Medieval infrastructure overloaded!

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I suppose that ridiculously late transportation was something that I needed to start getting used to in the Balkans. The train from Belgrade, to Bar in Montenegro pulled in nearly an hour late, and took almost another hour to get situated before it left. Luckily, we had two awesome Serbian girls sitting next to us which made the 11 hour trip a pretty good time, with a lot of laughs. We were so loud (and didn't even realize it), that the other people sharing a cabin, an elderly couple, got up with a sour look on their face and abandoned their seats. The scenery from the Serbian and Montenegran countryside was absolutely stunning, except that whenever we got poised to take a picture, we'd enter a noisy tunnel. I was able to get some shots in though, and also a few pictures of forest fires on the mountains which we saw once it got dark.

The train got in several hours later than it was supposed to, and we took a taxi to Kotor, an old medieval city which was supposed to be a hidden gem. An hour and a half later, around 230 AM, we pulled in as partiers were starting to head back home from the bars and clubs. We were tired, sweaty, probably smelly, and had nowhere to stay. Every place we stopped into was booked solid, and after an hour of searching, the only place with availability was an expensive 4-star hotel that was a few kilometers aways from the medieval part of the city, but beggars can't be choosers.

The next morning, after enjoying the included breakfast, at a bus stop where the bus never showed up, we met into a Czech couple also trying to get back to the old city. Luckily, some guy called Zoltan picked us up, gave us a ride, and offered us rooms at his neighbor's house. Unfortunately, he gave us the wrong phone number and we weren't able to get in contact with him to confirm. This led us into a bit of a dilemma... there was nowhere to stay. Kotor doesn't seem to have enough infrastructure to deal with its rapidly growing summer tourism, and to make matters worse, it was fashion week and a bunch of models, designers, and everything else associated with that industry was in town for nightly fashion shows.

We put the worry out of our minds and explored Kotor which is an amazing place. It's an old walled, medieval town that is still fully functional with small business offices besides the usual touristy fare, which is unusual for small places like that. The nightlife is also kicking, and the city is always bustling. There is a huge fort going up a mountain which we sweatily ascended and provided us with some awesome views of the whole city.

We were able to snatch up what was possibly the last room available in the city, staying at a local's extra apartment, and moved in. After an amazing dinner amidst techno music which seemed to be making the city walls thump, we met up with some British guys who we'd met earlier when trying to find rooms. The streets were full of what seemed like fashionistas, or at least, I assumed so by the crazy styles many of the people were wearing, the oversized sunglasses worn at night with the nose high up in the air. Time flew, and before we knew it, everything was closing.

We headed to Croatia the next morning on a horrible bus ride. The bus pulled in an hour late, was oversold , so we had to sit on the floor (some people weren't able to make it on, so we were counting our blessings on the floor), and stopped for an hour in a random city waiting for a bigger bus. The border crossing took another hour, unnecessarily, and we all in all, pulled into Dubrovnik 3 hours late, tired, irritated, and smelly.

Lessons learned: if you're in Montengro, book ahead, and don't ride the buses.

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