Dubrovnik Day Trip To Montenegro

As promised last week in my blog post about Bosnia and Herzegovina, I am going to tell you about another fun day trip from Dubrovnik to an additional great country – the beautiful Montenegro. This time we will only need to make one border crossing, so let’s go!

Montenegro is a small country relatively speaking – we actually drove through 40% of it and spent several hours each in two cities. Because of its size, we were able to spend a little more time in each city to truly explore all it had to offer.

To save even more time we took a ferry on the Bay of Kotor from the town of Kamenari to Lepetane instead of driving. The scenery of the Bay and surrounding areas were beautiful. Fun fact: the Bay of Kotor was rated one of the 25 cleanest bays in the world and I can see why!

Our first major stop was in Budva. Budva is a 2,500-year-old city, which makes it one of the oldest settlements on the Adriatic coast! Its fortifications are typical of the Medieval cities of the Adriatic with towers, gates, a citadel and, of course, churches too. There are three specific churches built in the 7th and 8th centuries in Old Town – Santa Maria being the most famous.

I knew we were going to be exploring many churches at our next stop so chose to walk around Old Town and admire the mix of old and new architecture and history – it is one of the oldest towns in Europe but also has an eclectic side with a heavy Russian influence. The diversity was really fun to see in such an interesting town.

Although Budva is notable for its long history and its well-preserved Old Town, Budva is also a great beach resort city (it has 17 beaches) with a lively and vibrant atmosphere and a very active nightlife (although we didn’t stay long enough to experience that). Some nightclubs and casinos are open 24 hours a day – even a recent James Bond movie, Casino Royale, was filmed here. We did have a lovely lunch on the boardwalk near one of the beaches and even caught a glimpse of the city’s own Eiffel Tower.

Budva also has one island (St. Nicholas) that draws locals and tourists alike. The locals call the beaches on St. Nicholas, Hawaii (PlažaHawaii) although no one is sure why because the beaches there are quite unlike Hawaii - they are rocky and pebbly and, as I’m sure you know, Hawaii beaches are mostly nice and soft…very different to say the least. Maybe it’s because that is what they imagine it would be like, but who knows?

Our next major stop was in the city of Kotor – another beautiful fortified town on the Adriatic coast. The town, first mentioned in 168 BC, was settled during the ancient Roman times but the surrounding fortifications were built during the Venetian period (there is still a strong Italian influence seen throughout the town). Kotor’s historic appeal of cobblestone streets, stone houses with green shutters and orange tiled roofs have been preserved and as such, has earned it a designated UNESCO site. Before you enter the Old Town, you will notice two very old structures on top of the hill. You need to look closely though, as they are camouflaged into the mountain. There is an old castle and then just below that the Church of Our Lady of Remedy built in 1518. It can be reached by a short hike, which many make to pray for good health at the church (as legend says that is what it will bring). I guess we felt we had enough walking that day and were just fine seeing the outside. Remnants of fortified medieval times are seen throughout this area -- like an original bridge submerged under water when the earthquake of 1667 destroyed it.

I mentioned earlier that we would be seeing many old churches and that we did! Kotor has heaps of lovely old Romanesque churches especially in medieval Old Town, including the striking St. Tryphon’s Cathedral (St. Kotor Cathedral). Today, Orthodox Christians far outnumber Catholics in Kotor (the reverse of Dubrovnik Old Town), yet the Catholic St. Tryphon’s is the symbol of the city and the best-known tourist attraction. It was built in 1166 and houses the relics of St. Tryphon (the city’s patron saint and protector) along with a treasury of immense value. There are frescoes from the 14th century in its interior and a small museum off to the side.

St Nicholas is relatively new church (by medieval standards of course) built in 1909.

St. Lucas Church dates back to 1195 and is one of the older churches with original frescos inside. St. Lucas is interesting because it has two alters, one for Catholic and one for Orthodox.

The Franciscan church of Sveta Klara (St. Clara) was built and reconstructed several times between the 14th and 17th centuries and is famous for its exquisite baroque altar made of colorful marble.

Many former family palaces have been refurbished and repurposed into galleries and museums, but some still remain as private homes. Most have Romanic and Baroque styles with some strong Italian elements as well. I am not sure if the building was once a former palace, but there is even a Cat’s Museum dedicated to all the cats of Kotor that roam freely throughout the city.

Be sure to save some time to take a boat to the island of Our Lady of the Rocks on your visit to Kotor. There are several boats that make the 10-minute ride across and back. It is fascinating that this is an artificial island that took 200 years to build created solely by rocks. The Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Rocks is the largest building on the island and even has a museum attached. According to legend, the island was made over the centuries by local seamen who kept an ancient oath after finding the icon of Mary and Jesus on the rock in the sea in 1452. Upon returning from each successful voyage, they would lay a rock in the Bay. Over time, the island gradually emerged from the sea. The custom of throwing rocks into the sea is alive even nowadays. We were told that legend also says that touching the alter inside the church will bring good health. We literally arrived at the island five minutes after the church had closed so decided that touching the door would have to suffice (and even convinced the family in our small tour group to do the same).

After visiting the island, we made our way back to Dubrovnik. It was another long but exciting day trip and we were able to catch the most amazing sunset while driving back – almost like an exclamation mark to a beautiful sentence! Although we were in a different country for the day, it didn’t seem like a long day and wasn’t as rushed as our day trip to Bosnia. Of course, we only had to go through one border crossing this time and that helped. It was a lovely day trip and definitely something I would recommend.

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