Tito’s train is back on the tracks through the Balkans (Picture: Stevica Mrdja)

I’m watching a Serbian woman lounging in a vintage, powder-blue bath while her husband takes pictures of her on his camera.

It’s an unusual sight: she’s fully clothed and this isn’t any old bath. It once belonged to president Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia.

Since Tito’s death in 1980, his Blue Train has languished in a Belgrade railway siding. But this year it took to the tracks once more and will be making the 11-hour journey between the Montenegrin port of Bar and the Serbian capital Belgrade and back until the end of October, and then again from next spring.



Tito ruled Yugoslavia for 35 years. He was seen by many as a benevolent dictator, who made Yugoslavia one of the most open and economically successful Communist states.


He was one of the few Eastern European leaders to stand up to Stalin, skilfully forging alliances with both East and West during his time in power.

After its inaugural run in 1959, the train was nicknamed Tito’s ‘palace on wheels’. Its carriages have been preserved by Serbian State Railways, right down to the last nut and bolt.

Inside, time has stood still. The lavish interior is filled with the mahogany, pear and walnut marquetry panels commissioned by Tito and the same mint-green velvet sofas that world leaders, from the Queen to Leonid Brezhnev, have sat upon.

I find myself sitting around the enormous conference table with a mix of train buffs, history lovers and nostalgic locals.

Our guide is 75-year-old Toma Popovic, who ran the train in Tito’s day. He’s travelled this route hundreds of times but his enthusiasm for it clearly hasn’t dimmed.

As we speed along, he points out the engineering marvels: some of the world’s steepest track and the highest railway viaduct in Europe.

With our English-speaking guide, Nemanja Ciric, we go on a tour of Tito’s private quarters – his study, bedroom, bathroom and the diplomatically titled ‘companion’s bedroom’.

But if he committed any indiscretions on the train, Popovic isn’t telling, adding only: ‘He was a nice man to work for.’

Afterwards, Popovic produces a bottle of his home-brewed version of Serbia’s national tipple, slivovitz or plum brandy.

‘If you poured it over a plum pudding, there’d be a flame for an hour,’ says fellow traveller Inga, who has been visiting the region for more than 30 years.

The interior of Tito’s luxurious train (Picture: Stevica Mrdja)

After a few super-strength shots, Inga begins a spirited debate, arguing that people would like to go back to the time of Tito.

‘They may have been poor but even remote villages had education and electricity, unlike other Communist countries,’ she says.

Ciric agrees that people still miss Tito. The charismatic and controversial president created the Cult of Tito, which helped hold the six ethnically diverse Yugoslav republics together.

If the train passed through your town, it was an event, and Tito would pull down the window and address the masses.



Eleven years after his death, Yugoslavia broke up and, after a long and brutal civil war, emerged as seven separate nations – Slovenia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Croatia and Montenegro. Croatia has a booming tourism industry and has just joined the EU.

Although the Yugoslav people adopted a socialist lifestyle under his rule, Tito wasn’t averse to a bit of luxury, with a love of whisky and French wine. But, says Popovic, ‘he still enjoyed a glass of slivovitz’.

Lunch is served in the dining car under a rogue’s gallery of former guests, including Libya’s president Gaddafi and Romania’s president Ceausescu.

From the tiny galley kitchen a five-course feast of meaty Serbian specialities arrives: veal consommé, pork chops stuffed with sausage, rounded off by calorie-laden baklava and washed down with full-bodied local wine.

Some feel the need for a post-prandial nap and sneak off to one of the sleeping compartments to bed down on a velvet couchette but I sit in Tito’s private salon and watch the scenery.

It’s wild and dramatic and from a comfortable armchair I see rugged peaks, dizzying gorges and the fast-flowing rivers of Montenegro, then the crop fields and sleepy villages in Serbia.

Tito died on May 4, 1980, and two days later, as the train carried him on his final journey from Ljubljana to Belgrade, mourners lined the route.

As we pull into Belgrade’s almost-deserted station there’s no fanfare, just an old man staring in disbelief at this powerful symbol from his past.


Sarah travelled with Explore Montenegro (www.montenegroholidays.com), which offers a four-day tour (from £399, excluding flights), a six-day tour (from £899, including flights) and a seven-day tour (from £965, including flights).

The packages include a day aboard Tito’s Blue Train. Train-only tickets start from £99, including lunch. www.visit-montenegro.com

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