A Stroll Through Veles, Macedonia 🚶 Mountain Wilderness

Hello everyone! 👋 I've missed you all! Hope everyone is doing well. 😘

For the first time, I am venturing outside the capital, Skopje, to show you some of the beautiful wilderness that can be found in my country. This first post will be purely focused on the wilderness, while the next one will focus more on the village itself, and some more wilderness. 😛

Small Preface: So, you might be asking me "Jocko, why are you in the middle of nowhere?" Astute question fellow reader! I would expect nothing else from a Hiver. Well, to be honest, my sister bought a house in this very remote mountain village. It's an hour's ride away from where I live, and she invited me to visit.

This place was amazing and it actually produced two posts for me. This one, and the one that will come out next week. In this first walk, we will focus on a particular walk I took with my nieces and my brother-in-law. We walked a while from our village to a nearby monastery.

Time for ya'll to get another look at my beautiful country, I know, you can't wait- Onwards! 🚶

🔷 WILDERNESS 🔶

I will talk more about the village itself in my next post. For now, I will focus on this particular walk and the surrounding mountains.

The village itself is called R'levci. It is very remote and is considered in the region of Veles. Veles is a city in the very center of Macedonia. It is a moderately large city and R'levci depends on it heavily.

This walk was conducted in the early hours of the morning. It was very peaceful except for one aspect. As we were walking we could hear hunting dogs and shots fired in the e distance. It was the first time I "witnessed" a hunt. 😁 We found wild boar tracks as we walked, so we assumed the pray.

What you see above is the village's school. Or I should say was. It got shut down around 50 years ago during the village's max exodus. Frankly, for such a remote place I am surprised there even was a school. Just goes to show the change of times.

And of course, what was once the school's playground is now a field. And being a field it gets plowed by the tractors as fields do.

The walk itself was relatively long. Took us about an hour to get to the monastery. When I checked my steps on my return, it was around 9.000, which means around 4.500 steps a direction. Solid walk that.

🔷 MONESTARY 🔶

You will have to forgive me but I don't remember the patron saint of this monastery. What you see in front of you is its lodge. It is where the monks ate lunch and socialized.

I'm not a religious person myself, but I appreciated the cross on the gate. It's a nice touch. Remember, this is a remote place in a remote place. So. we're talking about somewhere long forgotten.

Forgotten but not abandoned as people still come here. Evident by the money present in the donation jar.

The place of prayer is quaint. And there's a little stream running alongside it that gives off this peaceful aura that I adored. ❤️

What you see before you are my two nieces along with Sasho, our escort, and husband of my sister's. He is the one who knows this area best and was our chaperone during the entire trip.

🔷 TRIP BACK 🔶

The navigation below was from around the monastery. 🌿

And the little rascal you see below is my youngest niece. 🤗

One of the many crossroads you'll find if you walk these mountain paths. The little black doggo is Gaara. My sister's dog. A dog I have a hive post up for anyone interested. 😀

But yeah, all in all, I cannot wait to get back here. Such a beautiful place. We'll explore the village and a different side of the mountain next week. But for now, I will leave you with a picture I put up on my gram. 🏞️