Monday, September 12, 2011
Now that we are home and beginning to get rested and caught up, we’ll tell you about our last week in Europe. We were in Montenegro’s capital Podgorica, a city with a population of under 200,000 (almost one-third of the country’s population). It lies at the confluence of two rivers (one of which was dry when we were there) in a fertile plain bordered by mountains and near both the large Skadar Lake and the Adriatic Sea. Like most of this part of the world, it has experienced a lot of history. The earliest remains date from the late Stone Age. During WWII it was bombed over 70 times (first by the Germans and then by the Allies). Although not directly involved in the Yugoslav wars, it suffered economically. In May 2006 it became the official capital of the newly independent state of Montenegro. It has many modern buildings alongside older ones. Outdoor cafes and pedestrian walkways (one of the main streets is closed to traffic at 5 PM everyday) give it a people friendly atmosphere lacking in larger cities.
Once again we stayed in an apartment not far from our friends Adriana, Nikola and Karlo. Nikola had to return to work and Karlo started preschool so Adriana showed us the city during the day and made sure we tried several local dishes. In the evenings we would all go out – one evening to a very modern mall for shoes for Karlo, once to a “farm” (an area with some animals, several soccer fields, pony rides and a large play for kids with trampolines, balls, Frisbees, sand box, etc. where Karlo could run free), and to some Roman ruins.
One memorable day we drove up into the mountains to Lovcen National Park. The road to the park was a good highway and it took only about an hour. Entering the park we drove up Mt. Lovcen on a narrow winding road with many hairpin turns (tour buses needed both lanes to make the turns) to a small circular parking area. Marvin and Nikola opted to enjoy the view from the restaurant while Adriana, Karlo and Linda continued up to the summit. This involved climbing 461 open stairs (most of which were through a 264 foot long tunnel) up to a very narrow plateau that is 5,740 feet above sea level on which is a mausoleum for one of Montenegro beloved rulers, Petar II Petrovic Njegos (1813-1851). The 132 foot long path along this plateau is only 4.3 feet wide with sheer drops on either side and no railings or guard rails! Fortunately it was a clear day with no wind. The panoramic view is spectacular – it is said you can see most of Montenegro from this summit. The mausoleum itself is remarkable with a 28 ton sculpture of Njegos carved from one block of black granite. The ceiling above the statue is 1,307 square feet of gilded mosaic.
After leaving Mt. Lovcen, we stopped in Cetinje, the old capital of Montenegro. It still has many of the old style buildings and many of the former embassies house various government departments. Because it is in the mountains it is cooler than Podgorica and very picturesque. After exploring the town we drove off the main highway onto a very narrow, winding, bumpy one lane road to the very small (now only about 6 families live full-time) village of Bokovo where Nikola’s father was born and raised. Nikola’s parent own part of the original house and spend the occasional day or weekend there (no electricity or running water). We visited with them and Nikola’s sister for a few hours, enjoying a second lunch along with locally grown grapes and figs.
Returning to Podgorica we again turned off the main highway onto a (you guessed it) winding narrow mountain road down to the small town of Rijeko Crnojevica on a river of the same name which is one of the five rivers entering Skadar Lake. It has a lovely stone bridge built in 1854. The area is being developed for bird watching though the only fowl we saw were some ducks floating down the river.
We returned to Podgorica at 7 PM (the temperature was still 99 F) after a full day and greater appreciation for the ruggedness of this country. If there were some way to export rocks, this would certainly be a wealthy nation. We saw incredibly rocky terrain everywhere we went. They say you can tell when you leave Montenegro when you no longer see rocks. And indeed, on our flight back to Belgrade, Serbia, we could be fairly confident of when we flew over the border.
We spent only one night in Belgrade before catching an early morning flight to Munich and then to Newark, NJ. Bad weather delayed us several hours in Newark before we finally arrived in Greensboro 24 hours after arising in Belgrade. YAZOO!
See the last album of photos of the trip at
https://picasaweb.google.com/104998323846009190297/201109MontenegroIV
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