The MOJO Family: Montenegro, part 1

Hello from Montenegro!

Where is the country of Montenegro and how did we get here?

We flew from Jordan to Albania, which is Northwest of Greece. After spending a week in Albania's capital of Tirana, we caught the bus to Montenegro. We left Albania on Jan 2 as things were starting to re-open after being closed for New Year's Eve.

We will be in Montenegro from Jan 2-Jan 22. It's the peach coloured country above, and the whole country is about the size of the state of Connecticut. A former part of Yugoslavia, it's a country in the West Balkans, and a beautiful and affordable place that is not in the Schengen visa zone. We have to spend a chunk of time OUTSIDE of the Schengen (see previous posts for explanation). With Croatia recently being added to the Schengen Zone, we will now spend some extra time in Montenegro and in Bosnia.

We have time in this region to slow down and hang out until we can return to the Schengen Zone. We will be joining family in Italy near the end of February, so until then we are exploring the Balkans.

Bus Trip from Tirana, Albania to Kotor, Montenegro

We rode the bus, which looked a bit like a 70s-theme enlarged van, to the border and across to Kotor, Montenegro. We unexpectedly had to pay for our luggage in the trunk of the van, which was almost a challenge since we had carefully spent our last remaining Lek (Albanian currency) on snacks. Not many places take credit cards around here, but thankfully the currency in Montenegro is the Euro, and we had some Euros left over to pay for our luggage. It's also common in this region to have to pay a bus station fee, so you can't use the interior of the bus or pass through without paying a small fee.

The border crossing was easy, although we weren't entirely sure what to expect before we got there. As we approached the exit point for leaving Albania, all the passengers on the bus handed their ID cards or passports to the driver. He handed them over to the border agent, and the bus waited while the agent processed the large pile. It felt a bit weird giving our passports over, especially since we were sitting in the very back of the bus, but that's just how it was. We were given our passports back, the bus drove forward about 50m and we all got out with our passports. Our luggage and small carry on bags were still on the bus as it waited for all the passengers to stand in the next line up to legally enter Montenegro. We all went through, boarded the bus again, and off we drove.

We had a longer stop at one point and we decided we would (1) grab a geocache nearby, (2) see if we could buy food and (3) get money out of an ATM. We succeeded in the first task but had trouble figuring out food near the station. While Jason was getting money out, I started yelling as I saw the bus pulling away! I ran out of the bus station (right passed the security person wanting to check that I had a ticket) and chased after the bus, yelling and banging on the door. Apparently we had misunderstood how long our stop was. I was glad we all got on safely for many reasons, especially since our luggage was still on the bus. Oops.

Kotor, Montenegro

Kotor is a popular tourist destination because of it's beautiful walled old town that overlooks the gorgeous turquoise water of the "Bay of Kotor". In the summer, it's very busy and there must be boats, cruise ships and kayaks filling up the bay. The mountains rise up behind the old town and all over the bay, creating lovely opportunities for steep hiking and lovely views.

There is a walled fortress just above the walled old town and we hiked up and down many times.

Inside the town, we initially had trouble finding food. Unfortunately we had assumed that things would open back up after the holidays on Jan 2, like they did in Albania. But in Kotor, all the grocery stores stayed closed until Jan 4. So we walked around until we found a gas station and bought whatever we could to make food there. Thankfully that worked out fine, although we ate some pretty basic and creative food for a couple of days.

Kotor has a thing for cats. There is a cat museum, cat souvenirs for sale everywhere, and an area where you can go and play with all the stray cats. Our kids really enjoyed that!

Jason got in some great runs here, with some good vertical training. He and I also had a lovely hike (and geocache) above the city that included a large cave.

Drawbridges are cool

The stairs going up to our AirBnb

The view from our AirBnb

Isn't this just the cutest little chapel?

The winding trail down to the city

Ava shooting arrows out from the fortress

Cats to play with!

After we found groceries and could cook properly again!

Jason inside the huge cave

Jason got some great veiws during his runs

Christmas in Kotor

Orthodox Christmas was Jan 7, so we had the pleasure of being able to celebrate a second Christmas. On Christmas Eve, free donut holes were available in the morning, representing a tradition where the women would make these 'fritters' on this day. The other tradition we learned about was the gathering of an oak branch, taking it to church, and then burning it on Christmas Eve. Also people used oak branches and oranges and apples to decorate their doorways, some trees, and put oak branches on the grills of their cars.

The grocery stores all closed again for a few days from Jan 6-Jan 9!

Burning the oak branch in the fire behind the church.

Driving to Zabljak

We rented a small Jeep and drove inland toward the mountains. Zabljak is a higher altitude community with access to two very small chair lifts and snowshoe trails inside Durmitor National Park. It is about a 2 hour drive from Kotor. We hoped to cross country ski and snowshoe and play in the snow.

Driving in Montenegro: the roads we have been on have been fine, and getting around has been easy. Perhaps the most challenging thing is that the center line seems to be a general guide, and other drivers are quite happy to go quite fast and pass other vehicles whenever they want... my passenger anxiety / back-seat driving tendency here is happy that it's the off season and the roads aren't very busy!

(But it's more comfortable than the narrow roads in Ireland or Greece.)

The drive was really beautiful.

We explored this cave along the way

Our rental car

We stopped for lunch at a larger town called Niksic, and ate our sandwiches at the fortress there

Zabljak

It's been an unseasonably warm winter in Europe, so many ski resorts haven't been able to open as there hasn't been much snow. When we arrived in Zabljak, it was cold but there wasn't any snow. There was a beautiful lake called "Black Lake" with some trails inside the park, but not anything going on in the town. There was snow up high on the surrounding peaks (difficult to access). But while we were there, it did snow! Our first snow since March 2022! We enjoyed throwing snowballs, making a snowman, and running and walking in it.

Unfortunately, the wifi connection in this town wasn't very strong, so we weren't able to be as productive with other work or planning for the few days that we were here. Also, the accommodation was rustic. We have been getting used to some challenging showers, limited hot water, little strange funky quirky kitchens, and drafty / damp accommodations. But the host (and people in general all over the place here) = very friendly.