Day 56 : Petrovac - Bar - Sveti Stefan

Slept in as was very exhausted from the previous day lack of sleep.

The rental car was delivered to me yesterday evening, first time I ever had a car delivered to door. It looks like I got an upgrade, as the booking I made was for a 2 door Volkswagon UP. But I also have a feeling they may had forgotten about my booking, as the car was not cleaned out properly and they had unfortunately forgotten to pump petrol before delivering it over, so there was only enough petrol in the tank to travel less than 10km.

So first task was to get petrol - full tank cost me €61, that could last me over 800km. But I think I should had pump less than full as based on the mileage balance, I will likely not cover 800km over the 4 days of rental.

Today's plan - to travel south towards the farthest point, close to Albanian border. It appears I had been over ambitious as I couldn't make it that far, especially since I had also slept in and only managed to get on the way about 10am.

My final trip was Petrovac - Bar - Stari Grad Bar - Sveti Stefan

Driving down towards Petrovac, I passed an island with some buildings on it which looked really nice - I noted it was called Sveti Stefan and made a mental note to visit it on my way back. 

Petrovac is a really small town, I got lucky with parking and found a spot on a side street that was just steps from the water. 

It's a very small town and with most places in this town seemed closed, I managed to complete the walk along the stretch of beach in about half hour. The water is really clear and there's also a small fort one can climb to. 

As it's nearing lunch time, I decided to have an early lunch before making my way and settled into a restaurant to order a soup and mussels. The mussels were plenty, but the meat were really small, and many still had their beards attached on, so I had to slowly remove each of them before eating it. 

It's a very cheap meal though, at €11.20 for the entire meal. 

Before driving off to the next location, I did a walk up the hill, cutting through pine trees and 3 tunnels which led me to a beach. The walk took about 30 mins which cut through tunnels and a good panoramic view. I didn't stay too long and headed back very quickly. 

Next stop, Bar, which was about half an hour drive away. Bar is a much larger city, with an extremely long stretch of beach. 

While driving through Bar to find a parking, I came across a huge church which looked rather impressive from a distance and decided to check it out. 

Inside it was even more impressive with frescoes covering the entire cathedral and marble flooring. 

There's supposed to be a Castle of King Nikola not too far from the cathedral and I decided to check it out, but was quite disappointing. It is now a Museum.

While walking along the beach I saw a long queue for Gelato and decided to queue too. My gosh this is cheap, 2 scoops of gelato for only €1.40! 

I continued my way to Stari Bar (Old Town). Unfortunately the fortress was closed for renovation, so I couldn't climb it. 

Wanting to catch sunset, I drove as quickly as I could to Sveti Stefan. I was able to see the sun set beautifully on the drive, but made it a couple mins too late to catch a picture of it with the backdrop of the island. 

Sunsets are beautiful around the coast as it turns red. Strangely the other end of the bridge which leads into the island of Sveti Stefan was closed off. I suppose it only opens during summer period. 

Not wanting to drive too much in the dark in a new country, I made my way back shortly, reaching back before 6pm and cooked a meal. It's been a while since I managed to really cook on this trip, and I was getting tired of eating out all the time. 

Simple pasta, but really needed to break away from fried or grilled stuff. 

Day 55 : Budva

The bus ride from Belgrade to Budva was originally scheduled to take 11hrs but we arrived about 1.5hr ahead of schedule, arriving into Budva at 7.30am instead of 9am, and got to see sunrise on the bus. 

It's the first time on this entire trip that I took a bus that was fully packed! Must be the New Year's and everyone is heading out of Belgrade for celebrations. 

As usual, I hardly slept on the bus. I did contemplate taking a train with a sleeper cart instead, but it was too much hassle thinking of all the steps involved - the train station in Belgrade was quite a distance away, and it requires a transfer to a bus at Podgorica, and it's said to encounter delays.

It's a good thing that I was allowed to check in early at the Accomodation Apartment Popović. It is located a little distance away from the centre of town, and oh my gosh, the number of stairs to climb! 

The owners were really friendly though they don't speak much English. I had chosen out of the city centre since I will be having a car for most part of the journey and needed a place where I can easily park. 

The old town is about 15 mins walk away, and the first few order of business was to get a mobile Sim card (€5 for 7 days of 400GB data), and lunch. Found this really nice restaurant by the water, although the menu was somewhat limiting.

It's nice to be out by the coast again, and most importantly at a temperature that is warm enough for me to move about without a jacket during the day. Day time temperature is about 16-18°C, and falls down to 6°C at night.

There's a very pleasant laid back atmosphere in this town, that I thoroughly enjoy. I could see myself staying here for a longer time.

There are numerous beaches around, and I saw a few people swimming. I felt the water and it was on the much cooler side, and would be an extremely refreshing dip if I was to go in. 

There's also a fortress, which when I walked in, reminded me of Dubrovnik or Croatia. 

A walk along the ridges brought me to patterned cliffs, with extremely clear waters. There's also a "door in the cave" at the extreme end.

I caught the last sunset of the year along one of the beaches but due to the lack of sleep from the previous night, I found myself nodding off a few times. 

As much as I wanted to see how NYE celebration is done in the city centre, I struggled to stay awake and decided to stay in instead. In any case, I read online that NYE celebrations were cancelled this year in Budva, and I didn't want to make a wasted trip to the city centre. 

As the clock struck 12, fireworks went off across different part of the city, which I managed to see from my place. It seemed fireworks are commercially made available easily for the public as I saw some fireworks being released from apartment units. It was pretty amazing!

Happy New Year, and hoping 2022 will be a much better year. Still finding it surreal that I am currently in the Balkans!