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5 days in Bosnia

A five day Bosnia route, three nights in Sarajevo and two in Mostar, that leads with the cash problem rather than burying it.

Last updated . Mountain seasons, ferry and bus timetables, fares and cash acceptance all change, and the seasonal notes here are the fastest moving of them. Recheck the official sources below before travelling.

Book the trip

Start with Bosnia, dates and travellers

Compare the travel services first, then use the itinerary below to plan each day.

You book each service directly with its supplier. These separate bookings do not form a RoamWeek package.

Bosnia is cheap, compact and easier to travel than its reputation suggests, and the thing that reliably goes wrong is money rather than logistics. The buses run on cash and only cash, starting with the one from the airport, and the amounts are small enough that arriving with a card and nothing else turns a five minute problem into an hour.

How many days do you need in Bosnia?

5 days: 3 nights in Sarajevo and 2 in Mostar, which is the split most recent visitors settle on.

Mostar is small and one night covers the bridge and the old town, but a second lets you reach Kravica or Blagaj without rushing. Sarajevo is where extra days actually earn their place.

Do you need cash in Bosnia?

Yes, more than most of Europe. The airport bus costs 5 KM in cash, and intercity buses take cash for both the ticket and the luggage.

The convertible mark is pegged to the euro, so roughly 100 euros gives you about 190 KM. Draw at the airport or in the centre, and keep small notes, because bus drivers rarely have change for large ones.

How do you get from Sarajevo to Mostar?

By bus in about 2 to 3 hours for roughly 12 euros, or by train on one of the more scenic lines in the region.

The bus is more frequent and the train is better looking. Both take cash at the counter. The road and the railway follow the same river gorge, so neither is a wasted journey.

When should you avoid Bosnia?

Midsummer in Mostar, which sits in a valley and gets significantly hotter than Sarajevo, 2 hours away.

Sarajevo is in the mountains and stays manageable. Herzegovina in July and August is a different climate, and the walking old town of Mostar has very little shade.

The plan at a glance

Day
1
Where
Sarajevo old town
What needs booking
Nothing fixed
Day
2
Where
Sarajevo, the siege and the tunnel
What needs booking
Nothing fixed
Day
3
Where
Sarajevo hills, then to Mostar
What needs booking
Nothing fixed
Day
4
Where
Mostar
What needs booking
Nothing fixed
Day
5
Where
Kravica or Blagaj
What needs booking
Nothing fixed
Nothing on this route requires an advance ticket. What it requires is cash, and that is the whole warning.

The route at a glance

6 mapped stops · 5 days

Live route map

OpenStreetMap tiles

Loading the OpenStreetMap map.

ROUTE OVERVIEW6 stops · 5 daysStop 1: Bascarsija1Stop 2: Latin Bridge2Stop 3: Tunnel of Hope3Stop 4: Stari Most4Stop 5: Kravica Falls5Stop 6: Blagaj tekke, as the alternative6

Route stops

Follow the numbered order through each day.

8 stops need a location

Day 1: Sarajevo old town

  1. 1Bascarsija · about 2 hours
  2. ·The Sarajevo Meeting of Cultures line · about 30 minutes
  3. 2Latin Bridge · about 45 minutes
  4. ·Gazi Husrev Bey Mosque · about an hour

Day 2: The siege and the tunnel

  1. 3Tunnel of Hope · about 2 hours
  2. ·War Childhood Museum · about 90 minutes
  3. ·The yellow fortress at sunset · about 90 minutes

Day 3: The hills, then south

  1. ·The 1984 bobsleigh track · about 3 hours
  2. ·Sarajevo to Mostar · about 3 hours

Day 4: Mostar

  1. 4Stari Most · about 2 hours
  2. ·The Mostar back streets · about 2 hours
  3. ·The bridge after the coaches leave · about an hour

Day 5: Kravica or Blagaj

  1. 5Kravica Falls · about 4 hours there and back
  2. 6Blagaj tekke, as the alternative · about 3 hours there and back
Days 1 to 3 are Sarajevo and its hills. Days 4 and 5 are Mostar and the Herzegovina countryside south of it. 8 of the 14 stops are not plotted because we do not hold a checked coordinate for them.

Day 1: Sarajevo old town

A city where the Ottoman and Austro Hungarian halves meet at a line you can stand on.

On foot
About 5 km on foot, mostly flat

Morning

  1. Bascarsijaabout 2 hours

    The Ottoman bazaar quarter and the centre of the old city. Coppersmiths still work here, which is why it sounds different from other restored old towns.

  2. The Sarajevo Meeting of Cultures lineabout 30 minutes

    A marker in the pavement where Ottoman Sarajevo becomes Austro Hungarian Sarajevo. Turn around on the spot and the architecture changes completely behind you.

Afternoon

  1. Latin Bridgeabout 45 minutes

    Where Franz Ferdinand was shot in 1914. Small, unassuming, and the reason a great many people know the city's name.

  2. Gazi Husrev Bey Mosqueabout an hour

    The largest historic mosque in the country, at the centre of the bazaar. Dress for entry and check prayer times.

Day 2: The siege and the tunnel

The hardest and most necessary day of the trip, and the one that explains the rest of it.

On foot
About 4 km on foot, plus transport out to the tunnel

Morning

  1. Tunnel of Hopeabout 2 hours

    The hand dug tunnel under the airport runway that kept the city supplied through the siege. It is out by the airport, so pair it with an arrival or a departure if the timing works.

Afternoon

  1. War Childhood Museumabout 90 minutes

    Objects and testimony from people who were children during the siege. Small, quiet, and the most affecting hour in Sarajevo.

  2. The yellow fortress at sunsetabout 90 minutes

    A short climb above the old town with the whole valley below. Locals come up here in the evening, which tells you it is worth doing.

Day 3: The hills, then south

The Olympic city above the siege city, and then a river gorge to Mostar.

On foot
About 4 km on foot

Morning

  1. The 1984 bobsleigh trackabout 3 hours

    The abandoned Olympic run on Trebevic, now covered in graffiti and reachable by cable car from the old town. Two histories stacked on one hillside.

Afternoon

  1. Sarajevo to Mostarabout 3 hours

    Two to three hours by bus or train through the Neretva gorge. Cash at the counter for either, and the train is the better looking of the two.

Day 4: Mostar

A small old town that empties dramatically once the day trip coaches leave.

On foot
About 4 km on foot, on very slippery cobbles

Morning

  1. Stari Mostabout 2 hours

    The rebuilt Ottoman bridge, and the reason most visitors come. Go early: this is a day trip destination from the Croatian coast and it fills from mid morning.

Afternoon and evening

  1. The Mostar back streetsabout 2 hours

    Away from the bridge there are still shelled buildings standing on main roads. Mostar is not a restored museum town, and walking two streets out makes that plain.

  2. The bridge after the coaches leaveabout an hour

    Same structure, a fraction of the people, and the divers still working in the evening light.

Day 5: Kravica or Blagaj

One short trip into Herzegovina, chosen on the weather.

On foot
About 3 km on foot

Morning

  1. Kravica Fallsabout 4 hours there and back

    A wide curtain of waterfalls about an hour from Mostar, and a swimming spot in summer. The obvious choice when it is hot.

  2. Blagaj tekke, as the alternativeabout 3 hours there and back

    A dervish house built against a cliff where the Buna river comes straight out of the rock. Closer than Kravica and better in cool weather.

Bosnia in outline

Two cities and a river

A mountain capital and a valley town two hours apart, joined by a gorge and paid for in cash.

Illustration of a river valley town among steep wooded hills with slender minarets
Sarajevo sits in a bowl, which is what made the siege possible and the views good.
Illustration of a single high arched stone bridge over green water
Mostar is a day trip destination from the coast, so the evening is when it is yours.
Illustration of a steep hillside crowded with small pale houses
The hills above the old town hold the Olympic run and the cemeteries together.
Illustration of a wide curtain waterfall spilling over travertine ledges
Kravica is the hot weather answer to the final day.

Illustrations generated with FLUX for RoamWeek, August 2026. Stylised artwork rather than photographs of the places named.

The options below are separate choices rather than a package. Read how RoamWeek chooses and orders suggestions before using any of them.

Book the separate parts

Book the parts that need booking

Very little here needs arranging ahead, which is part of the appeal. Flights and beds are the whole list.

You book each service directly with its supplier. These separate bookings do not form a RoamWeek package.

What is worth the time, and what is not

Worth your time

  • The Tunnel of Hope with the War Childhood Museum. One explains how the city survived and the other what it cost, and neither works nearly as well alone.
  • Mostar in the evening. It is a day trip destination from Croatia, so staying the night buys you the old town almost to yourself.
  • The train to Mostar. The line follows the Neretva gorge and costs about the same as the bus for a considerably better journey.

Skip it

  • Mostar as a day trip. Arriving and leaving with the coaches means seeing the one hour when the bridge is at its worst.
  • Relying on cards for transport. The airport bus, the intercity buses and the luggage charges are all cash, and none of them are expensive enough to be worth the trouble of getting wrong.
  • Herzegovina in the middle of a July day. Mostar sits in a valley with little shade and runs far hotter than Sarajevo two hours north.

Why this order

Sarajevo comes first and gets three nights because it is the harder city to understand and the one that gives context to everything south of it. The tunnel sits on day two rather than day one because it is easier to absorb once the old town has made the city feel like a place rather than a headline. Mostar gets two nights specifically so that one of them is an evening, which is the difference between seeing the bridge and seeing the town. The final day is deliberately a choice rather than a fixture, because Kravica in the heat and Blagaj in the cool are answers to different weather.

Read next

What we checked

Why this page exists. This is the only RoamWeek route that warns you about Bosnian cash before the airport bus rather than after it, including that the fare is 5 KM and cards are not taken.