To be fair, not my first post pandemic trip but you don’t want me to bore you with my skiing trips. So here it is – The big family holiday.
Travelling again is a bit weird!
Montenegro. Faded soviet influence but bloody lovely.
Not sure where all the Russians have gone! Any ideas? Nice and quiet tho! Probs the time to come.
Don’t fly Ryan air! They are a shower. Jet 2, on the other hand, are the dogs bollox!
Airport queues are a fact of modern life, but don’t turn up too early – everyone else does. The queues actually die down!
Queues are shorter for gender neutral toilets. I can be flexible.
Citizens of Europe appear not to need to queue at the other end. Not sure why!
Yeyyyyy. We now get stamps in our passports. Just like 40 years ago.
I found out I can’t do anything without a mobile phone data plan. And everything needs a sodding app, even parking!
Surprise! Montenegro isn’t covered in the phone company free roaming agreements but the currency is the Euro!!. Roaming costs are eye watering! Sort out a travel eSIM before you go.
Strike that. If you can, wait and do it when you get here. The deals are much better (15€ for 500gb for 15 days! Compared to 20 quid for 10gb bought on the world wide information super highway from some dodgy Israeli company) you live and learn! The only trouble with this is to get the internet you need to be on the internet. Catch22 was a very good book though.
eSIM’s are a bloody revelation!
Google maps is crap at estimating the time to go through the border crossing – allow an extra hour!
Eastern European border guards are exactly how you would expect them to be, but without Kalashnikov’s! Take a pee before the queue – you could be a while
Airbnb can be awful and amazing in equal measure. It’s a lottery! Best bet is to make sure you act quickly if you have a shocker. We had an absolute worldie with our panic buy when we found out our first house was atrocious.
Roads and parking in Montenegro are asymmetric warfare! Motorways are not a thing. If you want to go somewhere, think of a time then double it!
Take a boat trip (a private one of course), but don’t take a bus trip! Usual rules apply! Saw a proper James Bond submarine hideout on the blue cave boat … awesome! Still got “ding, Diddley, ding ding ta ding” going on in my head! The rest of the trip was great – sea forts, fish restaurants, swimming in the warm sea. Fantastic… but on the way back had to sit opposite a guy with the worst case of “Chernobyl fallout” I’ve ever seen (you have to say it out loud to get teh joke)- off, leg and middle stump hanging out of his swim shorts all the way back! That makes for a long return trying not to look and laugh.
I’ve created a new destination assessment system, the IICPI (International Ice Cream Price Index). A fool proof way of assessing relative costliness of a destination. Based on the local ice cream price and a benchmark figure (not pulled out of my arse) sourced from at least 3 mins of furious googling. I think I will write an academic paper on it for the Economist! I will take submissions from my 12 followers to build an extensive data base of crowd sourced comparisons – price for a single scoop of proper ice cream (not Mr Whippy) in a waffle cone (in Euros).
Kotor, in principle, lovely! Medieval walled town with beautiful cobbled streets. In practice, packed with complete arse pains and surrounded by an unsympathetic urban sprawl. Ruined by the cruise ship trade. Kotor’s International Ice Cream Price Index (IICPI*) 1.15
Perest, on the other hand is very classy, unspoilt and pedestrianised. A gem! But a IICPI of a shade over 1.23!
Herceg Novi IICPI 0.33. A medieval walled town in daily use. A really quiet, smaller, scruffier version of Kotor. We preferred it.
Off to Croatia. 4 lots of passport stamps and up the coast to Dubrovnik. Putting aside the £30 a head to walk the walls (a cost which simply had to be bourn), it is, hands down, without doubt, one of the prettiest cities in the world. You wouldn’t believe that in 1992 the Yugoslav army bombed the shit out of it! IICPI=0.96 which given the number of cruise parties in, is a bloody miracle! In the EU roaming zone on your phone contract, but currency is the Kuna!!
Skadar lake… an amazing sight! Best approached over the mountain from Kotor to Rijeka. Amazing switch back roads built by the Austro-Hungarians – slightly pant staining when engaged in asymmetric warfare with a local coming the other way.
All the “advice” on the world wide information superhighway is to head to Virpazar for a boat trip. Don’t – it’s a den of thieves. €120 for a 2 hour boat trip in a bit of the lake where you can see litter and the main road to Podgorica. Lesson learned! And, I can’t give it an IICPI score because there aren’t any decent ice cream sellers…. Total fail!
Save yourself the money and take in the view from Rijeka, and if you must, take a boat from there.
Sveti Stepahan (sweaty Steven as we called it) – a seaside resort hell. Didn’t stay long enough for the IICPI score.
Budva: getting to the old town, which quite honestly is the only bit to go to, is like wading through Hades. The old town has been beautifully reconstructed following the 1979 earthquake – lovely spot, IICPI 0.33, food though is quite pricey.
Now… Bosnia & Hertzogivena… not exactly on the tourist trail, but none the less worth a visit, if only for another set of passport stamps. We seriously considered the drive to Sarajevo but at four and a half hours each way it was just too far. Quite fancied Mostar but again a bit far. Settled for Trebinje – very quiet medieval river crossing town, Just across the boarder – lovely and peaceful. Soooo bloody cheap IICPI 0.21 and £49 quid for a meal for five. Proper Bosnian food too! And a little twist, their currency is that Convertible Mark and is pegged to the Deutsche Mark.
Food: Mixed grill! I’ll leave it there.
In other news, fried octopus and the potato fried up with garlic and spinach are both very nice. Traditional fish and meat stews with local pasta are very tasty.
Don’t bother with the scampi. Very nice but you use more kilojoules getting them out of the shell than you consume and they cost a fortune (3 euros each!!!!). Would be a great starter at half the price.
The stews and slow roasted meat are the dogs b’s, but when it’s hot it’s all a bit much!
Hope you enjoyed my statistically irrelevant assessment of Montenegro and surroundings… we would definitely go back!
Thanks for the top tips and I’ll be passing them on to DH who is speeding through (think Steve McQueen) in September on his way to Albania. Interesting references to bollocks throughout and I’ll take heed for any forthcoming boat trips in Croatia next month and come prepared with a pair of scissors … xxx The Blonde one xx
Im very happy to find this website. I wanted to thank you for your time due to this fantastic read!! I definitely savored every part of it and i also have you book-marked to look at new stuff on your website.