The Full Montenegro

Rio Hamish Bear & Nely have been travelling around Europe and since January have had to stay out of Shengen area so have been in Bosnia, Albania and now the tiny country of Montenegro and as part of our travelling year we flew out to visit them for 2 weeks.

The history of this Balkan country seems  complicated – there are several ethnic groups and over the years the borders have been fought over in bloody and violent wars. Montenegro has now had independence since 2006 after being part of the federation of Yugoslavia, followed by the Union of Serbia and Montenegro, they still have an unstable political system with a country split with Serbs making up almost half of the population. Bosnia, Croatia, Serbia and Albania are all on its borders and although each country claims its own language politically, they actually all speak the same language. 

Montenegro has only a population of 677,000 and Podgorica is the capital and they use the euro. The Montenegrins seem stern looking people, abrupt and don’t appear to engage much but when they do they are very kind and helpful. 

The name Montenegro came from its own people in the 15th century ‘Cerna Gora’ and literally translates to ‘Black Mountains’ named after the black forests that cover the mountains. 

The mountains make up a large part of the rugged landscape, along with deep canyons and a coastline along the Adriatic Sea that contains a fjord like channel making up a bay that accommodates cruise ships. 

This makes it very popular for tourists, hikers, skiers as well as those who crave sunshine and beaches. 

We were staying on the Bay of Kotor about 1 mile from the medieval old town. The sea is a breathtaking crystal blue and the beaches are stony white shells & sand. 

Kotor is famous for it Ladder -an ancient road up to a Fortress of at least 1000 steps and it’s Cats and they are everywhere. No one owns the cats but everyone looks after them and they are all well fed and cared for. They love attention and crave a stroke or a saucer of milk. 

Thank goodness on this trip we didn’t have George as he would have been beside himself. Instead we had Nely who was in heaven! Both Bear and Nely fell in love with these cats but Nely would want to stop and see every ‘cat tie’ She loved it when they would follow her and longed for them to follow her home. We actually had a resident garden cat who they tried to tempt into the house. 

We had to fly from Stansted airport and took the 06:30 flight thinking it would be straightforward- far from it! 

The M4 and M11 motorways were closed and we got lost trying to find the airport at 4am in the morning!!

Tired and stressed we made our way through an extremely busy airport – who’d have thought there would be so many people – it reminded us both why we hate flying !! We’d been given a long list of ‘things ‘ to take out to Rio and Hamish and carried 50kg of luggage, luckily that part went smoothly, as i had weighed and re weighed the bags checking that they would not be over the limits and charged a fortune by the delightful Ryanair!!

We arrived in Podgorica and it was sunny and warm, the airport was small so we were through arrivals quickly. Hamish and Bear were there to meet us and took us in their camper van through the mountains to get to Kotor and our house for the next 2 weeks. 

It was so lovely to be back with them again, to see how the children had grown and hear of their travel adventures. They have completed 10,000 miles so far and stayed in some remote and off the beaten track destinations in hotels and AirBnB along the way. 

I soon slipped into my role as resident cook and Bob the playful grandad ! 

Rio and I embarked on a fitness regime of 25 mins of strength and cardio circuit training each morning including running up and down 4 flights of stairs, plank, squats, lunges and burpees! For the first 4/5 days I was in agony but finally Im starting to feel the benefits….

Since we’ve been here we’ve explored the old medieval town of Kotor with its clean limestone lined streets and tourist shops selling Cats of Kotor mugs, bags and fridge magnets, Balkan pottery and mosaic lamps and had black tea in china tea cups with delicious carrot cake in a cafe; we’ve climbed the Ladder of Kotor up to the fortress for the views of the town, the bay and the Black mountains where half way we were served homemade lemonade and herbal tea in the Cheese shop; we’ve scooted to the play park several times; we’ve walked past streams, villages and mountainsides slewn with domestic rubbish like I’ve never seen before to get to an old concrete fortress high up in the mountains in line with the clouds where donkeys and cattle approach you to share your picnic!

Despite some of the obvious drawbacks I’m loving this country and how different it is from anything we’ve visited before. 

They lack infra structure, they don’t recycle and are ecologically unaware but they have so much to offer in nature, it’s wonderfully undeveloped and refreshingly simple without all the usual rules and regulations. 

Above all we’ve had the best times with two precious little jewels who are growing up far too fast!