Dovidjena Crna Gora!

With my last few days in Montenegro, I wanted to make sure I did something I never got a chance to do. Lauren and I had our eye on Monastery Ostrog ALL year, but never really got the chance to make it up there because we had heard it was really difficult to make the trip by bus. I took the opportunity to take my parents up there because I knew we could rent a car and forego the terrible bus. After we got our car (a tiny little thing), my mom was designated driver because she got an International Driving Permit.

On the way in to the center to rent a car, we ran into Bojana. I was excited that we saw her because she was the only Galeb girl my parents got to meet. We told her about our plans and she said "uh oh. the roads are very small". My mom was already a little nervous to be driving on the side of a mountain, but I reassured her everything would be fine. We went and grabbed something at the pekara and set out for our day trip.

Everything was going well until we made the turn to get off and head up to Ostrog. The roads were TINY ...even for this car... and super windy. My mom wasn't very amused at this point. Any time we passed a car going the other way one person had to stop so the other could maneuver around. It was a little stressful at times and my mom made my dad drive. In the end, I had my head out the window saying "clear" or "no", depending on if I could see another car or not. Phew. It was about 30 minutes of both parents being beyond stressed out. We finally got there and it was worth it. This little monastery was carved into the side of the mountain and was awesome! We first walked into this little little room with an open casket and a priest. Everyone said a prayer (I just looked and tried to figure out who it was), did the sign of the cross, made a donation, kissed the wall, and walked backwards out of the exit. Kind of strange, but I went along with it. Then we walked into the monastery and it was about three levels of stairs that led to another room. This one had a picture of Jesus that everyone kissed and gave money. All throughout there were pictures of saints where people just threw money on the floor. It was a pretty interesting place. Even though I wanted to spend a little more time there, my parents were anxious to get back down the mountain and be safe and sound on solid ground.

After we were down, we met Cory and a few girls who play in Slovenia for a coffee at Soho. We planned to go have dinner at a grill and then I went back to my apartment to gear up for my last day in Bar...

That next day, we took advantage of the rental car and drove to Sveti Stefan. I pass by this little island alllll the time, but never stop because I'm always on a bus. Finally I had the chance to stop and take some pictures of one of my favorite little places in the country. We knew we couldn't stay long because we had a date with Sandra's family that morning, so we just went to snap a few pictures:

When we got back Sandra's family was waiting for us. Her mom made us a little breakfast that had all of their national things, like prsut, rakija, homemade wine, and sopska salata. It was all delicious and it was nice to have a farewell meal and enjoy their company one last time. I think my parents really enjoyed meeting them because they have heard so much about them over the year.

The last night we just went to Soho for a coffee and hung out around the apartment, cleaning and doing some last minute things. The taxi came at 7am to take us to the airport. We packed up and headed to Greece (...or so we thought!)

English (or not...)

I found this youtube video and thought it was super interesting. It is supposedly what english sounds like to foreigners. It's an italian singer who made up gibberish to sound like english.

Montenegro Thus Far..

My parents made it safely to Montenegro! We've been doing so much, and it's been fun to show them around. They arrived minus a bag (my dad was not very happy about it, but we got it the next day). They really enjoyed the ride from the airport to Bar. It's been raining a lot so everything was really green and the lake was full, which made for good scenery.

When we got back to Bar, they were pretty tired so we just went to bed. The next morning I had every intention of taking them to go get burek, but Nikola had other plans. We went to Soho for a morning coffee, but my parents ended up taking in their monthly alcohol allotment too! They tried rakija, which neither of them were particularly fond of and my dad was really excited about the collection of Cuban cigars...he also made sure to take plenty of pictures of them because his friend would be really jealous.

not a face of enthusiasm

this one on the other hand....

After this, Nikola made arrangements to go to the fish restaurant with us in Ulcinj. On the way there we made a little pit stop at Stara Maslina (which means Old Olive) ....the tree is more than 2,000 years old and is still producing olives. 

We ordered waaaay too much food (which is normal for a meal with Nikola) with some exotic sea food. There were octopus legs attached to the head, mussel things, other chewy weird things, shrimp, and rice. Then, for the second course we had two HUGE grilled fish with spinach and potatoes. One was a Dorado, and the other was a Sea Bass if that makes an difference to anyone. They were both delicious, but we were stuffed. 

for someone that doesn't like seafood, this plate looks anything but appetizing

After that, Nikola drove us to another beach on the Veliki Plaza and we looked around a little before heading home. After that we took a nice walk on the korzo at sunset and then headed over to grab an ice cream and ran a few errands around the city. 

The next day we intended to go to Monastery Ostrog, but those plans fell through so we decided to wake up and actually follow through on the plans to get burek. As always, it was delicious and I ordered my mom and dad both one with meat. It was delicious, but my dad takes after me and did not like that nasty jogurt!! They met Rose, my fruit dealer and we walked around the pijaca to see what the farmers had to sell. Then we made our way up to Stari Bar.

It was the first time either of them had seen anything like it, so they were very amused. We took lots of video (my dad is LOVING their new bloggie) and had a good time just taking pictures and walking around. Sometime when I have more time I'll upload a video so you can all hear the lovely commentary that goes on during these videos. Here are a few more pictures of us at Stari Bar:

After we left Stari Bar, we ended up eating my Last Supper at Palma. I got Becka and kupus, my favorite! My dad got the same, and my mom got the chicken. It was delicious and I can't believe I will never eat at Palma again in my life! 

waaa! no more becka for this girl. 

After that I had a few things to give to Sandra's mom that I had collected throughout my stay here. She was SO excited to meet my family and visit with us. We stayed for a few hours and talked with her and Maya (Sandra's little sister) and I had a really good time. Unfortunately Sandra was out of town, but we will get together again before I leave to say our goodbyes. We had a little photo session before we left:

This brings us to day 3 of Montenegro. Today we hit the road (finally!) and went to Kotor, Perast, and Budva. First up it was Budva, which was nice for my parents to see a functioning Old City. We stayed around there for a little while before we caught the bus to Kotor. I planned for them to hike up the mountain but as soon as they saw the flag at the top they said "no way!!" and we moved on to Perast. We took the little ferry out to the islands, took a church tour, and saw the attached museum. To our tour guide, the most beautiful possession of the church was an embroidery made by a woman waiting for her husband while he was at sea. He was very excited to report that the hair of the angels was made from her own hair and pointed out that when she started she was young so the hair was dark, and it gradually turned to gray as the embroidery was finished. Neato!

When we came back, we sat at a cafe and ate some palacinke. It was wonderful. We headed back to where the bus arranged to pick us back up, and saw that there was a booth renting segways. We thought that would be a good way to kill some time because we were so early and it was really cheap. The guy probably thought we were idiots because we asked if we could just drive it around the parking lot so that we didn't stray too far from where the bus would be. He said ok and gave us each a quick little lesson and let us go. It was fun, and I was pretty good at it. My mom learned quickly too, but my dad had some serious issues. He thought it was based on fancy footwork so he had a pretty interesting strategy of bending at the knees but keep every other part of his body as STIFF as possible. Hilarious. We played around on that for about 30 minutes before the bus came to pick us up and we headed back to Bar.

Tomorrow we plan to go to Monastery Ostrog and perhaps somewhere else. More updates are on their way!!