Jablanica is a small Herzegovinian town in a dramatic place: the Neretva cuts through the valley, Lake Jablanica opens upstream, and the mountains of Prenj and Cvrsnica rise hard on both sides. Most travellers meet it on the road or railway between Sarajevo, Konjic, and Mostar, but it is worth more than a lunch stop.
The town's great sight is the Railway Bridge, a collapsed span left in the river as a memorial to the Battle of the Neretva. The nearby Battle for the Wounded on Neretva River Museum explains the 1943 partisan operation, when Tito's forces used deception, a temporary crossing, and speed to move wounded fighters across the river.
Outside town, Jablanica becomes wilder fast. The Dugo Polje Necropolis on the Blidinje plateau is part of the UNESCO-listed stecak tombstone landscape, and the hike toward Hajducka Vrata leads into some of Bosnia's grandest limestone mountain country.
Jablanica also has a plain, local pleasure: roast lamb. The restaurants along the road south of town are famous across Bosnia, and a plate of lamb with the Neretva below you is one of the better ways to break the Sarajevo-Mostar journey.