A Day Trip to Budva

 

I saw as much of the Tivat as I could between bouts of rain.  When the sky appeared to stay sunny one day, I figured it a good time to find my way out of town for the day.

Uber doesn’t exist in the area, so it’s best to catch the bus or a cab.  I flagged down a taxi on the main road and asked him to take me to Budva. 

I mentioned in my last post that the one major road was cut through the mountains.  Unsurprisingly, when there is construction on that single road, the traffic can get ridiculous. There were delays on both trips to Budva and I don’t envy anyone having to regularly take that road during the day.

While Tivat is this peaceful little town with a harbor full of yachts, Budva has more of a touristy party town vibe.  I remembered passing through the town on the way from the airport and the place was jumping well into the evening.

When the cab stopped, I thought we were just stuck in more traffic since I didn’t see any signage for the café.  But, no, the ride was over.  He gestured vaguely to the left, but since he only spoke Russian, I didn’t understand what he was saying.  I paid him and got on the good foot.

I’ve seen some comments online about people lamenting how much travel has changed in the last few decades.  That it was more of an adventure to find hidden gems without seeing them first on the internet, how you were forced to figure things out without Google translate and easy access to money.  I do understand what they mean – it was a different time.  Having said that, I would not give up having a living map on my phone for anything in the world. 

The GPS came to the rescue once again as the café was in Old Town, much of which is not accessible by car.  The narrow stone walkways through ancient buildings reminded me of Portugal and the maze of Mykonos at the same time.  It was full of shops and restaurants, hotels, and hostels with loads of tourists wandering around.

The café itself was just a store with no attached restaurant.  After buying my shirt, I found a place on the beach for lunch.  Just outside of Old Town is a boardwalk curving around the water.  Plenty restaurants facing the boats for rent in the harbor.  I had a basic meal and a cosmo with a great view of the water. 

As per usual when visiting a place I like, I looked at pricing for apartments.  Depending on where you look, there are places as cheap as 380 euros for a one bedroom.  Two-bedrooms can be found for around 750 euros.  Of course, there are also plenty of luxury places for the billionaires and a lot of construction going on everywhere.  I’m not sure what the visa situation is looking like right now, but it might be worth a look.

Overall, I’m impressed with Montenegro.  I knew it would be pretty, but I didn’t expect it to be so affordable.  It even has a slight advantage over Türkiye as far as livability (Ah!  Sweet potatoes! Broccoli!  I missed you!).  The widely spoken English is a bonus.  But there are a couple of issues that I can’t overlook.

I checked a couple of pharmacies in Tivat and one in Budva for my pills, but it was a no go in both cities.  No immediate worries, though, since I’d already stocked up in Türkiye.  I just wanted to do a price comparison between countries.

While grocery stores and places of interest are in walking distance to my apartment in Tivat, getting out of the city does require a car.  There are buses, but their schedules are tricky.  Cabs, as I’ve mentioned, are not cheap.  There probably was another way to get around, but I just didn’t stumble on it.

It rains a lot.  I started my two weeks in the country wearing shorts and by the second week, I was in long pants.  The temperatures dropped fast in mid-September because of the rain.  But it keeps everything green and pretty so I can’t complain too much.

Also, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to mention this but, I did spot a rode by a dumpster one day.  This was near the harbor and the high-end shops, so I was a bit stunned.  Left me spooked for the rest of my stay.  And this was with all the stray cats and dogs around the area.

I had to leave for the states after my stay otherwise I would have liked to explore more of the country.  Dubrovnik, Croatia is right up the coast from Tivat so there is still much to see in the area.  I can see myself going back one day.

Tivat, Montenegro

The sun was setting as my flight landed in Podgorica (pronounced Po-go-rizza), Montenegro.  Then it was on to the usual routine of getting through passport control, gathering my bag, and finding a way to my new home for the week.

Just as quickly as I was able to check my bag with Air Montenegro, I sailed through passport control without even having to answer any questions.  Baggage Claim was a few short feet away and my bag was one of the first ones out.  So far, the country and I were getting along just fine.

Why choose Montenegro as my 12^th country on this journey?  A YouTuber I follow visited there and marveled at the beauty of the place.  I can stay for 90 days on a tourist visa and the flight took only 1 ½ hours from Istanbul.  The price of accommodations is about on par with Türkiye so I figured ‘Why not?’

Tip #1:  When visiting Montenegro, do not fly into Podgorica if you are staying in Tivat.  The city has its own airport.

I made this same mistake when travelling to the Big Island of Hawaii years ago.  I landed in what I thought was the only airport, but ended up on the wrong side of the island.  That meant a stupidly long drive while exhausted, at night, in a strange car, on a road that was only partially paved – in the rain.  I really don’t recommend EVER doing this.

In this case, landing at the wrong airport meant a stupidly long ride in the back of an expensive cab driven by another madman.  The road to Tivat is cut through the mountains and is the only way to go between the two locations.  This meant a lot of roundabouts, hairpin turns, and some admittedly stunning views of the cities in the valleys below, all done at breakneck speed. 

Seriously, Google maps had the journey taking two hours.  Dude got me there with half an hour to spare.

But I did just come from Türkiye.  I was more than accustomed to crazy cab drivers.

As we drove through small patches of civilization along the way, I kept noticing the number of people just walking along the roads.  Even in the areas that weren’t brightly lit and obviously commercial, there were pedestrians everywhere.  I asked the cabbie if that was normal, that it was safe to walk at night.  He assured me the place was pretty safe, no worries while I was here.  I have rarely been out at night in any of the countries I’ve visited, but it’s always good to know I won’t be a target as a tourist.

We finally arrived at Tivat and it came time to pay.  I had asked before getting in the cab if he accepted cards since I mostly had Turkish money on me.  I handed over my card – and it didn’t work.  Gave him another card which did work except the card machine asked for a PIN.  It was a credit card.  I had no idea what the pin was as I never used it for ATM withdrawals.  The other credit card had the same outcome.  So, none of my cards worked, I was in a strange country where I had no money, and I owed this dude 80 euros.

This was a nightmare.

After fumbling with all the cards multiple times and checking with my bank to make sure I had set a travel alert (I had), I finally asked the guy to take me to the nearest ATM.  I sat on pins and needles until we found a place, then got out and put my card in.

Can I tell you how sweet it was to hear the ATM counting out the money?  Huge sigh of relief along with a huge tip for the guy for his patience (that and the machine only gave out 20’s so I couldn’t give him anything smaller).

He drove me back to the apartment and deposited my bag in front of the door.  Even after getting paid, the sweet man was apologizing for the machine not working.  I told him I was just happy that my card worked and I could pay him.  I was seriously freaking out for a minute there.

Then it was on to the task of checking my phone for the front door code, wrangling my stuff onto the elevator, trying to figure out the light switches, and finding the apartment.  Outside of both my new home and the apartment across the hall were buckets full of umbrellas – not a good sign.  I didn’t want to spend the next week indoors because of the rain. 

The key was located in what the host referred to as an ‘acid box’.  What the hell does that mean?  I fumbled a bit with the electrical boxes on the wall until I figured out that she was referring to the umbrella bucket.  Is there acid in the rain?  Is that why it’s called that or does that just mean something different in the native language?  I don’t know.

All I knew was that I was wiped.  I took some time to admire the nicely appointed apartment, then took my happy behind to bed.

Thunderstorms woke me up the next morning, but the rain didn’t last too long.  Then it was off to explore.

Montenegro is a small country of about ½ million people, known for its coastal towns, several world heritage sites, and stunning natural beauty.  The currency is the euro while the language … is different.  I always thought, because of the name, that it would be a Spanish speaking country, but no.  Technically, the country has their own language called Montenegrin, but Google Translate doesn’t recognize that language.  The closest approximation is Serbian.  Montenegro is kind of an off-shoot of Serbia and Bosnia Herzegovina so I think their language is something of a hybrid dialect. Fortunately …

Tip #2:  English is widely spoken in the country.

I’m always appreciative when someone (somehow) spots that I’m not a native-born Montenegrin and instantly switches to English. I am also still impressed at how easy that is for some folks.

While there are tourists from various countries wandering around, I was only one of three or four black people in the entire town.  No one stared at me like a zoo animal, though.  Actually, I got more stares in Istanbul than in Tivat.

(And I must apologize to the Montenegrin people – I will not be learning your language.  I got too much Portuguese and Turkish swirling around in my brain and there’s only so much I can absorb.  I can do ‘da’ for yes and cao (ciao like in Italy) for hello/goodbye, but that’s about it.)

Tip #3:  Tipping in restaurants is not expected, though it is appreciated. 

Additionally, the waitstaff give you the bill at the beginning of the meal.  It’s not like they are trying to get rid of you – they have the same laid-back attitude of the Turks.  If you do decide to order more, they will just print out another receipt.

And why wouldn’t you order more?  Prices for restaurants and grocery stores is pretty cheap.  Being able to go to a sit-down lunch, have a nice meal and maybe a cappuccino afterwards, and get change from my 20?  Awesome.  It’s not Turkish levels of cheap, but I’ll take it.  This is coming directly after paying over 20 euros for a meal at Burger King in Istanbul Airport.  I know airports markup their food, but that is ridiculous.  I don’t know how anyone is affording anything in the U.S. when fast food costs this much.

Yet in this cheap, beautiful country, the wealthy seem to gather.  Tivat is touted as the Monaco of the country because of all the high-end shops and extensive port. 

Oh.  Excuse me while I dock my yacht in Montenegro.

And I think this beast is actually a private vessel.  Holy crap!

The place is peaceful, nestled between the mountains and the Bay of Kotor.  I wouldn’t describe Antalya that way even with the mountains and ocean.  There’s just something about this place.

Goodbye Turkiye (for now)

 

With my 90-day Turkish visa about to expire, the search began again for a new home.  And though it took me a while to get used to Antalya, I’ve come to love it almost as much as Istanbul, making it doubly hard to leave the country this time.

Newsflash:  I really like Türkiye.

So it was interesting to see an article about the country adopting a new digital nomad visa.  The qualifications look good.  The country wants you to bring in $3,000 a month in salary OR have $30,000 in savings.  I don’t have the job yet (and the hunt for one remains a soul-sucking nightmare), but the savings part looks good.  Also, the other stipulations seem pretty reasonable though I need to do more research.  I still have my heart set on living in Portugal, but hearing news of this visa started me thinking about how great it would be to have a place in both countries.

I’m not rolling in dough like that, but it was still a nice thought.

Since I didn’t want to piss off the Turks by overstaying my welcome, I knew I’d better skedaddle.  Time to boomerang back to Portugal except ... I’m not sure what’s happening to the Airbnb prices there.  I really want to go home but finding a place to stay in Funchal for less than $100 a night is getting tough.  The mainland is no better. 

And, alas, I feel another trip to the U.S. is looming.  I don’t want to return but … mail and supplies and … whatever. 

The fact is, I really hadn’t intended to be nomadic for this long.  My life has become the definition of ‘winging it’.

On my last day in Antalya, I revisited a beachside restaurant called the Dubai Club for lunch.  Not only did the lady with the butt-length braids at the front entrance remember me from the previous week, but one of the waiters also remembered my order.  How did he do that?  I mean, I know I’m somewhat distinctive as one of the few black tourists in the entire city, but still …

The same waiter brought my bill later on.  I asked him when the place closed and he said the restaurant was open from 9 to 2 or 3 in the morning.  He works 10 to 17 hour shifts a couple of days a week.  When my mouth dropped open, he said he was young so he could handle it.  A beach in Antalya is a gorgeous place to work, and he was indeed a young guy, but that schedule is just stupid.

Before long, it was time to pack up and move again.  Grabbed an Uber/cab back to Antalya Airport.  Since this is a smaller airport, getting through the lines wasn’t too arduous, leaving me some time to wander around.

Can someone please tell me why there’s an Arby’s in the Antalya Airport?   Why?  McDonalds and Starbucks I can understand as they are everywhere.  But Arby’s?  Really???

Anyway, another 1 ½ hours back to SAW.  I grabbed another cab and headed for a hotel that was closer to Istanbul Airport for my next international flight.  Now, by this point, I had taken numerous taxis to and from both SAW and Istanbul into the city.  The cost was usually around 1000-1400 lira – approximately $30-$40 USD.  Imagine my shock when traveling between the airports saw the price almost triple.  Are you serious? 

That bill just added to the stress of the travel day even as I checked into the hotel.  The lovely receptionist listened to my woes, telling me I got scammed and offered me a cup of coffee. I declined, deciding to drop my stuff off and find something to eat.

The Fly Point Hotel is located in the Arnavutkoy neighborhood of Istanbul.  This is very much an in-between place for tourists needing access to Istanbul Airport.  There are a lot of hotels in the area and the restaurants have most of their prices in euros instead of lira.  I was still in lira mode so this surprised me more than anything else.

Taking a walk around, I was happy to see the mosques, flags, stores, and animals that are part of the Turkish experience.  The rest of the area was kind of industrial and not much to look at.  It just made me miss Balat and the Bosphorus.

A single night in the hotel, my last Turkish breakfast for a while (buffet style this time along with a cappuccino from one of those nifty coffee machines), then I checked out of the room.  I sat in the lobby of the hotel for a few hours as my flight didn't leave until around 6 p.m.

A quick (and cheap) Uber to Istanbul Airport and, after going through initial security, I checked the big board for my flight.  How come every flight was listed for several hours before and after mine and yet my flight was missing?  I kept checking my phone and checking the board but came up with nothing.  

Eventually I had to hit two information desks before I could get an answer.  Apparently, my flight had been cancelled and I'd been bumped to the next one leaving at 7.  After some more waiting for the ticket booth to open, I quickly checked my bag and got my ticket.

Even though my initial entry into the country was over a year ago (!), the experience is still quite vivid in my mind.  Because of that, going through Turkish passport control will always make me nervous.  But, once again, there were no issues.  I hadn't overstayed my time and the laws hadn't changed since entering the country.  Sphincter unclenched, I traveled the 20 miles through the airport to wait for my next flight.