Serbia beyond the Belgrade weekend.
Which Golubac day puts you on the water. Whether the house on the Drina is worth five hours in a van. Where the rakija is poured by the man who distilled it.
The six days a week in Serbia gets built around.
Golubac and the Iron Gate gorge, Novi Sad and the Fruška Gora cellars, the cabin on the Drina, the wooden town at Mokra Gora, a distiller’s plum brandy and the concrete Belgrade left over from Yugoslavia.
Belgrade sits on the ridge where the Sava gives itself up to the Danube.
A fortress on the point between the two rivers, a Habsburg grid on one side of it and an Ottoman tangle on the other, and a strip of floating clubs that does not warm up until midnight. The walking tours take the top of the hill; the boats and the tunnels take everything under it.
What travellers book first in Serbia.
Every review →Day trips that run in any season, plus the handful of Belgrade evenings that are gone by Thursday.
1
Novi Sad & Sremski Karlovci Full-Day Tour
See Krušedol, Sremski Karlovci, Bermet wine, Petrovaradin Fortress, and Novi Sad from Belgrade on an 8-hour guided day trip.
From · $76
Read our review →
2
Gems of Eastern Serbia Tour
from $123
3
Sremski Karlovci and Novi Sad Full-Day Tour from Belgrade
from $78
4
Day Trip from Belgrade: Gems of Eastern Serbia
from $127
5
Sunset Cruise with Live Guide
6
Western Serbia 1-Day Tour of the Key Sites from Belgrade
from $129
7
Day Tour to Nis, Serbia with tickets and pick-up
from $93
8
Belgrade Nightlife Bar Pub Club Crawl with Drinks
from $90
Golubac and the Iron Gate, three different days.
All Golubac tours →
The fortress stands where the Danube squeezes into a gorge a hundred kilometres long and, in places, deeper than the river is wide. Some days stay on the ramparts and the gorge road, some put you in a speedboat under the cliffs, and the long ones carry on to the cave country behind it.
Fortress ramparts and the gorge road
East along the river to the towers, up onto the walls, then the cliff road through the narrows to the viewpoints above Donji Milanovac.
Speedboat under the Iron Gate cliffs
The gorge only makes sense from the river: an hour on a fast boat under walls that close to a few hundred metres, with the Roman tablet cut into the rock face.
Resava cave, Lisine falls and a fortified monastery
Inland instead of downstream. Manasija keeps eleven towers and a curtain wall, the cave is a kilometre of limestone, and the waterfall is a short walk from the car park.
Western Serbia keeps its three best things within half an hour of each other.
A cabin marooned on a rock mid-river near Bajina Bašta, Kusturica’s timber village on the ridge above Mokra Gora, and a narrow-gauge railway that ties itself in a figure eight to climb the mountain. Most trips out here do all three in a day.
Three things that exist nowhere but Serbia.
Fortresses and river cruises run the whole length of the Danube. The house on the rock, the loop-the-loop railway and a household still of plum brandy are Serbia’s alone.
The House on the Drina
A group of young swimmers near Bajina Bašta got tired of lying on a bare midstream rock and built a hut on it. The Drina has torn the hut away several times and it has been rebuilt every time, most recently in timber that matches the original. Nobody goes inside; the point is the walk down to the bank, and the drive through the Tara canyon to reach it.
- 1Best of West (Drina House, Drvengrad and Sargan 8)★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 195 reviews
- 2Šargan Eight Railway, Wooden Town & House on Drina river day trip from Belgrade★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 107 reviews
- 3Best of West (Drina House, Drvengrad & Sargan 8)★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 104 reviews
The Šargan Eight
The engineers who had to lift a narrow-gauge line 300 metres up the Šargan pass ran out of mountainside, so they drew a figure eight and bored the loop through the rock — twenty-two tunnels in about thirteen kilometres of track. The tourist train still runs it from Mokra Gora and takes the better part of an afternoon to come back to where it started.
- 1Šargan Eight Railway, Wooden Town & House on Drina river day trip from Belgrade★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 107 reviews
- 2Višegrad, Andrićgrad, Šargan Train, Drvengrad★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 95 reviews
- 3West of Belgrade: Woodentown, Šargan 8 train & Drina River★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 42 reviews
Rakija
Every fruit here ends up distilled, but šljivovica — plum — is the one that counts, and a still in the yard is a matter of standing rather than business. Tastings run at farms in Šumadija and in cellars under Belgrade. The good stuff comes at room temperature, in a small glass, and is not to be hurried.
- 1Golubac Fortress w/Iron Gate Speed Boat & Rakija Distillery tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 47 reviews
- 2Belgrade Traditional Serbian Brandy Tasting★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 14 reviews
- 3Belgrade center walking tour with Rakija, Cocktails and Burgers★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 4 reviews
A day out in Serbia, sorted by price.
Everything on the site arranged by what it actually costs. A morning on foot in Belgrade comes in under the price of lunch on the river.
Walking tours of the old town, kayak mornings on the Sava, pub crawls and the e-bike run along the river.
The day trips: Golubac and the gorge, Novi Sad and the wine road, the long haul west to the Drina.
Private drivers, speedboats under the Iron Gate and the two-region days that cover half the country.
Novi Sad is an hour up the motorway and a different temper entirely.
Habsburg squares instead of an Ottoman ridge, a fortress with a clock whose hands are the wrong way round, and the Fruška Gora monasteries and cellars on the hill behind it. Sremski Karlovci pours a sweet bermet nobody bothers to export.
- 1Novi Sad & Sremski Karlovci Full-Day Tourfrom $76
- 2Sremski Karlovci and Novi Sad Full-Day Tour from Belgradefrom $78
- 3Novi Sad and Sremski Karlovci Tourfrom $76
Belgrade does not start its night until the rest of Europe has finished.
All nightlife →Belgrade Nightlife Bar Pub Club Crawl with Drinks
Read our review →
The košava blows down the Danube for three days at a stretch. Go underground.
Belgrade’s answer to bad weather is below street level: the gun galleries and Roman wells under Kalemegdan, a barrel cellar in Sremski Karlovci, the Resava cave two hours east. A tasting room works too.
Book these before you land in Belgrade.
Most of Serbia can be arranged from your hotel the night before. These cannot — they run on timetables, water levels and a football calendar that closes both grounds without warning.
- 01Best of West (Drina House, Drvengrad and Sargan 8)The narrow-gauge train keeps a fixed timetable with only a few departures a day, and summer seats go early.
- 02Iron Gate NP Tour with 1-hour speedboat ride + 2 viewpointsThe gorge boats only run when the Danube allows it — take a date early in your trip so there is room to move it.
- 03Private Red Star-Partizan Stadium Tour in BelgradeStadium tours stop on match days, and a derby weekend shuts both grounds.
- 04Sunset Cruise with Live GuideOne departure a night, timed to the sun, and it fills through the summer.
Where in Serbia — pick a corner
Golubac & the Iron Gate20 tours
Novi Sad & Fruška Gora35 tours
Zlatibor & Mokra Gora24 tours- Tara & the Drina24 tours
Resava & the east18 tours
Niš & the south16 tours
The national parks14 tours- Every tour in Serbia →
What kind of Serbian day out
One week in Serbia, in the order that works.
BelgradeThe newest Serbia tour reviews.
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Private Serbian Food Cooking Experience in Belgrade with Meal
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UVAC, Mokra Gora, Šargan Eight, Drina river house, 2 Days Tour From Belgrade
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Beauty of Medieval Serbia, Day trip to Monastery Manasija and Resava Cave
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Belgrade Private Custom Waking Tour with A Guide ( Private Tour )
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