[binreadin]

I went through there in the early 70s as a backpacker, sleeping out in the open. Yugoslavia was the most beautiful country I visited while I lived in Europe, but it was like being in the dark ages in many parts of the country.

[rlmorel]

I went to Yugoslavia in 1977 on the USS Kennedy, and I recall we were the first US Navy group to do a port call there since 1945.

It was scrupulously clean in Dubrovnik (little old ladies patrolled the streets with little brooms) and I remember those orange tiled roofs.

It was the one of the very few places I recall visiting on liberty where we had to wear our uniforms ashore.

I also recall Airman Benton and I, in our full uniforms, got into a basketball game with a bunch of Yugoslav men, and I ruined my coroframs when one of the guys stepped on my foot and irreparably scuffed it.

And the women...just beautiful as I recall. We heard a girl call out to us, and looked up at a stone bridge going over us, and she was looking down at us with a big, friendly smile, with her hair hanging down like Rapunzel even though she was more silhouette in the fading light. Funny how you remember those things.