2022 in Montenegro (Kotor and Budva)

On October 6, 2022, the Balkan bus tour brought me to the border crossing between Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro (Montenegrin: Crna Gora), entering my 25th country:

This made it my:

• 1st time in a country that became independent in the 21st century
  • Montenegro separated from Serbia in 2006
  • 2nd time, if we include Serbia as also achieving independence from Montenegro!
• 4th former Yugoslavian constituent country (out of 6)
  • after Serbia + Bosnia + Croatia
• 6th Slavic-speaking country
  • after Poland + Bulgaria + Serbia + Bosnia + Croatia
• 4th country using the Cyrillic alphabet
  • after Bulgaria + Serbia + Bosnia
  • Cyrillic only appears in official written documents in Montengero
  • most signage appears in the Latin alphabet
• 4th Serbo-Croatian speaking country (out of 4)
  • after Serbia + Bosnia + Croatia
• 1st Albanian speaking country
  • Montenegro has Albanian as an official language

So, Montenegro was an independent nation-state that separated from Serbia in 2006. It became the last of the Balkan countries to become independent, with full recognition from the United Nations. The name Montenegro is Latin for "black mountain" (or literally, "mountain black"), which comes from the translation of its local name, Crna Gora ("black mountain").

The Montenegrin language has only slight differences from Serbo-Croatian (some might consider it just a dialect of Serbian). For example, I noticed that a carton of milk in Serbia said "mleko" but in Montenegro it became "mlijeko" (for a softer pronunciation). Even though Montenegro has not officially yet joined the European Union, it adopted as its currency the euro.

I was also sufficiently informed that Montenegro had a reputation for its "laziness". The joke was that while all the other Balkan countries declared their independence in the early 1990s, Montenegro slept through it until the mid-2000s! I would only get a good idea of this "laziness" in Budva, as I will explain below...

Visit

We had left Trebinje (in Bosnia and Herzegovina) that morning and crossed into Dolovi on the Montenegrin side. The bus would snake through some mountainous terrain for a couple of hours. We stopped at a spectacular viewpoint, from which we saw the mountains of Montenegro. We then proceeded towards Kotor, a well-known cruise port-of-call.

Kotor

Kotor was a small fortified town with the entrance at the Sea Gate (locally: vrata mora). Its compact area lended well to tourism. One could walk around its labyrinth of narrow, pedestrian-only streets and always discover something new. Cats dominated the area which probably made the area rather rodent-free.

I ate lunch at a restaurant called Bokun, which was actually quite a treat with their tasty Montenegrin sandwiches.

Budva

After Kotor, the tour bus drove about half an hour to the town of Budva, where resorts dominated the landscape. At this point, the Cyrillic alphabet made a comeback, with the town once catering to Russian investors.

I did not have a good impression of the hotel (which shall remain nameless at this point), a glorified two-storey motel with an overly vast layout:

• elevators did not exist (would not pass accessibility laws in many countries!)
• rooms were difficult to find without proper signage and site plans
• phones and wi-fi did not work
  • contacting the front desk meant having to go back through the maze of the complex

Hotel staff there sounded extremely confused and clueless. Giving up on the hotel, I went to a local restaurant (which shall also remain nameless). I had some Montenegrin njeguški steak and Vranac wine for dinner, which tasted alright. However, the service took forever and it made me think back to what the tour guide said about the country's culture of "nonchalance".

Still, I enjoyed a walk along the beach on the Adriatic Sea, then proceeded to go back to "Hotel Labyrinth" for sleep. I had no mood to check my e-mail with the non-existent wi-fi at that point.

The next day would involve three countries: Montenegro, Albania and [North] Macedonia.