Spending 48 hours in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, is definitely a more unusual city to visit. I’ve found that barely anyone has understood why I wanted to visit Sarajevo. ‘There’s a war there!’ (Not since 1995, a whole 30 years ago-pretty sure we’re good to visit now!) I’ve also had ‘where is Bosnia’ and ‘well there won’t be anything to do there’. Bosnia and Herzegovina is part of the Balkan countries, next to Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro. There’s also a lot to do here, so read this post to find out all about spending 48 hours in Sarajevo.

We visited Sarajevo because I want to visit every country in the world, so I’m slowly working my way through Europe as it’s the easiest continent for me, and I’d not yet visited Bosnia Herzegovina. We’ve done most of the other Balkan countries (just the capital cities, so far) and we were going to add our last one, Serbia, on to the end of this trip. So far we’ve really liked each Balkan country, so Bosnia felt like a safe bet for us. I’d heard good things about Sarajevo too so spending 48 hours in Sarajevo, exploring the city, was an attractive prospect for me.

Originally part of Yugoslavia, Bosnia Herzegovina became a country in it’s own right in 1992. This triggered the Bosnian War, 1992-1995, and obviously this had a massive impact on the country. I’m not a historian and I can’t do everything that happened justice by trying to tell it in a paragraph in a blog post, but I’d highly recommend you research before visiting the city, as well as visiting some of the museums to find out more. We can only stop these things happening in the future by learning from the past.

On a day trip from the city (which I’ve not covered in this post, as it fell outside of our time spending 48 hours in Sarajevo) we were told that the country can be called Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bosnia Herzegovina or just Bosnia, so I’ve used these interchangeably throughout this post.

What do I need to know if I’m visiting Sarajevo?

Most places will accept card, but you will need cash for the trams (2.20 mark per ticket) and some smaller shops and restaurants. It’s always worth carrying cash with you, we withdrew some at the airport and just used that whenever we needed cash, around £100 worth (220 marks) was enough for our three days. I could have actually done it on a bit less as spent some cash on the second day on entry fees where they took card, as I knew I’d need to spend the cash before flying out of the country again. There was a fee for withdrawing cash at the airport, about £6.50, but I don’t know if atms in the city charge fees too as we didn’t try. I ended up not keeping enough cash and couldn’t pay for a couple of things at the end of the trip, so I’d recommend not using your cash, unless necessary, until the last day, even the last few hours, in the city. We mananged, I’d just do it differently next time.

I always use my Monzo card for fee free transactions, and fee free cash withdrawals, abroad. The atm may charge a fee but Monzo doesn’t, and it saves me money. If you’d like a Monzo account (I love mine so much I use it as my main bank account now) using my link and making a transaction within 30 days gets us both a mystery reward of £10, £20 or £50.

Taxis do exist in Sarajevo and there are apps, but no one wanted to take our job on either of the ones we tried, so I can’t in good conscience recommend them. This may be due to us being halfway down a mountain in the rain, but we were at a restaurant with a car park, not in the middle of the forest.

Our airport taxi didn’t have a meter, and we paid 35 mark for the ten minute drive to our apartment. This was higher than we should have been charged, we were expecting 20 mark, so felt a bit ripped off. Unfortunately though, our options were get in a taxi or walk 40 minutes in the day, so we went for the taxi. Leaving Sarajevo, we had to check out at 10 and our flight was 3pm, so we walked (slowly) planning to stop for a coffee on the way. Unfortunately, every cafe we passed didn’t take card and I had no cash left, so we had to get to the airport before we could grab refreshments. We did stop for a rest on benches regularly though and the walk wasn’t too bad.

Everyone spoke enough English for us to manage and be understood. It’s a very British tourist thing to expect people to speak our language (and I don’t, to be honest!) but I do always really appreciate it.

Sarajevo has A LOT of cats, and most of them were friendly. They wouldn’t approach you unless you made it clear you wanted to be friends, but as soon as we called them, they’d be over. As cat lovers, we were big fans of this. I did get bopped and slightly scratched by one ‘friend’ who didn’t actually want to be my friend, but that’s the risk you take with cats. (I took a lot of really cute cat photos, so the best are in this post. Sarajevo’s lovely cats deserve the spotlight!)

Sarajevo’s roads have controlled crossings, and when the man turns green you can cross. Cars don’t just stop, though, so you’ll need to set off walking. There are yellow buttons to press at the side of the crossing-but these don’t actually work, our walking tour guide said they were put in because the EU said they needed to be-don’t bother with those.

Sarajevo’s yellow trams are regular and reliable, although busy. You pay 2.20 marks to the driver for a ticket, and it’s super easy. A few times the tram was really packed so we just waited a few minutes for the next one and it was more manageable, you shouldn’t ever wait too long for one.

How much will I spend each day visiting Sarajevo?

Across three full days in the city (including a day trip), we spent;

£23.51 on transport, including an expensive airport taxi. If you’re able to skip the taxi, the trams are super cheap. £104.10 on eating out, desserts and coffees. We didn’t go mad, but we didn’t scrimp on things either. £71.94 on activities, including on an optional extra on a day trip. £36.03 on souvenirs (a tray, a small bowl, a bracelet, a snowglobe, 4 packets of turkish tea, and a pack of melatonin. The melatonin is technically medical rather than souvenir to be fair. £17.68 in the supermarket, this came out of our at home food budget. £7.16 on atm fees for the one withdrawal we needed.

We spent a total of £260.42. If I’d been on a solo trip, I would have eaten snacky food at my accommodation more but probably bought more souvenirs, so £150 as a budget for a single person not wanting to scrimp on anything would be more than enough in my opinion.

How expensive is travel and accommodation when spending 48 hours in Sarajevo?

We spent £87 on four nights in an air b n b, a 30 minute tram out of the city, and £28 each on our flights to Sarajevo. We didn’t fly home, we flew on to Serbia, but return UK flights would have been another £25-£35. Sarajevo worked out very cheap to visit.

What should I see when spending 48 hours in Sarajevo?

If you’re spending 48 hours in Sarajevo, you’ll want to stick to the city, rather than heading too far out. We started our first day with a tour with coffee and street food included, although found it disappointing-the first half was good (we tried some Balkava and Burek, and the guide was really attentive) but the second half went downhill, as he had to go and pick up some other guests who were at the wrong starting location. During this time, he said we could go for coffee on the company. He didn’t suggest where we should go, leaving it to a lady on the tour to suggest somewhere she liked, and most people didn’t order a coffee, expecting coffee with the guide as part of the tour. There was no coffee with the guide later, so I’m not sure they should really call it a coffee tour, and that’s why I’m not linking it here.

Sarajevo is pretty compact, at least in terms of the main touristy things to see, so honestly I’d save your money here and explore yourself, rather than paying for a walking tour in the city-unless you’re a solo traveller in need of some company for a few hours (I’ve been there!) in which case Get Your Guide (AD-aff link) has quite a few options for tours in Sarajevo.

Make sure to see the Eternal Flame, a memorial to the victims of the Second World War, which is small but striking. It was lit in 1946, a year after Sarajevo was liberated, and has burned most of that time-after being extinguished between 1992-1995, during the Bosnian War. It’s a popular meeting point for Sarajevo locals too.

The Sacred Heart Cathedral takes inspiration from Paris’ Notre Dame and it’s a very striking building not to be missed. From there, head to Gazi Husrev-Beg Mosque, you can view the outside and if you’d like to go inside you can do so between 9am and 11am, for 3 marks (around £1.22). Check their website for the most up to date information. The Clock Tower is near the mosque, and it’s really unusual because it shows midnight at sunset each day, as it’s believed that’s when a new day begins.

Sebilj is an Ottoman style wooden fountain in the central square, and if you drink from it legend says you will definitely return to Sarajevo. I had a drink, I’d happily visit the city again. From the central square, take the opportunity to wander the shops-these remind me so much of Morocco’s Souks, I think it’s the low roofs and such a variety of things for sale. Don’t miss the meeting of cultures on the floor, which shows where Bosnia used to be divided between East and West.

Kazandžiluk is Sarajevo’s metalwork street and it’s well worth a look in the shops on the street. We saw one of the shopkeepers making a copper plate and his skill was amazing. Just look at these photos of the goods for sale! I wanted to buy a Bosnian tea set but had to resist, simply because I couldn’t have fit one into my luggage.

Finish by seeing the Latin Bridge, including the place where Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, leading to the start of the first world war.

All of these Sarajevo must sees are close to each other, and walking for a couple of hours will let you see them all, depending on how many cats you stop to befriend of course! Make sure to make time for Bosnian coffee too.

Once you’ve wandered the city, bought yourself a few things from the shops and had some Bosnian coffee, take the cable car up Trebevic mountain. This came highly recommended and I’ll add my recommendation for it to the pile, it’s pretty cheap (15km for a one way trip, 20km for return, around £6.67/£8.90) and the views are amazing. The trip takes less than ten minutes and once at the top there’s a cafe where you can enjoy a cuppa with the view. You can also walk to see the 1984 Olympic Bobsled track, which you can walk along, and you’ll pass the Olympic rings on the way. We walked quite a lot of it, realised we’d gone quite a bit down the hill, and decided to walk back down the mountain instead of going back up to the cable car. It was a manageable walk even with my fibromyalgia, but our calves were very sore for the next few days!

I’d recommend ending your first day in Sarajevo here, but if you’ve taken the cable car back down the mountain or if you have energy left, you may want to visit one of Sarajevo’s museums-we’d planned to see their new Cat Museum, but ran out of time-it looks like a cute thing to do Sarajevo.

Our second day started with a lie in for me and some work for J. If this had just been a two night trip for us we would have gone out earlier, but as part of a multi city trip, rest is important for me and work is necessary for him. We decided to spend most of the day learning about some of it’s history so we visited the War Child Museum, spending just over an hour there, and then visited a coffee shop I’d seen recommended, Ministry of Ćejf, for some head clearing caffeine. I had a Bosnian coffee which I got quite hooked on during this trip, J had his usual flat white, and we split a Cejf cake between us-it was soaked in honey and it was as delicious as it sounds. I’d read that the coffee shop was full of cats which didn’t turn out to be the case, but the street it was on was, so we were happy.

More history was next for us, with the Museum Of Crimes Against Humanity And Genocide. We were here about an hour and a half but could easily have spent another hour, as there was so much to see. I personally found the museum tough-it’s obviously awful to read and hear about what people went through, but it’s so important to do this anyway. We can only stop similar atrocities happening in the future, by learning from those that happened in the past. If you are able to cope with reading every single thing in this museum, you really should.

After the two history museums, we felt understandably sad, so we headed to a tea house, Teahouse Džirlo, for a fancy tea-they have so many. The tea house is on the same street as Ministry of Cejf so we saw those lovely street cats again, but unfortunately I was running really low on cash and the teahouse didn’t take card, so we didn’t get to try their teas. Pro tip-always carry more cash than you think you’ll need, and then just spend it as you’re leaving the country!

Our second (and last) day in the city ended with a walk up to the Yellow Fortress, which was a difficult hill with my Fibromyalgia, but absolutely worth it for the views. We were there for the sunset and even saw a proposal (she said yes!) don’t miss seeing the sun go down from the top of the fortress when you’re spending 48 hours in Sarajevo.

Where should I go after visiting Sarajevo?

Bosnia is surrounded by Serbia, Croatia, and Montenegro. After leaving Sarajevo you could explore more of Bosnia and spend a couple of days in Mostar, Banja Luka, Zenica or Tuzla, or you could look at moving on to another country.

If you’re in Banja Luka, you can get a bus for under £30 to Zagreb, Croatia. This takes just under 3 hours, and Zagreb is a wonderful city I’d highly recommend. From Sarajevo you can get a 6 and a half hour bus to Podgorica, and spending time in Podgorica is a must-I loved the city. Finally, if you want to go to Serbia, there is a bus from Sarajevo to Belgrade but there’s also a flight which takes just 30 minutes, so I’d recommend that. We flew, and other than the delay longer than the actual flight (the perils of air travel!) we had no problems.

Sarajevo does work well for a two or three night trip on it’s own, but if you’re like us and flying from a southern airport despite living in the north, it totally makes sense to add Belgrade on-Luton has flights to and from both Sarajevo and Belgrade, so for us this was a no brainer. Four hours of driving to Luton for a 4 night trip felt a lot, but for an 8 night, two country trip it was perfectly reasonable, and worth it to enjoy spending 48 hours in Sarajevo.

If this post has inspired you and you’ll be spending 48 hours in Sarajevo (or more) let me know in the comments. I’d love to hear about your trip.