Surprising Crna Gora (Montenegro)

Quel suprise!

Having exited unscathed from Croatia customs and police at Cavtat we cruised south the windless short 30nm to Montenegro seeing plenty of surveillance along that coastline. Not a lot of trust around that part of the world.

We entered Boka bay which reveals Montenegro like an emerging rose. The magnificent vistas unfold more and more spectacularly as you progress down the bay.

We were deliberately unprepared for Montenegro knowing little of the place before arriving, preferring to let it unfold. Checkin to Montenegro was super easy with all formalities taken care by the genial Yacht Care staff of Porto Montenegro. It was cool to share the same wharf as Black Pearl there at customs.

Our base for the winter was Porto Montenegro again a place we were unprepared for. It is really a superyacht marina with provision for the smaller 100 or so 40 to 60 foot yachts and motorboats. It is owned by the UAE and features a 5 star hotel, 40 or so restaurants with Rodeo drive shops and Russians in dubious bling in abundance. It was originally a shipyard on the outskirts of Tivat which a Canadian fella saw as an attractive site for a huge marina. After extensive dredging and flying in US Navy dolphins to locate old unexploded ordinance, the marina took shape and now hosts superyachts like Olivia O and Black Pearl. The EU sanctions on Russia hsave caused many other of the Russian superyachts to leave and hide in Turkiye which tolerates them more. Whilst not yet a part of the EU, Montenegro is a NATO member and supports mostly so the sanctions. That said there is some local resentment over maintaining superyachts like 107m Luminosity at government cost.

The purpose of heading there was not just to experience the place but to put Cooinda somewhere safe, before flying back to Australia. It was a bit of a dart throw as to where to winter and we certainly had a big win with PM. As it turns out a whole bunch of other folk with similar boats to ours, had the same idea. It turned out to become a thriving community of similarly minded sailors who are lots of fun, helpful, supportive and many now lifelong friends. There were 3 other Elbas like Cooinda and variety of other FP’s and Lagoons as well as a number of monos of all shapes and sizes. Nationalities were as diverse with NZ, Australia and UK folk predominating but the requisite Yanks and Cannucks with Dutchies and Argentinians and others featuring. Many if not most were like us fairly new to the cruising liveaboard lifestyle, although there were people like Steve and Judy off Fair Isle and Iain and Kate off Intrepid Bear who have plenty of miles under their keels who catalogue their travels on excellent YouTube channels. Others like Mads and Alisha and Chris and Christine and Todd and Catherine had ocean crossings to their names and provided lots of sage advice to the rest of us.

People came from all walks of life from plumbers to engineers to executives, nurses and IT folk with even a couple of crusty old pilots. Whilst an eclectic bunch it was super social with hikes, swims, winery tours and go carting with a Wednesday curry night in the Blue Room an institution involving excellent indian curries and plentiful libations, a must do each week. Our location had us close to some dangerous folk who offered beer/wine on every passing, and sometimes we declined their offers.

Winterising your boat involves basically protecting the boat from lack of movement, exercising of systems and the elements. Whilst doing this many of us take the opportunity to do some necessary annual maintenance and do upgrades and warranty work. Montenegro proved a lot more difficult for this than most of us expected. We had the advantage of shipping in major items, tax free under the “Yacht in Transit” customs rule (not available in a lot of other countries). Customs however proved difficult there with goods getting lost, held up for months and overall unreliable such that a number of shippers are reluctant to send to Montenregro. A change in Government and reform will help, but not overnight. Also difficult is the lack of skilled trades in the boating industry with a few rogues further diminishing available options to get work done.

The people in Montenegro first struck us as withdrawn and perhaps even a little surly, but after not too long I found them a friendly bunch who enjoy a joke, strong on family and hard working. A little surprisingly we found English more widely spoken than a lot of Croatia and certainly Italy. On arrival at PM you are beseiged by people offering boat care services, especially care for when you return home leaving your boat in the marina. Most are good and reasonably priced and like everything you get what you pay for. Vedran who came to us offering his services and any other local advice and contacts he had. He was a great resource when we arrived. We also got to meet the wonderful Nina Grubisic who working with the energetic and entertaining Edward Daniell was able to source all the people and services we needed for our time there. Without her diligent and never say no help, so much we got done whilst in MNE.

With Nina

It is not a rich country by any means with infrastucture a little worn but improving and services perhaps a little antiquated but universallyu available and cheap. Most of what you want everyday is there (except fresh milk!! grrr.. )with some modern supermarkets, “Bunnings”like stores and chandleries all there and available. A lot of stuff is cheap especially food and booze. A 500ml can of Niksicko beer went up to 0.87 Euro causing much angst! :) Local and quite reasonable wine was around 8-10 euros a bottle. Meat is a big thing in Montenegro and it is cheap. Eating out is good and as long as you like meat you are in luck, as there are some excellent and very chap options. Whilst great seafarers and having a decent fishing fleet, fish is a little expensive to get hold of as is a wide variety of veges and fruit.

So October was the time we were supposed to be off the water as convention said the weather becomes untenable then for cruising. How wrong that was as we enjoyed a very balmy October and lamented the opportunity to see more that season. We did take the chance to explore locally a bit getting to the beautiful Kotor Bay for an explore.

Montenegro is a stunningly beautiful country. Car hire for a week cost us 65 euros which allowed us to cover some of the closer and better known sights nearish to the coast. Budva not far south of Tivat is set back in a beautiful bay with picturesque islands and a wonderfully restored fortified old town. The museum together with the restaurants and shops are tastefully incorporated within the faithfully restored battlements.

A little further south the monastery island of Svete Stefan is another treat. Heading away from the coast towards Cetinje the mountains start to reveal their beauty as you pass through the old capitol of Cetinje. It is oddly sited in a valley bowl and it is a struggle to imagine it as a seat of power. From there it is not a long drive to the new capitol of Podgorica. Like so much of the Balkans there is a lot of history here with various occupiers razing it then laying claim. Post WW2 it was renamed Titograd until being rerenamed Podgorica and declared capitol of the newly reindependant Montenegro in 1992. Whilst there are old buildings in the city so much of it is obviously new, reminding me of Canberra which whilst not wanting to offend the denizens of either capitol, it lacks charm to me.

On the outskirts are a number of wineries with Plantaze by far the largest, in fact it is the largest in Europe by area and vines cultivated (11.5 million). It is state owned and produces some quite nice reds in particular.

Just south however is one of the jewels of Montenegro in Lake Skadar National Park. It has some stunning views especially from the heights, plentiful birdlife and its rawness jealously preserved.

Ssndy headed home in late October whilst I stayed on a week or two longer finalising a bit more work. unfortunately we got our first of a few warranty issues not long before leaving proving a little expensive! After a regular service of the engines it was revealed we had water in our saildrives. Think of these as the leg of an outboard motor terminating at the props. Obviously oil and water dont mix well and water has no place inside the saildrive mechanism and gears, so we had to get Cooinda lifted out. Often times fishing line or rope caught in a prop can lead to this phenomenon, however the Volvo Penta mechanics showed us that in our case poor assembly of the prop seals caused this. Volvo took no responsibility saying the part was a wearable part and no warranty applies there even though it was patently their assembly that was the cause. So 2500 euros later Cooinda was back in the water with my views on the poor quality of Volvo Penta engines confirmed again. Little did we know an even more insidious warranty item was apparent then but missed then.

Getting out of MNE, especially Tivat off season is not quite as simple as flight frequency to major hubs often requires flights from the capitol Podgorica. Thus for me a flight to Gatwick on the surprisingly good Wizz Air, gave me a night with my old mate Nige and lovely Jill before heading to Heathrow and home on QF.

It’s probably worth the telling. I bought a rather expensive full fare round trip Qantas ticket to Rome via Perth from Sydney with a return from Rome via Heathrow and Singapore. Rome was easy as it was close to where we collected the boat in southrern France and we hadn’t selected our wintering spot by then. Anyway it was easier to go from MNE direct to London than via Rome so I called and held for the QF call centre for the requisite 90+ minutes. And I enjoyed the same hold music I had had for the previous 20 or so years of the 35 whilst working there! I requested dropping the one BA leg Rome to London. Whilst I thought it unlikely Joyce would give anything back, I requested what refund I might expect. My original fare was some $4200 and after a few minutes was told the refund would be around $3200. I was grateful but incredulous and asked for a recheck of the figure. Anyway it apparently was correct but I would have to wait 10 weeks for the money. They would however not confirm anything in writing until that 10 weeks time. What a surprise when 12 weeks later I had heard nothing from Qantas so after a few calls I finally found someone who followed up properly. She indicated the figure wasn’t right and she would get back to after it was referred. Surprised? Well around $3400 was deposited to my account, which on QF logic was the cost component of Rome to London on BA. And I kept all the points!