The original plan was to spend all of June in Slovenia, until meeting a special guest in Zagreb on 8th July. Instead, I spent 10 days in Slovenia, travelled all the way to Montenegro, and am now travelling back up to Slovenia (via Bosnia) to spend the rest of the time before the 8th. Why? I thought a little bit about how I was going to explain this route deviation but I’ve decided to just be honest… It’s not to save Schengen days! It’s to spend a few more days with a guy I met in Prague and liked a little too much. An Australian called Will. Because if now isn’t the time to travel 18 hours to see a guy you’ve known for 10 days, when is? And I’m so so glad I did. This is a big perk of travelling alone and having a very flexible plan with nothing really booked ahead.
But Montenegro round 1 - I’ve left the country with a lot of wonderful memories, less hair, more tattoos and a new plan for August.
In Budapest Will’s friend Paul joined from Australia to travel with him. Paul’s family are from Ulcinj, a town in the south of Montenegro on the coast, so this was our first stop. We stayed for two nights, in an apartment of a family friend. It was a nice little town, we spent most of our time relaxing and swimming at the beach. There was a night club on the seafront called Big Ben, where the DJ booth was at the top of a replica Big Ben tower so that was kind of strange. Our next 2 nights were spent in Kotor, another town on the coast but in the North. It was back to hostel living after almost a two week break for me! We all enjoyed the pub crawl that night, and the skinny dip to end it (with the hostel being 5 metres from the beach it would be rude not to). One day we caught the bus to Perast, a smaller town on the coast, and had our first true Balkan bus experience. Namely, there are no timetables, you just go to the bus station and hope a bus turns up. Luckily one eventually did. Perast was lovely, it reminded me of Capri or somewhere on the Amalfi coast. Whilst we were relaxing on the beach we had a view of two small islands, one with a monk’s house on it and one with a church. After some debate over whether or not it would be possible to swim out to them, Will was adamant he would do it. And so Olivia (a girl from the hostel who had joined us) and I went with him, although at a much slower pace! We got there eventually, it took 30 minutes I think. We couldn’t even stand up on the island once there, because it was sacred and we were in bikinis, but at least we had a sense of achievement from it… The swim back felt even longer. Then we started the impossible task of getting the bus back. We waited in what we believed was the correct spot for around 45 minutes, luckily the view was insane. And the bus eventually did come! When I walked into the hostel I heard someone shout “Meg!” - it was Andy and Kevin from Prague and Budapest! Europe really is a small place sometimes. Will and Paul were leaving the next day and I was unsure of what my plan was, but seeing Andy and Kevin made me decide to stay one more night in Kotor to spend time with them.
Will and Paul’s bus was at 8am, but Will and I woke up at 4:30am to hike to the fort half way up the mountain that loomed over Kotor, to watch the sunrise. It’s my favourite memory so far. The walk was unbelievably sweaty, despite the sun not being up yet. But the view was 100% worth it. There was a sea mist over the bay, and the colours were so soft. The company was pretty great too. Thinking about it makes me smile. It was a perfect way to spend our last morning together. The goodbye was sad, but I guess that means it really was worth me coming down to Montenegro in the first place.
I felt a little lost after their bus departed, so I bought a slab of cherry tart and enjoyed it with a coffee in the old town. Then I went to see if I could get a haircut, and I now have a true french boy style going on. This is the first time I’ve had really short hair, but I like it a lot, and am happy to have braved it. I spent the rest of the day chilling with Andy and Kevin and some other people from the hostel. A tattooist was staying at the hostel and doing tattoos. His style was exactly what I was wanting for my next tattoo, so it seemed like fate and I got this year’s birthday tattoo a bit early! At 11pm in the hostel kitchen. Olivia then got a spontaneous one on the beach, which is a pretty cool place to get a tattoo. Even cooler that she got the year of my birth (and the year of her birth, but I’m not sure that’s relevant…).
After getting a total of 6 hours sleep over the last two days I was proud to make my 7:40am bus to Mostar, Bosnia the next morning. So it’s goodbye to Montenegro for now, but not for forever. I liked Kotor and the hostel so much that I’ll be volunteering there for the month of August!
