By Corey Sandler, Destination Consultant Silversea Cruises

Montenegro is a ten-year-old nation with a thousand-year back story and some spectacular scenery at sea level and up in the mountains that fill much of the country’s interior.

Kotor, the port we are visiting, presents one of the most spectacular views offered from a cruise ship: an ancient city carved into the face of a mountain.

Silver Cloud at the dock in Kotor today

Montenegro, part of what was once Yugoslavia, is one of the smaller countries in the world: about 14,000 square kilometers or 5,300 square miles.

A KOTOR ALBUM 

Our approach to Kotor is through a winding waterway that some tourist guides insist on calling a fjord. That’s not technically correct: a fjord is a long, narrow inlet with steep sides or cliffs in a valley carved by glaciers.

Nearly all of the earth’s glaciers are at or near the poles, with only a few way up high in mountains near the planet’s mid-section.

What we’ve got in Kotor is a drowned river valley. The river was long ago covered over by a rising sea level in the region.

On our approach just short of Kotor is a bay where we make a 90-degree turn to starboard.

Directly ahead is the little town of Perast, which under the Venetians was a very prosperous mini-maritime state with its own fleet and a bit of wealth.

And offshore are two islets.

One is a natural islet, Sveti Đorđe, the Island of Saint George, which contains a Benedictine Monastery from the 12^th century and an ancient graveyard.

The second island is Our Lady of the Rocks. According to legend, local seamen found an icon of Madonna and Child on a rock in the sea at this location on July 22, 1452.

The seamen were said to have made an oath: upon returning from each successful voyage, they laid a rock in the Bay. Over time, the islet gradually emerged from the sea.

The custom of throwing rocks into the sea continues; every year at sunset on July 22, a small flotilla of boats sails into the bay for an event called fašinada, throwing rocks into the sea widening the surface of the island, takes place.

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By Corey Sandler, Destination Consultant Silversea Cruises

Kotor, Montenegro is not a place many people visit very often.

I do.

This is our third visit to the spectacular city in the hill this summer. For more details and photos, see my blog entries for June 13 and June 5.

A KOTOR ALBUM

I have sailed many times past the little island that holds Our Lady of the Rocks,  on an island built by residents of Perast in 1452.

Perast, under the Venetians, was home to several thousand,  with a fleet of 100 boats.  Today,  only about 300 people remain,  amidst 16 grand palaces

Text and images copyright 2015 by Corey Sandler. All rights reserved. If you would like to purchase a high-resolution image, please contact me.

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By Corey Sandler, Destination Consultant Silversea Cruises

Montenegro, of course, means Black Mountain.

And the region has had a version of that name for centuries, but not always in a Romance Language.

As far back at the 14^th century, the hilly area was called Tsrna Gora (“Black Mountain.”)

Today its name is an adaptation of the Italian-Venetian translation to monte negro. Modern Italian would be monte nero.

Not that they speak Italian or Venetian anyhow.

The official language of Montenegro is Montenegrin, which is nearly the same as Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian. In some areas, Albanian is the local preference.

A KOTOR ALBUM

Photos by Corey Sandler

We were last here just over a week ago; see my blog entry for June 5 for more detail and photos. 

 

Text and images copyright 2015 by Corey Sandler. All rights reserved. If you would like to purchase a high-resolution image, please contact me.

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By Corey Sandler, Destination Consultant Silversea Cruises

Montenegro is a nine-year-old nation with a thousand-year back story.

The nation, carved out of what was once Yugoslavia, is one of the smaller countries in the world: about 14,000 square kilometers or 5,300 square miles.

It’s smaller than The Bahamas, a bit larger than Qatar or Jamaica.

Montenegro’s coast line is on the Adriatic Sea, at its south-west border.

A KOTOR ALBUM

Photos by Corey Sandler

Croatia is to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast, Albania to the southeast, and Kosovo to the east. That’s a pretty rough neighborhood.

Montenegro, of course, means Black Mountain.

And the region has had a version of that name for centuries, but not always in a Romance Language.

As far back at the 14th century, the hilly area was called Tsrna Gora, which means…Black Mountain.

Today its name is an adaptation of the Italian-Venetian translation. Modern Italian would be montenero.

Today, the official language of Montenegro is Montenegrin, which is nearly the same as Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian.

Some people have called the Bay of Kotor “Europe’s southernmost fjord.”

That’s an interesting description. It has the feeling of a fjord in Norway or Chile.

We sailed a deep, twisting watery path from the sea about 17 miles into the interior.

But in technical terms, it’s not a fjord at all. A fjord is a long, narrow inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created in a valley carved by glaciers.

Nearly all of the earth’s glaciers are at or near the poles, with only a few way up high in mountains near the planet’s mid-section.

Kotor is at 42 degrees north, which is slightly closer to the equator than it is to the North Pole.

Instead, what we’ve got in Kotor is a drowned river valley. The river was long ago covered over by a rising sea level in the region.

On our sail-in, around the last bend ahead of us lay the Old City of Kotor.

The map of Kotor looks to me like a ski mountain: a city in the hill.

The city walls were built by the Republic of Venice when Kotor was an important trading port.

On this visit, I went to the ancient town of Budva, a seaside resort begun by Illyrian Greek tribes and then enhanced over the millennia by Romans and then local Slavs and Montenegrins.

It is also the home of a very exclusive (and expensive) resort on Sveti Stephan island.

A BUDVA ALBUM

Text and images copyright 2015 by Corey Sandler. All rights reserved. If you would like to purchase a high-resolution image, please contact me.

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO PURCHASE AN AUTOGRAPHED COPY OF ONE OF MY BOOKS, PLEASE CONTACT ME.

SEE THE “How to Order a Photo or Autographed Book” TAB ON THIS PAGE FOR INSTRUCTIONS