Imagine walking down from Terazije to Savamala, boarding a ship, and sailing all the way to… Egypt!
No, it’s not fantasy. It was reality. Today, it has been almost completely forgotten that Belgrade once served as a seaport in the heart of continental Europe! And not all that long ago—roughly sixty years ago. The city even had a regular shipping line departing from Karađorđeva Street directly to the Bosphorus, the Mediterranean, and Africa!
Yes, a seaport—or, more precisely, a river-sea port. This was the case from the late 1950s until the early 1970s.
Belgrade even had its own genuine seagoing vessel. It was called Kolubara, and Belgrade was its home port.
To reach the shores of Alexandria with passengers and cargo, Kolubara first sailed down the Danube, passed through the Sip Canal at the Đerdap Gorge, continued through Bulgaria, then entered Romanian waters and, along what is today the border with Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union), followed the Danube into the Black Sea.
From there, the ship reached its first stop—the Bosphorus and Istanbul. While passengers admired the beauty of Istanbul, Kolubara would soon raise anchor again and head straight into the Aegean Sea.
The voyage continued through Greek waters, initially hugging the coastline before weaving between scattered islands and eventually cutting through the waves with Crete and Rhodes passing on either side.
Its stern would then be washed by the waters of the Mediterranean as Kolubara entered the famous port of Alexandria in northern Egypt. In effect, Serbia—a landlocked country—had a genuine maritime outlet through this route, reaching all the way to the Mediterranean.
There were stops at various coastal cities along the journey. Some passengers disembarked in Turkey, others in Greece, while new travelers came aboard.
During layovers, passengers visited famous landmarks, enjoying an experience much like today’s cruise vacations—admittedly with far more modest comfort—but the point is that residents of Belgrade, Serbia, the former Yugoslavia, and other European countries could enjoy an exceptionally unusual holiday.
At a time when streams of young people from Western Europe and the United States were heading east to discover Asia and Africa in what later became known as the “hippie trails”—traveling by bus from London to India (with a stop at what is now Nikola Pašić Square in Belgrade), by truck, or by train—people in Belgrade could discover the Orient in perhaps the most pleasant and comfortable way: aboard a ship, with sunshine on the deck and the sea stretching before them.
We also owe a few details to those who enjoy the technical side of the story.
The motor vessel Kolubara was built in 1957 at the shipyard in Kraljevica, near Rijeka in present-day Croatia, under the working designation “Newbuild 348.” It measured just over 77 meters in length and 8.6 meters in width. Its draft was 2.98 meters, with a carrying capacity of 1,100 metric tons. Because it was designed to navigate rivers and pass beneath bridges, Kolubara featured a lower wheelhouse and a retractable mast.
The ship was built as a liner for the Belgrade-based Yugoslav River Shipping Company (JRB) and was registered in the Port of Belgrade as a vessel for major coastal navigation.
As part of the same series, the Kraljevica shipyard also delivered three additional ships to Belgrade, all named after Serbian rivers—Tamnava, Mlava, and Morava.
Together with Kolubara, these three vessels carried both passengers and cargo on the route for nearly fifteen years.
For reasons that remain unclear today—although the beginning of the construction of the Đerdap Hydroelectric Power Plant and the navigation difficulties caused by the massive engineering works are most often cited—this most exotic river-maritime route in Belgrade’s history was discontinued in 1971.
The ships that wrote this remarkable chapter in the history of Serbian shipping were soon sold to Obalna Plovidba of Vela Luka, where they continued operating along various coastal routes before gradually being scrapped at Adriatic shipbreaking yards from 1980 onward.
Perhaps there is still someone alive today who traveled on this route and remembers what it was like. If so, we would certainly love to hear those memories.
MORE TOPICS:
FROM AMMUNITION TO DRONES: How Serbia became one of Israel’s most important partners in Europe!
Source: Kaldrma.rs; Foto: Kaldrma.rs