On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
Good morning all,
We return to Sister Golden Bear’s wonderful series of submissions. Enjoy!
From Sarajevo, I wanted to finish the trip with a visit to the Bay of Kotor, but didn’t want to double back through my previous route. Thankfully, in my research I discovered a scenic backroad — very backroad route through the mountains of northeast Montenegro.
I had a tense moment at the border because the car registration paperwork got stuck in the envelope from the rental car company and I couldn’t find it initially. Since smuggling stolen cars into Montenegro was not uncommon, it dealing with border guards who spoke limited English was…. interesting. Thankfully, we eventually found the necessary paperwork and I was free to go.
Since this is the prettiest photo, I’m going to jump ahead and start with this one, which is looking down the bay towards Kotor itself. The bay coastal inlet formed by a drowned river valley that remains open to the sea.
The view from the top of the mountains above Kotor. There’s a narrow road down, which on the map looks like an earthquake on seismograph chart thanks to the many, many switchbacks. Thankfully, there was very little traffic, but there were a few encounters with oncoming traffic that required some careful maneuvering.
On the map, the M18/E762 highway appears to a major highway. In reality it’s a narrow track (almost one-lane at points), and before I crossed the border from Bosnia and Herzegovina I wasn’t sure I was on the right road until I encountered some oncoming traffic with Montenegrin license plates.
My best guess is the road was construction to build/support the dam on Piva Lake, a rather huge reservoir and hydro-electric project. The terrain was extremely rugged.
Fast-forwarding again, I spent the night in Budva, a beach resort town just south of the Bay of Kotor. Like many beach towns along the Adriatic Sea, it’s see a huge amount of development in recent years, fueled by Russian money that’s totally not being laundered through real estate.
The harbor had its share of luxury yachts, but still had a substantial number of redactional and fishing boats.
The Russian presence evident with the extremely loud techo music from the club across the harbor — loud even a nearly a half-kilometer away.
Rob
Such nice photos. I want to go there. And, as a bonus, I have a certain song by the pop group America going through my head right now (I’ve always liked that song).
Mary G
That last photo with the boats is evocative.
p.a.
????????
rikyrah
The pictures are beautiful?
Wag
Excellent photos. The bridge over the rapids is especially nice. Thanks for sharing
laura
That’s a fjord fiesta!
eclare
Wow, gorgeous
arrieve
Beautiful pictures. I’m so impressed that you were brave enough to drive yourself.
waratah
Thank you the beautiful photos of my favorite detective’s birth home.
MelissaM
Wow, beautiful! And it looks *old*.
Uncle Cosmo
Fabulous photos – the one overlooking the town is particularly stunning, since when I visited in 2013 I stood in the main square & looked up at the path leading up to the crest high above & said to myself, No fucking way! I would love to have a high-rez copy of that to blow up to about 18″ x 24″ for my living room wall…
I came to Kotor on the bus from Dubrovnik, which crossed the border at/near Herceg-novi. The town was a madhouse at the time – it only takes one oceangoing cruise ship in the harbor to create pedestrian gridlock in the Old Town, and one was in…
Did you make it to Cetinje, the old capital? I took a bus & it was almost deserted. Having read some years before Milovan Đilas’s biography of Prince-Bishop Petar Petrović-Njegoš (1813-1851, I jumped at a ride up Mt. Lovćen close to his tomb. Unforgettable views – & almost as unforgettable “agony of de feet.” (I had to climb the last 100 m or so over busted-up pavement in soft-soled boots.)
(Just FTR: I’d flown down to Dubrovnik from Prague, where I’d been visiting friends, & worked my way back via bus to Podgorica [where I spent a month one afternoon – it’s now on my short list of European towns that only a mother could love, & maybe not even her]; overnight train to Belgrade; a couple of days there; another overnight train to Budapest & a transfer in the chilly morning. Fun trip; I’d do it again, if & when this pandamnic & the accompanying Great Diseasiness subsides.)
J R in WV
Love those “country roads”… it’s like a really new steep mountain range transplanted to the beach. Wanted to take a driving tour in central Europe, visit my old country in Switzerland, never been there, undoubtedly have many cousins there.
Great pics, Sister, thanks!!!
Sister Golden Bear
Thanks again all.
@Uncle Cosmo: No I didn’t get to visit Cetinje.
If you’d like a high-res cover of the photo, have a FPer contact me so we can exchange emails.
TheOtherHank
Beer Lake, I like it. Well, I assume that’s what it means. Google translate says it means beer in Russian, Czech, Serbian, and Croatian. It doesn’t seem to speak Montenegrin, but I’m going to extrapolate.
stinger
Sister Golden Bear, thank you for this island of serenity and natural beauty in a world of chaos. With each photo, I feel that I am standing beside you, seeing and hearing and smelling that lovely landscape.
The part at the end about Russia was a bit of a downer — probably for you, too!
Buckeye
Thanks much for these pictures. I’ve been wanting to visit the region for many many years.
I remember a joke, probably from about 20 years ago, that the Montenegrin tourist campaign focused on Europe should be something along the lines of ‘Come visit Montenegro, your car is waiting for you.’
John Smallberries
Loved Kotor when we were there. We were on a 600 passenger ship so we didn’t destroy the town. The ships officers led a hike up to the fortress complex above the town early in the morning. We got a taxi, went to Budva for lunch, and came back and went to the Lady of the Rocks chapel in the middle of the bay. The cruise company had a special affinity for the chapel, the line provides funds for ongoing maintenance, and they made a point of a steam by on the way out.