Ostrog Monastery, Montenegro
The following morning we left Kotor and drove around the bay of Kotor again passing Perast and Risan. Outside of Risan, we took the road inland over the mountain to Niksic and then down to Ostrog Monastery. Driving the hairpin loops up the mountain was quite a thrill. High on a cliff, above a valley, the Ostrog Monastery is the most important site in Montenegro for Orthodox Christians. The Orthodox church, built in 1665, encompasses two caves and it is not known to this day how it was built into the cliff 900 meters above the valley. There are the relics, bones, of Saint Basil in the church so it is a pilgrimage site as confirmed by the numerous sleeping mats outside the cave. We waited in line 30 minutes to get into the church. Even with parking in the upper lot and not the lower Monastery lot, there were a fair number of steps to get to the entrance of the monastery. We spent an hour at the monastery, and it took almost an hour to get back to Niksic.
We continued on to Zabljak which is in the Durmitor national park, a UNESCO site. The mountains are really impressive and create Montenegro’s main ski resort. Zabljak, although not charming, looks like an alpine ski town.
We had dinner at the hotel. The homemade bread was warm and delicious. Dinner including a veal steak, Greek salad, a glass of wine and a beer, was EUR 17. Much more meat on the menu here. Gone are those seafood dishes.
The next morning we drove to Durmitor Park to walk around Black Lake. We paid a park fee of EUR 3 per person and E 2 for the car. It’s a ten minute walk to the lake on a paved road, and then you reach the dirt path that goes around the Lake. We walked around Black Lake which is really green, but called Black Lake because of the tall conifer and spruce trees giving the lake a dark color. It was 4 km around the lake and all beautiful. There are 18 lakes that feed it and many “celines” (springs) that appear in the spring when the underground water breaks the rocks.
We drove up to Curovac to hike another trail. This trail has great views into the valley and of the Tara river. This trail was pretty rugged.
That evening we went to the Restaurant Dedovina in Hotel Engima for dinner as earlier we had had stopped to check out the menu and determined it had interesting regional cuisine and was charmed by the rustic tavern atmosphere. I had a grilled goat cheese which was like the grilled halloumi cheese from Turkey. My husband had a veal dish and a Greek salad. The total bill with beer and wine was EUR 20.
Excerpt from my article, Mountains, a monastery, and reminder of war – a self-drive tour of the Balkan countries, published in the September, 2015 issue of International Travel News.
