Destination Report: Kotor – Part One: What to do, see, eat and avoid

For the final stop of our 4 months journey in Europe, we stayed in Kotor Montenegro. We picked Montenegro over its more popular neighbor Croatia because it’s got beautiful scenery (check out the view from our apartment below) and is not as busy or pricey. While we stayed only 2 out of the 4 weeks we initially planned, we really enjoyed it and would really recommend it as a lesser known gem. Let’s go explore Kotor!

Overall, we gave Kotor a 4 out of 5 stars rating (see our rating legend below). Our accommodation was incredible with the most serene views we’ve had since we started our journey and a pretty solid kitchen. The location was also top notch with easy/walking access to the old town, markets, grocery stores, restaurants and some sights. Groceries and food, in‌ ‌general, were average. The public transportation was available but not very convenient and no Uber service was available making us rely on private transportation to easily get in/out of the airport. The “expat” community was pretty much nonexistent, besides the flock of tourists that came daily from the cruise ship into the old town. The major drawbacks for us were a relatively limited selection of local produce, selection of food and local transportation costs. 

Our five stars rating system:

• 1 star: We hated this place and definitely do not plan to come back.
• 2 stars: We did not like this place and do not plan to come back.
• 3 stars: We liked this place but do not plan to come back.
• 4 stars: We really liked this place & we might consider coming back.
• 5 stars: We loved this place and are actually consider coming back This is a place we could call home someday. 

With that being said, let’s look into what we liked the most and what we recommend to do in Kotor! 

Where We Traveled Kotor, Montenegro

Number of Days 2 weeks (from September 25, 2019 to October 11, 2019) Initial plan was 4 weeks (from September 13, 2019 to October 11, 2019)

Type of Travel Married Couple, Slow Travel/Nomadic, Price Conscious

Note: Unless specified otherwise, prices are in USD and were converted from the local currency (EUR or Euro) to USD using a 1:1.11 ratio. (so 1 EUR = 1.098 USD). 

Introduction

Kotor is a coastal town in Montenegro with a population of only 13,000. It is well-known for its World Heritage (UNESCO) medieval structures and its stunning natural setting at the very edge of the mountain-rimmed Kotor Bay. It makes for a great alternative to Dubrovnik if you want to escape the crowd of tourists.

What did we do, see and eat?

There isn’t a lot happening in Kotor so it’s best to use your time to enjoy the beautiful surroundings and scenery or simply relax. Depending on the time of the year you plan on visiting, check out the Kotor event page from the Visit Montenegro website which provides the major events in Kotor. 

Now let’s dig into our favorites places to eat, shop and get entertained. To help you, we’ve included all the places (and more) that we are calling out below in the following Google Maps. 

Our Favorite Sights/Activities:

We stayed about 20 minutes away from the town of Kotor in a great apartment that provided us with unbeatable views of the bay. We spent about a third of our time exploring the city of Kotor and the other two thirds exploring outside of the city.  

Here are the places we recommend to check out in Kotor:

• Old town of Kotor – This is by far the most famous part of Kotor where history has been well preserved. The old town has a few monuments of medieval architecture like churches or cathedrals. There are also endless narrow streets and a few squares, restaurants & shops to enjoy. It is also here that you need to come to pay your tourist tax which is due within 24 hours upon arrival. There are three entrances to access the old town and the visit is entirely free! 

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• Climb up the Upper Town Walls – Above the old town you will see a long wall along an almost vertical cliff. You can climb it to get a fantastic view of the bay. Make sure to wear good shoes and be aware that if you plan to take the old road without a ticket, once your reach the wall you won’t be able to get in as apparently you can only purchase the ticket from the entrance which is inside the old town. Nevertheless, if you want to get some partial view of Kotor without having to pay the 8 EUR entrance fee (May-Oct only) that can be an alternative. 

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After that, there are a few places worth checking outside of Kotor for half or a full day trip. 

• In Perast (½ day trip) – You can take the bus from Kotor (blue bus) to reach Perast in about 30 minutes. Once there you can easily spend a few hours enjoying this small and quiet town by wandering its streets and visiting some of its churches. You can even take a short boat ride to visit the Lady Of the Rock which stands in front of it.

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• In Herceg Novi (½ day trip), You can take the bus from Kotor (check the blue-line bus website and their schedule) towards Herceg Novi. You will need to change buses about halfway. The connection was smooth both ways. But don’t come back home too late as we almost missed the last bus that leaves Herceg Novi before 8pm. The old town of Herceg Novi is pretty amazing. It is on a hill that leads all the way to the water and once you get to the top, you can enjoy the many plazas, fortresses and shops.

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• In Herceg Novi, Mrs. NN was excited to learn about some natural healing waters and mud in the town of Igalo which attracts people from all over Europe. You can do your own mud treatment from the beach which is about 20 minutes walking south from the old town (see our map for the specific location). Once there just look for the vendors who sell mud in a bag for 1 EUR and then have some DIY fun 🙂  

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• Budva / Sveti Stefan / Godinje / Lake Skadar (2 day itinerary w/ car) – We rented a car for two days to get out of Kotor and explore the east region.
  Day 1 – After picking up our car from Tivat airport in the morning, we headed out to Lake Skadar which is the largest lake is Southern Europe and is shared with Albania. We drove through the very developed city Budva and then continued to the viewpoint for a wonderful shot at Sveti Stefan from the highway (see viewpoint on our map). We then made our way to beautiful Lake Skadar where we stopped in the unique hillside town of Godinje. We did a 2 hour hike to visit the small town and stopped there for a packed lunch with a wonderful view. We drove a bit of Lake Skadar and made a couple of other stops to walk around and enjoy the views. You will get a wonderful angle of a small portion of the giant lake from the Pavlova Strana viewpoint (see our map for details and picture below). Overall a wonderful destination but unfortunately, there isn’t much hiking in the area and the existing trails aren’t well marked. The visitor center at Virpazar has some information on hiking if you can’t find any on the internet.

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  Day 2 – We spent the morning enjoying the wonderful beach at Sveti Stefan. This beach was so picturesque with the small islet of historical buildings and warm clear waters for swimming. It’s apparently known as a resort for the wealthy and the beach is normally not open to the public during the peak summer months.

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We then drove to Petrova where did a short coastal trail to a quieter beach that would have been a perfect location if it weren’t for the abandoned resort complex that was right behind it. We then went back to the town to enjoy some ice cream before heading back to see the town of Budva.

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Our Favorite Restaurants:

In Kotor:

• Fish Grill (Perper): A local place that specializes in grilled fish and various seafood. Everything is made on the spot by the owner who is also the cook. There isn’t a lot of places to sit and since the promenade is a 10 minutes walk away you could take your food to go and enjoy it. Keep in mind that the packaging won’t be eco-friendly( plastic utensils and styrofoam containers). If you like to reduce your impact on the environment as we do, you might want to bring your own container and cutlery. Cost: 13 EUR for a kilo of mussels, with one grilled bream fish.

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In Herceg Novi:

• Tri Lipe: We went to this restaurant during our visit of Herceg Novi. The atmospheric courtyard is nice. Cooking is local with a menu offering lots of options. Meat is definitely the focus on the menu but this place also caters to vegetarians and people with gluten intolerance. If you prefer to eat quick and on the go, the restaurant offers to go sandwiches which are of an unbeatable value. Cost: 22 EUR for a grilled fish and seafood risotto. 

Our Favorite Sweets Spots:

• Delicatesa Ice cream – The old town of kotor has a few ice cream stands that sell good ice cream (which include a few dairy free / vegan options). The scoop is at 1 EUR which is a pretty good deal for what is a touristy sight. Our favorite one is the one you can access from the North gate (see our map). Cost: 1 EUR per scoop.

Our Favorite Grocery Stores/Markets:

Here are our top recommendations:

• Kotor Farmer’s Market – Situated between the west and the south gate of the old city, this market is there daily (at least from 9-2pm) but the weekends are packed with more vendors. It’s a bit on the touristy side but it’s a much better option than the grocery store chains. If you need fish, fruits, mushrooms or vegetables, this is the place to go. Keep an eye open though for vendors that will ask for 2-3x the price of what an item cost. They aren’t the majority but we did run into a couple of them.

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• Voli supermarket: This chain has a great selection of fruits/vegetables as well as a pretty good health section (for things like flour, honey).
• Aroma – While Voli provides us with most of our groceries supplies, we like to go to Aroma for some specific items that we found of better quality and cheaper (like olive oil). Aroma was also closer to our accommodation so it was our place of choice when we needed to do a run to refill on drinkable water.

What to avoid

While it’s great to call out what to check out, we think it is as important to also include what NOT to do. These are activities/places we stayed away from. Of course, taste is personal and so your preference might vary.

• Avoid the cruise ship crowd – While Kotor was pretty empty during our visit (October), there was at least one ferry per day docking in the city and sometimes up to 3 ferry bringing thousands of tourists visiting the old town. The good news is that most of the tourists seem to just visit the old town and fortress. So when you do visit, look for the few days when there are no cruises scheduled and go early! You can lookup cruise schedules on sites like Crew Center. (schedule for 2020 is here)

• Avoid Sveti Stefan’s beach during high season – We heard that the beach becomes not only busy but extremely expensive where prices for a chair can cost you as much as 50 EUR! 
• Avoid the paid beach chairs at Kotor beach – do as the locals do and just hang out on the many piers that line the bay around Dobrota. You can use the ladders to go into the water for a swim.

• Avoid eating at the touristy restaurants in Old Town – from our observation, the prices were higher and the food was probably not as good. There are nicer, quieter restaurants that are along the bay up towards Dobrota and as an added bonus you get a really nice view.

Our Slow Travelers Tips

Slow travel is part of our philosophy. It gives us the opportunity to really connect with a place by not having to experience FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) and getting unnecessarily stressed for being on a schedule. With slow travel, we can see all the iconic sights and have time to spare to find the more offbeat spots that most tourists miss. Most of the time, those are the absolute gems. And as this blog post explains, we spend much less by leveraging “local” pricing and being able to leverage long stay discounts.

Here are some tips to maximize a nice and enjoyable stay in Kotor:

• Relax! Kotor and its gigantic bay make for the perfect stress free setting. Whether you walk by the bay, swim in it or enjoy it from the balcony of your apartment, the view is so serene that it is hard not to slow down and relax.
• Be familiar with the public transportation schedule. You can move around Kotor at a very affordable rate if you know how the bus system works. We had to learn it by ourselves and made a couple of mistakes but it helped us.
• Rent a bike. If you don’t mind biking, the bay of Kotor is relatively accessible by bike (minus a few sections where you need to share the road with cars). Renting a bike is pretty affordable and can be a great way to explore the bay of Kotor
• Rent a car. If you want to explore outside the Kotor region, you will then need a car. You can rent one from the Airport at a much cheaper rate but be very careful with the rental company. We used Avis and they are very very picky about scratches on the car and will work hard to charge you a fortune if they see a scratch that wasn’t reported at check-in time.
• Have delicious gourmet meals at home. The farmers market of Kotor has some really good produce. If you like cooking as we do, then it is worth grilling some of those veggies or fish at home rather than eating out. Especially since we noticed that the restaurants seem to be using a lot of vegetable oil, which is something we try to avoid as much as possible as it isn’t a healthy oil to use.

What about the cost? 

Because our destination reports were getting so long, we decided to split them into two parts. Part one (this part) is about what to do/see/eat. Part two (coming up next week) will be about the costs where we will be uncovering all the juicy details about our budget and how much the two of us spent during our stay. Make sure you sign-up for our newsletter so you will get this post (and any upcoming ones) as soon as they go live. In the meantime, if you really want some numbers, feel free to check out our past destination reports.

Would you be interested in going to Kotor? Does the serenity of this lesser-known city appeal to you? Maybe you’ve already been? Feel free to share your experience and ask questions by leaving a comment below.