Montenegro
Trip Start
May 24, 2005
1
13
25
Trip End
Ongoing
Kotor,
Serbia and Montenegro
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
The land is mountainous, as the name would suggest, and well forested. The road almost immediately becomes cleanly tarmacked with white lines running down the centre (signs at the side of the road attribute this to EU and USAID investment). The vineyards and fields of crops stretch for acres thanks to the presence of tractors and other heavy farming equipment - the first of which we have seen since Italy. In fact, what with their general acceptance of the Euro (all menu prices were in euros and cashiers didn't ever bother to tot up sums in the local currency) and their EU-funded infrastructure, a visitor might be forgiven for thinking S&M is already full integrated.
Originally we were going to head on through to Croatia but a guy in the bus station insisted we stop off and see Kotor (much nicer than Dubrovnik he said, and as he was the only person to smile at us during our time in the country we were moved to take his advice). The trip was beautiful, winding down steeply from mountain to coast as the sun set, turning the peaks any number of shades of blue and purple. Into Kotor late at night and a guy touting for business sold us his guest room.
Waking after a fitful sleep in our annex a stone's throw from the beautiful waters of an inlet from the Adriatic, we wondered what it was about this place that was giving us a 'funny feeling'. Families were picknicking and sunbathing on concrete plinths jutting into the clear water of the wide bay, the mountains rose steeply all around and the air was fresh with the scent of pine and flowers. But something kept nagging away. We entered the walled town of Kotor and encountered our first tourists since Sarande in Albania (mostly French). On the surface it all looked right - seemed to be working - but...but what?
Eventually we admitted it to ourselves. No-one was smiling. They hardly even seemed to talk to each other. Gone was the safe and comforting feeling of being amongst friends or would-be friends that we had felt in Albania, and in its place had descended a stifling atmosphere of mutual dislike.
With a bitter taste in our mouths we boarded the bus for Dubrovnik.
