♫Hey ho, Hey ho, It's off to Montenegro♫
Our journey continues. We have decided to leave Croatia due to how busy and expensive the camp sites are, and head to Montenegro - a country that only became independent in 2007, and promises panoramic views in every direction.
We crossed the border into another new country. Neither of us have visited Montenegro before, but it was high on our priority list - a must visit! The border crossing, although stressful, ended up being quite fast and easy! With a quick check of the passports and van documents, the cigarette smoking border guard in his tiny hut waved us through.
We had a few plans for Montenegro and we had our journey around the country roughly planned; Lovcen, Kotor, Skadar Lake, Tara Canyon and then what ever takes our fancy on the way.
Our first campsite of the c0untry was Oaza Lipa, a site situated in the foot hills of Lovcen - the famous mountain which gave the country its name.
After stupidly following google maps and not the road signs we ended up on another sheer drop narrow mountain pass on our way to the site. Fortunately, we arrived with out a hitch to a warm welcome at the family owned campsite . The views were breath taking, looking down from the campsite bar to the Balkan coast of Montenegro.
Next to campsite was Lipa Cave. The largest cave in Montenegro and well worth a visit. We drove up to the cave office and purchased our tickets, not only do you get entrance to the cave but you get a free train ride down to the entrance of the cave.
But before we jumped on the train we had another issue...a flat tyre! Luckily it seemed like it was only a slow puncture and we'd get this sorted as soon as we could.
It was Mid-August and it was roasting, luckily for us we had planned to spend the mid-day sun underground and it was a pleasant surprise when you stood in front of the cave entrance door and a barrage of freezing cold air came whooshing out- it really was like natural air conditioning and it was a TREAT!
The cave itself was pretty spectacular...
After Lipa cave we drove into the next town, Cetinje. We walked around the beautiful town which seemed like it was waiting for an influx of tourists to come that hadn't arrived yet.
The next day we headed to Lovcen national park, and to the Mausoleum situated on the summit Lovcen mountain. It's £2 each for entrance into the national park and then a further £5 for entrance to Mausoleum. Which is a lot cheaper than the Croatia national parks and the views from the top were pretty spectacular. The Mausoleum was built to protect Montenegro's greatest hero 'Petar Petrovic Njegos'
We managed to get up an down Lovcen and look around the Mausoleum a lot quicker than expected so we looked for a plan for the afternoon.
We quickly found something, we had heard Kotor old town was amazing so we planned to head there. The only thing that lay in our way was the most famous road in Montenegro. The Serpentine, a long narrow road full of hairpin turns leading from Cetinje to Kotor.
Google maps told us, it would take 45 minutes including traffic to get down the Serpetine...it took 3 hours! The road is a big tourist spot and there was even coaches heading up and down the road, so the traffic built up quite quickly! However we kept ourselves entertained, took in the breath taking views and enjoyed the journey down to Kotor.
We made it to Kotor and eventually found somewhere to park, thanks to the happiest parking attendant we had ever met! We walked into the Kotor old town walls and it quickly reminded me a little bit of Rhodes except as Montenegro isn't in the EU so they can sell lots of fake designer brands!
It was coming up to Ellies Birthday, we had been on the road for a good few months now so I had a surprise in store. We headed towards Skadar Lake, which is half in Montenegro and half in Albania.
Our drive to Skadar lake is one we will never forget. I have said this a few times now, but Montenegro is one of the most naturally beautiful places I have ever been.
We stopped for the night in a hotel car park, which included use of a swimming pool and decided to have a relax.
When travelling in a van, as a couple, solo or a family you can go weeks without any social interaction from outside of your bubble, but every now and then you will just meet some of the most wonderful people. As we were washing our pots an Italian couple from Bari came over to us shouting in Italian, and we were thinking what the bloody hell is going on here! We were thinking we were washing out pots in the wrong sink or something and were about to get told off! But no, they were just friendly Italians wanting to share a drink with us!
We had a broken conversation in Eng-alian and had a few shots of god knows what! All I know is that these little moments bring you such joy and massive hangovers!
We woke up the next day with abit of a sore head from the Italian liquor and it was Ellies 27th birthday. We hadn't had any time apart to go and buy Ellie a present so I decide to plan a surprise day. In her birthday card I wrote a few hints and clues to what we would be doing and kept her guessing until we arrived.
To give it away to the people reading this, I will let you in to what goes on inside Ellies mind. Ellie doesn't like horses, my sister has a horse and she won't go near him, but for some reason she thinks she will enjoy horse riding, and since we have been together all she has banged on about is 'I want to go horse riding', 'my mum would never let me go horse riding' and so on... So I thought it would be a great idea to go horse trekking for the day in Montenegro, and it was for a bit!
Following a 2 hour trek into the middle of no where we stopped off for some food, 'Traditional Montenegro cuisine' we were told, and it sounded nice until we realised we was eating carp and it tasted like dirt haha. After a 'wonderful' lunch we got back on our horses and headed back to farm.
In our group there was 3 couples, a Dutch mum and daughter and another couple from the Netherlands/Italy.
The Dutch family decided they wanted to go faster and for some reason the farm owner told them to go the back so they could trot. This was a disaster! And the horses kicked off, and the horse with the Dutch daughter on the back went wild throwing her off and giving her a 'suspected' broken back. We didn't get back on the horses, instead walking them back to the farm, which was an ordeal in itself!
So basically the day was a disaster and I don't think Ellie will go on a horse again, so at least its put an end to that fiasco!
I told Ellie that following the horse riding we were heading up to Tara canyon to meet our friends Dan & Leanne, but I had another plan up my sleeve. I had booked us into a hotel looking over Skadar lake for the night with AIR CON!! Honestly, I booked it for Ellies birthday, not the air con, I promise.
When I booked the room, in the special requests section I added if they could put a rose and a bottle of wine in the room as a surprise for my Fiancée's birthday, and they said they would happily do that, which was nice.
However I am not sure on how to explain what had happened. We went to check in together and when I showed the owner my passport he responds with 'Ooooooooo you're the person who wants something in the room aren't you'...whilst Ellie is next to me!
Ellie being the good sport clocks on a wanders off whilst I sort it out, he asks me to take a seat and give him 5 mins. After 5 minutes he said our room is ready and takes us up and shows Ellie the wine and flowers. He then says 'do you want it now or with your meal later' so I say 'we will have it with our meal later' and he picks up the wine and walks out! So Ellie never even got to see the surprise I planned! haha...Honestly though this whole palaver made the day much more memorable and we will laugh about it for the rest of a our lives. We really appreciate the effort the hotel went to and they did make Ellie feel special, it just made us laugh how different the culture is in the Balkans to back home!
After a wonderfully cold night with the Air con on the coldest setting we headed up to Tara canyon to meet Dan & Leanne.
We met Dan & Leanne earlier in our trip at Plitvice lakes. Dan had arranged for us to go rafting down the canyon and this is something I was extremely excited for!
Tara canyon is the 2nd deepest canyon in the world (after the Grand Canyon), I'm not going to lie I only found this our about 2 days before we were heading there but I still can't get over this fact.
Rafting down the canyon was one of my highlights of the entire trip, there had been a storm that night and the mist had descended into the valley making the trip feel even more Jurassic park than you can imagine.
That night we had a BBQ and watched the AJ get beat in the boxing again and decided due to the bad weather in the mountains we would head back down to the coast.
The toilet/shower facilities haven't been the best on the last couple of sites and we couldn't believe our look when we found Restella camp. A small family run campsite that comes with...private bathrooms for each pitch! And home made rajika, red wine and freshly picked grapes from the vines on the campsite. All this for £15 a night we couldn't believe our luck! Ivo & Milenko were a top guys as well and made everyone feel super welcome. I could not recommend this place enough!
The camp site is a short walk to the local beach and this was our first point of call after a hot and sticky day. We went for a quick swim to cool down...which ended in another disaster! Me standing on a sea urchin.
We spent the next few days relaxing and coming up with a plan for the next part of our journey. We explored a few local beaches, got my tyre fixed at a local garage, visited Stari bar old town and come up with a plan to head back into Croatia and go towards Bosnia....
