Free Republic of Liberland is a sovereign state located between Croatia and Serbia on the west bank of the Danube river. The nearest cities are Osijek (Croatia) and Sombor (Autonomous Province of Vojvodina, Serbia). On some maps, this area is referred to as “Gornja Siga”.
Liberland came into existence due to a border dispute between Croatia and Serbia. This area along the west bank of the Danube river is not claimed by Croatia, Serbia or any other country. It was therefore terra nullius, a no man’s land, until Vít Jedli?ka seized the opportunity and on 13 April 2015 formed a new state in this territory – Liberland. The boundary was defined so as not to interfere with the territory of Croatia or Serbia. Its total area of approximately 7 km² is now the third smallest sovereign state, after the Vatican and Monaco. For more information regarding the border dispute between Croatia and Serbia see an article on Wikipedia.
The motto of Liberland is “To live and let live” because Liberland prides itself on personal and economic freedom of its people, which is guaranteed by the Constitution, which significantly limits the power of politicians so they could not interfere too much in the freedoms of the Liberland nation.
FYI, please download the Liberland Brochure or visit their website www.liberland.org.
Location of Liberland
I had met Liberland’s charismatic President Vit Jedlicka (left) the year before at the famous Libertarian Conference of Professor Hoppe in Bodrum.
Now in 2017, we flew in from all over the world (Austria, Belgium, Brasil, Czech Republic, France, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hongkong, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Korea, Monaco, Oman, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Serbia, Swiss, Turkey, UK, USA) to Liberland, with ca. 30 of the world’s most extreme travelers, who are members of either
www.travelerscenturyclub.org (TCC) or
www.mosttraveledpeople.com (MTP) or
www.thebesttravelled.com (TBT), now called nomadmania.com,
gathering at Apatin Marina,
with its conveniently located Apatin Marina Apartments and,
a bit further down the Danube,
the recommendable Hotel Zlatna Kruna (Golden Crown)
with its romantic restaurant above the Danube. (F: J.P.Peixoto)
Top travelers Don Parrish (72, USA) and André Brugiroux (80, France).
Our boat for the day was Liberland’s state flagship
the MS Liberty
including tenderboats
and a hi-speed jetski, the Liberland Ranger.
Our beautiful voyage upstream on the Danube, near the tripoint of Serbia, Croatia and Hungary.
The world’s most extreme travelers gathered as the first ever tourist group on the shores of Liberland
getting their passports stamped in front of TV-stations from Belgium, Dubai, Portugal, and Turkey
and proudly displaying
the world’s most exotic passport stamp.
Croatian police and gendarmerie lined up 3 boats and several officials to greet us
as we gathered on the upper deck
of the much larger MS Liberty (F: P.Maselis)
floating along the shores of the Free Republic of Liberland
which are clearly signposted.
President Jedlicka welcomed the Croation officials back and, in his typical sovereign way, he exchanged some diplomatic notes.
Liberland is the world’s youngest and most modern nation, with its own Libertarian constitution, crypto-currencies, citizenship – and diplomatic representatives in more countries than Croatia.
Systematic travel (a term by the late Prof. Hogenauer of the USC) is all about collecting countries, territories and smaller geographic entities, according to clearly specified criteria and lists, to be proven within the extreme traveler community, by passport stamps, affidavits and fotos. As part of the ETIC series, we held our first “Systematic Travel Congress” at Apatin Marina Conference Center,
with Pamela Barrus and JoAnn Schwartz from TCC, Charles Veley from MTP, Harry Mitsidis from TBT, Jeff Shea from SISO,
and the world’s most traveled person (according to MTP) Don Parrish giving a speech.
In the evening there was another nice dinner at Apatin Marina Restaurant. Our youngest member Lumi (7, Finland) in the front.
The first family, ministers and ambassadors of Liberland were excellent hosts to our large visitor group.
The friendly and efficient Silvia from Liberland Travel (Contact: liberland.travel @ gmail.com) here pictured with travel legend Don Parrish.
Thank you to everybody at Team Liberland for a memorable visit !
–
(The higher quality fotos are courtesy of Michael Runkel.)
–