Cycling around Podgorica
Montenegro is a rather small country. After one and a half days of riding, I reach the capital Podgorica where the friendly and welcoming key manufacturer and Hospitalityclub member Ivan provides not only information about the relations of Montenegran people with their neighbours, but also a small room in the basement of a building in the town center - my base for the short roundtrips on the subsequent days.
After a busy day in Podgorica with four different meetings and a relaxing evening in the city's small pedestrian zone, I get back on the road again to meet up with Euronatur expert Martin Schneider in Ulcinj on the coast. On the way there, I pass the old town of Bar. As Edon and Bogdan, seven and ten years old, recognize that I am the "prvi turist koj govori srbski" (the first tourist that speaks Serbian), they follow me for the next hours, show me Bar's deserted ruins, their favorite bathing place and offer fresh pomegranates from the surrounding trees.
Martin Schneider spontaneously invites me to stay for a night in the castle hotel at Ulcinj and we have a fascinating evening conversation about the future of the Skadar lake and Montenegran tourism. I take off the next day and drive to the small island Ada next to the Albanian border. Once a Europe-famous nudist beach, the area has been almost completely abandoned for 15 years. Time didn't stand still, nature reconquered the territory and I spend the afternoon exploring dozens of decaying and overgrown buildings and structures.
The sun goes down and I am looking for a place for wild camping, as I stumble across Arian, an Albanian economics student. Today is Sunday and he is outside, herding the family's two cows. He invites me home, we share coffee, tea and cigarettes, do his German language homework and lay the base for my first steps in Albanian. Later that evening, Arian feels like going out. With his fathers car, listening to Albanian techno music at full volume, we drive back to Ulcinj, take a stroll along the promenade and let the hours pass with coffee and more coffee.
After an exhausting up-and-down trip along the beautiful rugged Southern coast of Skadar lake, I find myself the next evening in the house of Darko, a Montenegran draftsman. His 10-year-old son Stephan willingly translates the whole conversation. He learned to speak almost perfectly German - without school courses or contacts to tourists, only by watching German satellite TV for two years. At the end of the evening, Darko apologizes that I cannot sleep in his house - the whole family has only one room to sleep in. I pitch my tent on the back of his old pickup that is parked outside, instead
My next target is the Durmitor National Park in the mountains. Weather forecasts predict heavy snow, so I have to leave Durden, my bicycle, in Podgorica and take the bus to the village Zabljak, where I spend two days meeting local NGOs. Weather changes from sun to rain and then snow, and my schedule leave me plently of time to absorb the different atmospheres of the Durmitor region. As I drive back to Podgorica, freezing in the back of the Bus despite warm clothing, I know that I have to come back to this country - in summer.
06.12.2005 17:29h
More Articles
|
More Stories from Montenegro
More Pictures of Montenegro
Map of Montenegroand its Biospheres
(UNESCO site)
All Countries
Which nations have been or will be visited?
|
Travel Report
