Dubrovnik was a disappointment. The old town was crowded and we couldn’t find anywhere to park. We drove past the old city walls and saw the fortress from a distance,so decided that we had had enough and moved on.
The road down the coast was beautiful but the scenery was ruined by the endless succession of hotels, apartments and restaurants. When we got to the border with Montenegro, which apparently isn’t in the EU and we have to pass through customs and passport control, we were asked for “Montenegro insurance” and I got sent to a little office where I had to pay 15 euros.
The satnav saved us time and money by sending us on the little car ferry across the Kotor Bay,
The boat
Our van on the boat
Jennifer
but by the time we reached Budva I was sick of the heavy traffic and endless tourist facilities so we took the spectacular road which serpentined up over the mountains towards Podgorice, the capital of Montenegro. We visited Cetinje, apparently a former royal capital but had nothing worth stopping for and, setting the satnav for Shkoder in Albania, were sent along a single track road for perhaps 40 miles through glorious countryside of forests (short trees or tall shrubs with meadow-sweet trees permeating the air with their scent) and met a charming goatherd who couldn’t speak because he had a hole in his throat.
The goatherd and his flock
The road went through this natural arch.
A pic of Lake Shkoder on the border between Montenegro and Albania
Eventually we came to the border with Albania and were sent to an office for Albanian insurance which would have cost us 49 euros but the internet was off so the policeman waved us on and told us to drive carefully. Which I did, sticking strictly to the 50 kmph speed limit. Just as well because a car which overtook me was immediately flagged down by a policemen who jumped out in front of it. We continued until we found a quiet little side road, and spent the night opposite one of a previous dictators ridiculous pill boxes which can be seen all over the countryside and were supposed to deter a Russian invasion. We heard the muezzin at the nearby mosque sing the azam (call to prayer) and fell asleep to the sound of dogs barking from all directions.
