would happen. As amateurs, we can't stress enough how much of an honor this is, as most of the their content, is provided by professional travel photographers. 

Here is the photo that was featured, taken on top of Swiss Alps. Feels like your in heaven huh?!