Our first point of business before leaving Dubrovnik and Croatia was to secure our transportation. We were planning on staying in Kotor, Montenegro (which Ron and Paul had already lovingly dubbed “the ‘Gro”) for the next couple days which is only 90km from Dubrovnik but, according to my estimates, probably four hours of travel if taking the bus (including connections and wait-time). Because we only had a couple days in the city (and the country!), we decided to rent a car to try to maximize fun time and minimize bus time (a.k.a. decidedly not fun time).Ron and I went to pick up the car on Friday morning and it was definitely a much less formal and much more entertaining process than renting a car would be in the US. First, we sat and waited while the two employees on duty did their best to try to rent to an older French couple…who only spoke French. It was a hilarious 25 minutes of conversation where the woman renting the car spoke a bizarre mix of 50% Croatian, 30% Spanish, 20% English, but added a splash of French in by answering “yes, yes” or “oui, oui” to everything she possibly could. (If you’re really trying you can actually answer “yes, yes” too many questions!) The couple renting the car spoke 90% French and 10% Spanish so you can imagine how smoothly this process went. Despite the serious confusion and lack of common language, the French couple finally walked out with a pair of keys and, after they were gone, the woman at the agency looked at me and Ron and said, “Thank God for English!” and rolled her eyes toward the door. “Who travels to Croatia and only knows French?”
After a much smoother English-only process, we went out with our rental agent to inspect the car before taking off. His boss jumped up and asked for the contract. She looked at us and said, “I have to check his work today because he came to work drunk last night.” Her employee didn’t even bat an eye and replied, “I was drunk before I came to work. Now I am just hungover." Important clarification. She handed him back the contract and raised her eyebrows with a “oui, oui, whatever” look on her face.
We proceeded to check the car and our agent began walking around it and marking all the many scratches and dents on the contract. “There’s one here…and a big scratch here…and here…people think they are James Bond when they are driving and I just don’t understand…and another one here…oh, wow, big one here…don’t they know that if they try to fight the wall that they will always lose?!...and this one…you know what? Why don’t we just draw one big circle around the entire car?!” Ron and I were cracking up the whole time. We finally got out of there with our “gently used” (decidedly abused) vehicle and were on our way to pick up Paul and Amanda.
We made the relatively short trip in two hours and arrived in Kotor which is cradled in a back nook of the southernmost fjord in Europe. Like much of the Croatian coastline, it was also under Venetian rule for around 400 years (at which time it was called “Cattaro”) but belonged to Austria for most of the 19th century until after WWI. Kotor is known for being spectacularly beautiful with a gorgeous old town and crumbling fortress walls nestled into a mountain and it did not disappoint. It really was a pretty awesome location. We let Paul and Amanda out near the old town to try to find a place to stay and Ron and I continued on to find our hotel and park the car.
I had out my trusty Google Maps and so we set off. Per the directions, we went a couple kilometers past the old town, took a left, and then drove another couple kilometers into the hills. I thought this was a bit strange as I always booked hotels or apartments as close to the center of town as I could but I had booked so many places for this trip (and all my previous trips!) at this point that I really couldn’t remember what I had booked let alone where exactly it was. I had the address, phone number, and the name of the place but no other details. (And seriously, should I really need any?)
Ron patiently took directions as we got closer and closer to the address and further and further from the old town. Strangely, however, it didn’t look like we were near any kind of hotels. We were basically in Kotor suburbia. We drove directly to the address and were sitting, very confused, outside someone’s home. Well, that clearly wasn't right. The road was blocked so I told Ron to drive down and around the “block” (a series of a badly paved or dirt roads between homes) and see if the hotel was just on the other side of the barricade. We drove to the other side and still, nothing but homes. Ron was hungry and getting increasingly annoyed (and also increasingly vocal about his annoyance). I was confused and frustrated too but had the exact address so wasn’t sure what was going on. I called the hotel but couldn’t get through although, not understanding the automated message in Montenegrin, I wasn’t sure if this meant that the line was busy, that I was supposed to enter a number for reception or help, or that the number didn’t even exist…at this point I was getting extremely nervous that I might have gotten scammed and there was not actually a hotel at all. Yikes!
We decided to drive back down to the main road and ask in the market. I hopped out and asked a woman selling snacks and drinks at an outdoor stand if she spoke English…nope, not a word. I went into the market and asked one of the employees if she spoke any English…again, nope, not a word. I was sick of asking (and, to be honest, didn’t expect to get a better answer unless I went back to the more touristy old town) and Ron seemed to be on the ragged edge of snapping if I didn’t figure out where to go very soon, so ensued a miming show with Blackberry reading addendums and the writing of key words on the backs of my old receipts to help guide the “conversation.” Through this mess of an attempt at communication I was finally able to figure out that the street name was actually the word for “Old Town” (Stari Grad) and that the hotel didn’t have a street, it was just a building number in the old town. Clearly. That makes so much sense.
I was so happy though that I thanked the woman profusely, exchanged a quick, “Ciao, ciao!” and ran back to the car. I gave the good news to Ron who didn’t actually look as happy as I had expected. Instead of a big smile I got the hook-jab combo of “Why didn’t you know that before we got here?” and “I’ve been hungry for the last 30 minutes of Kotor wandering!” looks. Sorry! It's my first time here too!
We parked and ran into the old town to find our hotel and, after scrambling around the bumpy (but beautiful), marble streets and alleys for a bit finally ran into the hotel (turns out having an address in “Old Town” isn’t super helpful when you’re trying to find an actual building…good thing that the old town is small!). We checked in, threw our bags in the door, and headed out immediately to find Ron some food. He seemed to be on the brink of a hunger-induced meltdown and I didn’t want to be on the receiving end of that so we walked out of the door of the hotel, walked ten meters to “Pizza Pronto,” and had pizza in our hands in literally less than two minutes. Can’t get any more pronto than that! Thankfully, Ron was able to cope with life once again. Disaster averted!
We met up with Paul and Amanda who had not yet had a chance to eat and, shocker, Paul led another mad charge to find and review every single menu in the old town. I was pretty over the menu hunt after five days of it but used the opportunity to check out our “new” old town. Kotor is much smaller and much less touristy than Dubrovnik (thank goodness!) and, as such, was really a very charming relief. There were certainly tourists around but they weren’t completely clogging the streets and the town itself seemed more real and less “Disneyland.” Dubrovnik is gorgeous but it’s almost so pretty that it looks like a movie set. Kotor looked more lived in and real and I liked it already. We finally settled on a restaurant for lunch (no surprise at this point that it was the first place we had checked 45 minutes earlier at the start of the search) and decided that we’d wait until early evening to walk up the 1,350 steps to the top of the fortress surrounding the city when it was a bit cooler out (80° instead of 90°F – you take what you can get!). We spent the afternoon checking out the city and just relaxing before our hike up the fortress walls.
The walk up to the fortress was awesome…lovely stone steps winding their way up what look like the equivalent of city walls on the side of a mountain fjord. The views of the fjord were fantastic, as were the remains of the old posts, a beautiful church with a knockout view, and, finally, the fortress at the top. We all made our way up and, true to form, I was climbing all over everything and standing places I probably shouldn’t stand (on a crumbling stone wall over a deep gorge) in an attempt to get the best pictures I could. Ron had become very protective of my camera over the trip as 1) I had some amazing pictures, and 2) because of number one, Ron had stopped taking his own pictures. Subsequently, I was standing on a decently precarious ledge when Ron said, “Hey! You shouldn’t be standing up there. It’s not safe…” I was thinking, “Awww…that is so nice that he’s thinking of my safety!” only to be slammed back in my (comparatively low) place with “…and if you do fall can you at least make sure to throw your camera back?” My jaw dropped to the ground. “I’ll be here to catch it!” he added helpfully. I said, “Well, it’s a good thing I know where I stand with you!” Ron laughed and came over to give me a hug. Remember, we had just (very quickly) come up 1,350 steps so were all pretty gross. I said, “Normally I would tell you not to hug me right now but after that comment you deserve to get slimed!” Punk.
We all headed back down again and then, as only crazy Americans (maybe crazy Californians is more appropriate) would do, Ron, Paul, and I decided to do it again for an extra workout. As the only normal one in the group, Amanda left to head back to her hotel while the rest of us ran up one more time, completely baffling all the other (non-American) tourists on the steps. We got some pretty confused looks from people as they realized we were coming up again. (Side story…the longest set of steps I can find in Helsinki is 50 steps high and I will sometimes run them in an attempt to create a poor man’s version of Lyon Street. As 50 steps is very short, I run them 20 times before I’m bored out of my mind and have to do something else. I have never seen anyone else running these steps and, in fact, they are actually the hang out where people meet to drink beer. The last time I went a bus full of Europeans started clapping for me. It was pretty embarrassing.)
After having such a great day in Kotor, we were ready for another great night out and started out with drinks at our hotel. We had been drinking wine and watching VH1 in the hotel (100 biggest music celebrity scandals or something equally intellectual) so were pretty happy by the time we left for dinner after 10pm. I think we put Amanda in charge of picking a restaurant and, lo and behold, we found one in five minutes (sorry, Paul!). At some point that night Amanda had figured out that my birthday had been a couple weeks before and that I had celebrated alone in Ljubljana so she had decided that we were celebrating it together that night. There was a man playing guitar and singing on the small square there and at some point I had gone to the bathroom and when I came back outside to the table he immediately began singing some sort of Montenegrin rendition of “Happy Birthday” which had somewhat similar lyrics and a very dissimilar tune. It was really cute. (Thank you, Amanda!)
We had heard that one of the famous drinks in Montenegro was called a “bambusa” or “bambuse” and was a mix of red wine and Coke. Amanda had been waiting for this all week and, finally given the menu option at dinner, was able to order one. The wine and bambusas kept flowing and everything just became more and more fun (and funnier). Dinner was capped off with a special happy birthday “banana split” (which Amanda had asked for and was supposed to coincide with the song but they had gotten this all mixed up) which consisted of a banana, a spoonful of ice cream, and a mountain of whipped cream. We weren’t complaining though (who doesn’t like whipped cream?!) and made short order of that before heading to another bar.
It was at that point that I wanted to try a bambusa and asked for it with diet Coke. The waitress shook her head and said, “No, no bambusa with diet Coke. Only regular. We have to open a bottle for that instead of just using machine.” I said, “Well, then can you bring me red wine and a bottle of diet Coke and I will make it myself?” She smiled and nodded quickly. The table was laughing at me and Ron definitely uttered the words “high maintenance.” It was actually pretty good even if it may not be the most sophisticated drink. (Ron then proceeded to drink nearly all of my high maintenance bambusa which probably worked out for the best for me anyway given how we all felt the next morning.) Amanda was definitely bambusa’ed at this point and although we were sitting at an outdoor café in the old town, she would jump up and run over to the neighboring bar / club every time she heard a song she liked and start dancing. So cute and so funny!
Ron and I were thinking of calling it a night so we all got up and walked toward the dancing Amanda. She was standing next to a group of Croatian girls who, when we walked up, starting yelling, “Dance! Dance!” and, of course, all being bambusa’ed, we did. So there we were in the middle of a square in Kotor dancing with a group of Croatians. One of them yelled over the music, “Where are you from?!” Paul replied with, “The United States. California.” He said “California” and the Croatian girls all yelled in unison, “CALIFORNIA! YEAH!” One of them continued, “I know Tupac! California Love!” to which Paul did as anyone would do in this position...and responded with a full-on white-boy rendition of California Love (a very good version, I have to say). Those Croatian girls went crazy for this and were singing (screaming) with him as we all danced in the square. I am not sure I have laughed so hard in years. It was pretty amazing.
One of the girls then threw in, “And New York, I love New York!” to which Paul, now in his rapper element, responded with another white-boy rap song, this time Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind.” So it was the four of us, about six Croatian girls, all screaming, “In New YOOOOORRRRK! Concrete jungle where dreams are made…there’s nothing you CAN’T do….these streets will make you feel BRAND NEW!!...” It was pretty ridiculous but absolutely hilarious. Amanda yelled and pointed at me, “It’s her BIRTHDAY!” The girls all screamed and gave me a birthday kiss on the cheek. One of them asked me, “How old are you?” I said, “Twenty-nine.” She stepped back, furrowed her brow, and said, “No! Nineteen!” I laughed (but I definitely liked her even better after that!). She pointed to Paul and Amanda, “Are you boyfriend and girlfriend?” Someone said yes. Then she pointed to me and Ron, “Are you boyfriend and girlfriend?” Ron said, “No, we are just very good friends…” at which point she cut him off and yelled, obviously, “KISS!” then they all (including Paul and Amanda) began chanting, “KISS! KISS! KISS! KISS! KISS! KISS!” I laughed and Ron, knowing there was no other way out, laid one on me and the whole group yelled, “YEEAAAAHHH!” and continued to jump and dance around.
We started taking pictures together and another random group of girls walked by, one of them wearing a beauty queen-ish sash. One of our new Croatian friends grabbed the beauty queen by the arm and pulled her into the picture. I’m pretty sure there a few pictures of Ron, Paul, and about ten random girls including a sash-wearing beauty queen in the Kotor old town square posted in a few places on Facebook right about now! (I actually don’t have any of them and am hoping Amanda got some – they must be hilarious!) One of the girls asked where we were going and we said we didn’t know. She said, “You MUST come to MAXIMUS!” (She said it “max-eee-MOOOOOOSE!”) Somebody heard the name Maximus and the whole group started going crazy about max-eee-MOOOSE!!! So, naturally, we were on our way to Maximus.
Maximus turned out to be a huge, confusing, crazy club…crazy because every room you entered or turn you took resulted in a new dance floor and a different kind of music. We first followed our new friends to the main stage area where there were a lot of very serious looking Montenegrin men standing at tables, not smiling and not dancing, just drinking and listening to the music. Then the main attraction of the night came out which was basically the Montenegrin equivalent of Ricky Martin. It was pretty funny but, unfortunately, not great dance music and all the serious guys in the place were killing the mood. (I was standing at a table with some Montenegrin girls and some random guy there made us take our purses off the table. He apparently didn’t want them there. Mind your own business, dude! And while you're at it, chill out too!)
It was about 2am and I was getting tired as was Ron. I told Amanda that we were thinking that we’d leave soon and she said she was ready to go too. Now, someone just had to (successfully) tell Paul. Ron took one for the team...and Paul was not happy. Ron, Amanda, and I figured we could handle him if the three of us joined forces so we all started walking toward the exit together…but had to walk through another dance floor which just so happened to be playing American rap music so we, of course, all stopped mid-step and started dancing. Paul was ecstatic – he was ready to stay out all night (every night…) but then the music changed and we were ready to go again. We started walking out again but Paul took his stall tactics up a notch, jumped on Ron’s back, starting waving one arm around like he was riding a bull, and kept right on dancing from his piggyback perch. One of the bouncers tried to pull Paul down but wasn’t successful. Ron finally escaped; I grabbed his hand and pulled him out the door. Amanda almost made it but Paul sucked her back into Maximus at the last second. It was perfectly dramatic end to a great birthday night.
The bambusas caught up to us the next morning, as they tend to do, and let’s just say we were definitely not ready to run up the fortress steps once, let alone twice, that morning. I had read about a beautiful drive with around 30 “hairpin” turns up the side of one of the mountains which offered amazing views of the fjord and then took you through part of a national park on the way back down the other side. Steep, hairpin turns can be difficult to maneuver as a driver, and deal with as a passenger, when you’re feeling great so taking it on hungover was a bit of a challenge. Ron did an amazing job as our fearless driver (poor guy was the only one in the group who could drive a manual transmission so got stuck as driver the whole time) and we really did get some awesome views. It was a bit overcast and a little rainy that morning which was actually nice with respect to seeing the fjord. It was a really beautiful and worthwhile drive (although I didn’t have to do any of the work driving so maybe Ron would disagree!).
We came down through the national park and saw some lovely little mountain towns and villages before getting back to the coast where we then turned south to head towards Sveti Stefan. Sveti Stefan is a picture-perfect island just off the coast packed with pretty terracotta-roofed houses and connected to the mainland by a small walkway. Sveti Stefan was actually a fishing village until the middle of the 20th century when someone decided to turn the community into a luxury hotel. (Bizarre!) It became less popular and fell into decline in the 1990’s during the demise of the former Yugoslavia. It is again being turned into a resort and supposedly set to open sometime this year. Unfortunately, this meant that we weren’t able to actually explore the town and island but we were able to at least visit and see it.
We had been hoping to spend time at the beach there that day but despite some hopeful cloud-parting moments earlier that day, the rain clouds were still heavy and socked in. We ate lunch at a great restaurant in town (fabulous Serbian dishes and, finally, cheap!) and then decided to head down to the beach to check things out even if we weren’t able to enjoy it that day. Sveti Stefan really does look like an oasis or something – really too beautiful and perfect to not be a movie set! It was drizzling a little bit but wasn’t terrible and then just as we got to the walkway out to the island, the heavens opened and just started dumping rain. Ron, Paul, and Amanda ran to stand underneath the awning of a building about 100m away and I jumped under a beach umbrella with a guard for Sveti Stefan. I had my camera out and needed to put it back in its bag before running out in the pounding rain. I got the camera in the bag and the guard and I huddled under the flimsy umbrella. We were getting slammed from every direction. The wind was blowing hard and the umbrella hardly seemed to be protecting us from anything. I figured I better just suck it up and run to building, and I guess the guard was waiting for me, because as soon as I made a slight indication that I was going to run he looked at me and said, “Ok, bye bye!” and was off before I could even say goodbye myself, leaving me under the pathetic umbrella alone. I took off my sandals, did my best to protect the camera, and ran through the now inches of standing water on the ground to the building where the others were standing. Figures – the one 30 minute period we were actually standing outside all day coincided exactly with the one 30 minute window of torrential rain!
We waited out the rain and then wandered around the grounds of a nearby (now muddy) monastery before jumping back in the car to check out another nearby town called Budva. It took us nearly two hours to go only eight kilometers from Sveti Stefan to Budva because of insane and inexplicable traffic just outside the city. Ron was a trooper and didn’t complain a bit, despite having to drive a manual for two hours in stop and go traffic. After the rain, the clouds and cleared and it had actually become a beautiful day. We were hoping to explore the old town in Budva and then hit the beach for a bit but by the time we got to Budva, I think we had all gotten a bit drained from the car ride. Paul and Amanda prioritized beach time while Ron and I went on a sladoded mission in the old town. Also bizarre was the fact that we couldn’t find a single sladoded shop in Budva’s entire old town. We were tripping over sladoded sellers in every other old town but couldn’t find one in Budva to save our lives! We were persistent, however, and found a great place right outside the city walls…it was so good that I almost decided to skip dinner and just gorge on sladoded! Ron and I ended up spending our short time in Budva sitting outside the city walls…as far away from any other tourists and marble streets as we possible could. I think we might have finally had our share of old towns!
We had a great, if a bit more subdued, final night out together in Kotor and just had a fun dinner before making another sladoded run for Ron at the end of the night. The sladoded shop we stopped at didn’t have labels for the flavors so Ron asked about a few of them and settled on the flavor described as “nuts” since he’d had such great peanut-flavored sladoded in Budva. He tasted it and his eyes got wide. “This is awesome!” He offered his cone to the group, “Anyone want a lick of the nuts?”...There was a slight pause before the other three of us burst out into loud, uncontrollable laughter as Ron hid his face in his hands, “I can’t believe I just said that. Anyone want a lick of the nuts?!” We burst out laughing again. This wasn’t the first amazing Ron comment from the trip but it just might be the funniest and was a hilarious end to the final evening.
Unfortunately, we had to leave relatively early the next day to make the drive and get through passport control at the border in time to make our flights. I wanted a diet Coke for the road so ran into one of the coffee shops outside the old town while Ron and I waited for Paul and Amanda to arrive. “One diet Coke, please.” I said. I had paid one euro in Kotor for diet Coke over the past couple days so pulled out a euro coin and laid it on the counter. The man came back with a can of diet Coke and said, “Two euros, please.” I said, “Two euros? For a can of Coke?” He said simply, “Yes.” “That is a rip-off!” He laughed and I grumbled as I fished through my wallet and, for once, didn’t actually have much change. I pulled out a 50 euro bill. The man put his hands up and backed away like I had a weapon or something and said, “No, no, no!” He took a small step forward and pushed the bill back at me. “Too big! We don’t have change here!” I was already annoyed about the price and was now also annoyed about him having no change and wasting time when I was in a hurry. I said, “Well, you shouldn’t charge two euros for a Coke then!” Not sure how much sense that made but I was mad! The man and his colleague behind the counter laughed again. I said, “I don’t know if I have anything smaller.” They stood there staring at me while I searched. Now really irritated I looked up and said, “Well? Are you going to look for change or what?” They chuckled again just as I found another euro coin hidden in my bag. “Aaahh!! Yes! You have euro!” Ron stepped inside the door to tell me that Paul and Amanda had arrived just in time to hear me say, “This is a rip-off! This would only be fifty cents in the United States!!!” at which point he apparently shut his mouth, did an about face, and quickly walked back out. I can’t blame him…I was little embarrassed myself! Might have been a good time to take a vacation from the vacation! I walked out in a huff as the guys at the coffee shop just laughed. Then Ron and Paul made fun of me for scolding the guys at the shop only to still pay the two euros. (“Ever heard of market pricing?” they joked. Very funny.)
We left to head back to Croatia and the Dubrovnik airport and had a good final car trip together. I told Ron the directions were really easy…stay on the same road and if in doubt, stick to the coast. We drove happily for a bit, sharing stories and laughing about the trip, when Ron suddenly said, “Andrea, um, which way? Which way?” as we approached a split in the road. I had about three seconds notice and I said, “I don’t know. Just stay straight. We’re not supposed to turn off this road.” I watched our location for a few minutes on my Blackberry and we were on a nonexistent road, at least according to Google Maps. I said, “Well, better turn around. Looks like we should have actually taken that last turn.” Ron turned around and we were back on the right road a couple minutes later. He joked, “Just stay straight, huh?!” I looked him, blinked, and thought, seriously? We went 2km off track in a car with a GPS map and you are worried about getting lost? Good thing you weren’t with me in Finland when I was 30km off on skis without a map, phone, or enough clothing to survive the night! Sometimes you have to get off track a little bit to see the good stuff (or so I tell myself, usually while lost)!
We were making great time until we hit border control and then had to sit in line for a bit to get through. We pulled up to the station (which was on the passenger side of the car – how much sense does that make?) and I had to hop out to give the man our passports. He asked the usual, “How long were you in Montenegro? What were you doing there? Where are you going?” I answered all his questions and then he flipped open the passports to check that they matched up to those of us in the car. He looked at my passport and said, “Ahn – drae – uh?” He looked into the car for Ahn-drae-uh and, standing in front of him, I said, “Yes.” and nodded indicating that it was me. He looked back at the passport picture, held it out in front of him to get a better look, squinted his eyes, and then looked back at me. “You? Ahn-drae-uh?” He looked again at the passport picture and kind of shrugged as if to say, “Wow. Never would have guessed.” Plate face (my horribly round and wide passport picture) strikes again! The whole car erupted in laughter and I was just happy he didn’t recognize me as plate face. It was the perfect exit from Montenegro and a fittingly funny end to my trip.
Sadly, I had to say my goodbyes at the airport so my three travel companions could head on to Prague. I let Ron say goodbye to my camera too…it almost felt like we had joint custody of it at that point since he had grown so attached. I promised to take good care of the camera and gave hugs all around. Thanks to all for making the trip such a great one and to Ron especially for coming to Europe to visit and for being such a fantastic partner in crime! Looking forward to reliving the bambusa with you all when I get back to San Francisco!
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