Adriatic Treasures: Croatia to Venice
Mike and Judy Henderson
September 13-29, 2019
I'm going to leave the map at the start of each page so you can see where we are.
9/17/2019 (Tuesday) Today we go to Kotor in Montenegro. Montenegro is a very small country, at 13,812 square km it is a bit smaller in area than the US state of Connecticut.
We had an early start, departure at 7:30am. Matt, our Tauck tour director, warned us that crossing the border could take quite a long time, and it did take us almost an hour to cross into Montenegro. First, you have to clear Croatia passport control to leave Croatia, then drive a few hundred meters to the Montenegro passport control facility and go through the passport checking again. The Croatia border people took their time, but since we were a bunch of older American tourists (bringing dollars) we cleared the Montenegro border check quickly.
Here's a map showing the location of Kotor relative to Dubrovnik. We drove along the coast. The location of the border crossing is shown by the arrow.
When we got to the general area of Kotor we had to cross to the other side of the lake on a ferry. The ferry crossing is shown by the arrow in the next picture.
Here's a view of the ferry.
After a bathroom stop, we headed to the Old Town of Kotor. (Here's another link.)
Where we met our guide.
He talked to us a bit before we entered the Old Town.
This is the entrance to the Old Town.
The streets were narrow.
We went to the Maritime Museum.
Then to the Cathedral of St. Tryphon, also known as the Kotor Cathedral. Note the balcony pointed to by the arrow. We were able to go up there, which allowed me to take a picture looking down.
A view of the altar area
We went up to the second floor which housed a small museum, then went out on the balcony. Here's the view from the balcony.
Then it was time for lunch. We went to a pizza place and ran into Al and Diane who were arriving at the same time. Our time in Kotor was short and we boarded the bus shortly after lunch. As we were leaving the area, I was able to get this picture of one wall of the Old Town.
We headed north out of Kotor, heading to the the Our Lady of the Rocks church which is on a man-made island in the Bay of Kotor. You can see a lot more of its story and history here.
Here's a picture of the two islands - St George on the left and Our Lady of the Rocks on the right. I took this picture through the window of the bus, so it has reflections in it.
Tauck arranged for a small boat to take us out to the church.
The group in the boat.
A view of the church as we approached. This is the back of the church.
Inside the church, looking towards the altar.
After our visit, we took a boat back to the mainland and boarded the bus for our return to Dubrovnik. This time we were able to clear the border crossing very quickly and we arrived at our hotel about 4:30pm.
We had dinner in the hotel restaurant this evening.
9/18/2019 (Wednesday) We head to Mostar today, traveling some of the most narrow and winding roads I've ever seen! But first, we're going to stop in the village of Orašac to visit the home of an olive oil maker who still uses traditional equipment to press the olives. Orašac is about where the arrow is pointing on the map, below.
Here is the press. The horse walks around the press, driving the two millwheels to crush the olives placed in the mill, creating the first press.
Quite a bit of the olive oil is extracted by this crushing, but some is left in the pulp that remains. That pulp is taken to another press and placed in the area indicated by the arrow, and then is pressed by screwing the press down with the long arm that the maker is reaching for. You can see a small amount of oil coming out of the spout.
After the demonstration we went to another building where we had a nice snack of green salad, cheese and breads. Everything was made or grown there.
Then it was on to Mostar which is in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Since we're going to another country, we had to go through passport control again - but it went fairly quickly.
As we approached Mostar it became a lot more urban looking - we even saw a McDonalds!
We headed into the center of the city to the area of the Old Bridge, knows as Stari Most in Croatian. On arrival, we met our guide, Armana.
She took us first to a place where we could observe the Old Bridge and told us the story of how it was destroyed in the war and rebuilt after. You can read the bridge's story here.
Here's a picture of the Old Bridge during the war - before it was completely destroyed.
Next we walked to a house where a gentlemen was waiting for us. He and his family had lived through the Siege of Mostar from 1992 to 1994 and he told us what it was like living in Mostar during that time. He spoke in Croatian and the young woman next to him translated.
There are still signs of the war in Mostar, even 25 years after the seige.
Then we had free time for lunch. Judy and I went to a restaurant near the bridge and I was able to get this additional picture of the Old Bridge.
[Update 6/23/2022 - Bing wallpaper had a picture of the bridge today. I thought it was a very good picture.]
Our time was short but as soon as we finished lunch, I hurried to the bridge to take a closer look and to take pictures. Here's the entrance to the bridge. Note the guy standing on the side of the bridge - pointed to by the arrow. It's a sport here to jump off the bridge. Not a bungee jump, just a jump into the river. First, the jumper collects contributions in kind of a "dare", and then he jumps.
There were boats in the water to pick up the jumpers, and people watching from below.
Here's a closer look at the jumper. I couldn't stay to actually see a jump.
But then it was time to leave. Our time in Mostar was too short for use to see much of the city - just a few hours. We headed back to Croatia and the city of Split, where we checked into the Hotel Park.
We had dinner in the hotel restaurant with Paul and Julie and then it was time for bed.