Montenegro -- Part 1

Before I keep my promise to write about my trip to Montenegro, I better warn you that this will probably be a little long. But you’re so used to that by now that you probably just expect it from me, right? ;) Well, now that that’s out of the way, on to my adventure!

Emily and I headed over to Pastor’s house for English church on Sunday morning. We planned to start church at 9am, which isn’t all that early. But we had monstrous thunderstorms the night before. Since buildings here are made of cement, not wood and insulation, the thunder was super loud. Just obnoxious. If it had been a normal thunderstorm, I think I would have been able to sleep through it. However, since this one was monstrous, it shook the shelves and lights, blew windows open, and subsequently created a huge puddle out of the bathroom floor and the kitchen floor. We were awakened around 5:30am and cleaned things up a little bit and went back to bed when things quieted down around 6am. This made for a short little early morning nap before we got up to get ready and pack around 7:30am. But we managed and made it to the Ahlers’ on time for church.

It was drizzling as we walked over there and during church, and it was sprinkling by the time we loaded the car and hopped in to leave. The drive through Albania was not really anything special. We went through the smaller town areas and saw the large number of unfinished buildings. I mentioned such buildings in an earlier entry and on this trip I found out that they are just as common in villages and small towns as they are in bigger cities like Tirana and Durres. Also, we saw tons of bunkers. People aren’t kidding when they say Albania is the land of bunkers. I now understand why miniature ones are for sale in bookstores, souvenir shops, and gift shops. We even saw some of the really big ones that are large enough for vehicles to drive in to.

The border crossing was teeny tiny little buildings, but that was because it’s under construction. Albania and Montenegro are building a joint border patrol and crossing so there was a lot of construction around where we had to drive and get our passports checked. We had no problems and soon enough we went through “no man’s land” and were in Montenegro. When we were in “no man’s land” Pastor said, “Alright! Now we can do whatever we want!” And Emily replied, “You know that black line between the countries on the map? That’s where we are now.” It was funny because it’s actually true. It’s international land. Lol

So anyway, driving through Montenegro was interesting. Although their roads are much better paved and marked with signs and they drive in a more civilized fashion than Albanians, they don’t have as much control over their animals. We saw all sorts of animals in the road at random times with out people present. Sheep, donkeys, cows, dogs, chickens…Yeah, that pretty much sums up the barnyard animals that were just chillin’ on the road. It was funny though.

Then, all of a sudden we drove around this corner in the mountains and there it was, an absolutely gorgeous view of the Adriatic Sea and the coastal mountains. It would have been nicer if it had been sunnier, but it wasn’t raining at that point so we had a clear cloudy view, if that makes sense.

We were starving by that point and stopped at the restaurant that pastor always stops at according to his wife. It was at the top of the mountain and had amazing views of the sea. Even though it was chilly out, we sat outside to enjoy it. It was just so relaxing to sit there and look out over the sea with the chilly breeze pushing my hair in my face. Also, right below the balcony we were dining on was a little grove of lime trees in someone’s yard. It was so cute! Plus, I’d never seen a lime tree before. And across the street was one of many olive groves we passed. I’d never seen olive trees before either. They are something else with their gnarled trunks and the crooked way they grow. They also have tiny leaves that are whitish green. It reminded me of the color of the back side of silver maple leaves that you see when the wind blows in a good summer rain storm.

We left the restaurant and decided we’d head towards Budva (pr. BOOD-vah) instead of Ulqin (pr. ool-CHEEN). Ulqin is a beach city and since the weather that day was definitely not beach weather, we all agreed that Budva would be more enjoyable. We headed in that direction and made it to the city of Bar. Bar is the biggest port city of Montenegro. It’s probably also the biggest port city for Serbia as well because when Montenegro split from Serbia, it made Serbia a land locked country. Anyway, now that you have that little fun fact in your head for future trivia games, let me just say that we ended up stopping in Bar. :)

We kept seeing signs for Stari Bar, or Old Town Bar. We tried following them but instead we ended up at the site of some Olive trees. They wanted us to pay a Euro to get in, but since we could see everything from the street (it was just a little park with a low fence around it) we decided to get the same pictures from the street for free. We found out thanks to a poorly translated sign that the tree in the center is around 2000 years old and is most likely the oldest tree in Europe.

Once we’d seen that, we continued the hunt for Stari Bar. We found it. Stari Bar is the old, original city of Bar, complete with fortress walls and lookouts around it. They use a combination of the Latin alphabet and the Cyrillic alphabet in Montenegro and unfortunately for us, everything at Stari Bar was in the Cyrillic alphabet so I couldn’t read any of the real history. But I did read on something that it is kept preserved as a historical site by some historical society (go figure) and that it was badly damaged by an earthquake in 1979 but that it has been around for centuries.

That place was awesome! I have always wanted to see ruins of someplace really really old and I finally have! I just have to say that it is fascinating being in a part of the world that has ancient history and buildings that go with. Don’t get me wrong, I love America, but buildings with plaques that say “built in 1864” or whatever just won’t get me all that excited anymore. Even buildings on the east cost from the 1700s aren’t as much of a thrill as the sites here. Haha! God bless the USA, but Asia Minor and Europe started it all. ;) It’s really astounding to think that I’m in a part of the world that was once ruled by the Roman Empire and once by the Ottoman Empire as well. Wow! And then when you think about how close Albania is to Greece….WOW!!! St. Paul and other people who knew Jesus traveled this part of the world!

Stari Bar was absolutely fascinating to me. I can’t describe it fully without being able to narrate my pictures. But I will post the link to the photo albums of this trip and will do my best to write clear concise captions describing things as well. Just be a little patient with me. The fortress at Stari Bar was so old that it had places for archers to sit and the little narrow holes they shot through that branch off to the sides to people can shoot out but not in. In side the fortress was a complete city. There were little churches and pathways and it was just amazing. It was hard to believe I was finally at a place like that! While we were exploring there (They didn’t have tours or anything. You just paid two Euros and could wander around on your own for as long as you wanted.) it was lightly raining for awhile but I don’t even really remember noticing it because I had an umbrella and because I was so entranced with my surroundings.

When we left there, we stopped at this cute little place for ice cream. There was a steep cobblestone road coming up to the entrance of Stari Bar. You couldn’t drive on it, just walking was allowed, but it was adorable. It had houses that people still live in, tourist shops, bar kafes, and restaurants. But because of the Cyrillic alphabet, I couldn’t understand it all. Emily could at least pronounce things because she knows that alphabet from when she lived in Bulgaria. But they use the same Cyrillic symbols that Russia uses so there were some she didn’t know so well. The funny part was that when we went in to get ice cream, the lady didn’t speak English or understand a little Albanian, but she understood the Bulgarian that Emily remembered. All of a sudden Emily just started talking to the lady and I realized it wasn’t Albanian. I laughed right out loud when I realized what was happening. :)

I told you this was going to be long, and I wasn’t lying. I was so tired when we got back last night that I just had to wait 'til today to start writing this story. But now, after our first day of registration, I’m tired and need to rest. Plus, I fear that if I continue this post, you’ll stop reading and will then miss out on the fascinating tale in its entirety. ;) Just kidding. But I do want you to read the whole thing without getting bored, but I’m tired and need to stop now if I want to be awake through another day of registration tomorrow. We had over 15 people come and register today which was more than we were expecting! We’ll see how tomorrow goes.

Now that I know I have your attention with such a cliffhanger, I know you won’t want to miss out on the rest of my Montenegro escapade so I’ll “see” you here tomorrow—same time, same channel. Lol :)