Last May I received an email message that included a photo of my great-grandparents, Johann & Margaretha Pape, as well as a photo of their grave in Jermenovic, a small village in Serbia.  I was so surprised and pleased to see this as I didn't know anything about them or that part of my heritage.  

The photo came from my cousin Teresa via my sister Jean.  Afterwards there were messages sent back and forth with them and other cousins saying how wonderful it would be to travel to Serbia and see the village where our ancestors were born and to visit their grave.   I finally said that we should just quit saying it would be great and just do it!  So, after much discussion and planning we are here in Belgrade, Serbia!  Our group includes Jean, from Whitehorse, Teresa, from Delta, Bonnie our cousin, from White Rock, Alison, Teresa’s sister from the Iowa, Vivian another cousin from Quesnel and me!

We arrived yesterday late afternoon, checked into our hotel, Villa Forever, and walked about 200 meters down the street to a restaurant for dinner.  The cuisine here in Serbia is very much meat based with generous portions.   Having said that the salads have been very good and I had delicious grilled vegetables today for lunch.

This morning we walked to the main shopping area just around the corner from the hotel to find a bank and then on to Republic Square to take part in a free two and half hour walking tour.  Our guide was excellent.  She was so knowledgeable and filled our brains with so many facts about the history of Belgrade as well as Serbia.  It is all very complicated history because of the many different countries that have occupied Belgrade.  We walked up to Kalemegdan Fortress and saw parts of the walls built by the Romans, Turks and Austrians.  Belgrade is on the convergence of the Danube and the Sava rivers and from the fortress walls the view of the two rivers is quite a lovely sight.

Street laundry

Lots of graffiti 

A fountain

Streetcar

Kalemegdan Fortress

Kalemegdan Fortress

Door panel

Water fountain in the centre

After our walking tour we enjoyed a delicious lunch in the courtyard of the oldest cafe in Belgrade.  It is called Tavern Question Mark (?). It's across the street from an important Orthodox Cathedral, it had a number of different names that were deemed inappropriate by the church authorities so the owner finally just put a question mark on the sign as a protest but it has remained ever since.

We had to stop and have an afternoon coffee, tea, cake, gelato break after wandering the pedestrian streets and window shopping.  There are so many bakeries, shoe stores, book stores and dress shops here that there’s always something to be drooling after!

Our journey will take us from Belgrade to Novi Sad on Saturday where we will meet up with Erwin Pape and his sister Edita.  Erwin is our distant cousin, he sent Teresa the photos of our great grandparents.  They are his great great grandparents and through his ancestry searches he connected to Teresa who was doing her own research.  

Erwin will drive from Berlin to meet us and Edita will come from Zagreb.  We will have dinner together on Sunday, October 2.  The next day they will drive us around the areas in Serbia where our great grandparents were born and to the village where they are buried.  If there is time we will also cross the border into Romania to the place where our ancestor Anton Pape entered Serbia in the mid 1700’s.  

The following day, October 4, we will all drive to Croatia where we have two days booked in an apartment in Zagreb.    Our only other plans are to fly home from Berlin on October 27 so we are free to go where and when we decide.

This is day one - more to come!  Stay tuned!