Kotor

On a whim one night out we were offered a few seats in the back of our friends Eric and April's car to take a day trip from Dubrovnik down to a town called Kotor in Montenegro. I knew nothing of Kotor and Montenegro, so I thought it would be interesting. We jumped on the opportunity and were all very pleasantly surprised.

Kotor is a small town built around a bay with towering 10,000 foot surrounding mountains. Above the center of town is a castle. It lies 3600 feet about and has a path leading to the top. The hike offers stunning views of the bay and mountains.

Kotor is a city that has been untouched in terms of tourism. An example of this can be seen in this castle climb. There are many points in which your safety is not guaranteed. Big cliffs, large broken breaks in the walls climbing up to the top. But the biggest example can be seen in the castle at the very top. After your hour long climb the reward are nice (even if broken up) castle ruins. It is nothing grand or huge, but very pleasant. To get into the ruins you must cross this bridge that felt like it could break at any point. At the top of the castle one side is steep sheer cliff with a drop of at least 1500 feet. If I fell it would be auto-death. There is no protection against it, no guard rail, not even a rope. Just a sign that says “High Danger Area” when entering the castle. You don’t even know what its talking about until you check out this spot where one wrong step would be the end of you. Something like this would not fly in a highly touristic area.

Kotor is a city thats a total noob in terms of tourism but I don’t think it will stay that way. With eastern European countries becoming more and more attractive to tourists the name Montenegro will become more and more popular. Expect to hear the city of Kotor in that conversation as it will be dubbed as the new Como.


Kotor is a city that I would strongly recommend to anyone. It is beautiful, fun, and relatively unknown. There are very few tourists which adds to the charm of the city. At the restaurant we ate the server thought we didnt have enough money to order more food and told us we could pay him tomorrow. That doesn't happen much. Kotor is quiet, sleepy and offers plenty of hiking, boating, and beautiful scenery. Plus the food is good and not overly priced. So strike while the irons hot and make it out there if you can before the tourists start swarming, you won’t be disappointed.