Balkan road trip – Part 2
From Novo Pazar, Serbia to St. Stefan, Montenegro
Day 3 – Merry Xmas
25 December 2018, 08:47, 1°C , cloudy
718 km from Sibiu
Nozi Pazar, Serbia near the border of Kosovo.
The city reminded us of Indonesia, it is a Muslim city with various moscs. The buildings are mainly from 19th century, streets with various buildings and shops. The temperature dropped and the rain turned into light snow. For breakfast the hotel served us omelet filled with sheep cheese. Coffee was Turkish stile – small and strong.
We left the hotel at 8.30 am and reached Peter and Paul church 10 min later. Црква Светих апостола Петра и Павла у Расу
Peter and Paul Church is about 1200 years old. Unfortunately it was closed, no opening hours or contact information as a telephone number published which is absolutely disappointing for the visitors. We left the city and continued the drive towards Montenegro.
It took about one hour drive until we arrived at the border – Špiljani: the border is up in the mountain, it was snowing. As usual, the officer asked for passports and car registration. Then he wanted to see the car insurance paper – the green card. But we didn’t bring that, luckily I stored a scan on my drive and showed the digital version. The car was checked again for declarable goods, but we brought only a little wine, which was ok.
After passing the border, the mountain scenery became more impressive. And the snow fall stronger.
We drove on the road E65 to Berane, it was snowing more and more in the mountain, but the area at Berane was snow free.
From Berane we drove on road P2 to Andrijevica. Our plan was to drive the M9 road over the mountain, which is a very small and winding road. In Andrijevica we talked to a police officer, and he insisted that we will not to drive over the mountain because the road M9 is not cleaned and not possible to pass on a snowy day. The mountains already have been covered by dark, grey clouds and we followed the police officer’s advice, drove back to Berane from where we circled around the mountain.
We followed the E65, direction Bjilo Polje, then to Mojkoac, passed the Trmanje mountains on a impressive road with tunnels and stunning views, huge limestone rocks, descended to Duga and then reached Podgorica.
Podgorica, the capitol of Montenegro, is located in a wide, flat area surrounded by mountains. This area is Montenegros largest vine plantation area and the largest vine producer is the company Sipcanik. One of their three storages is located on an old military base, inside of the former airplane shelters. Sipcanik offered wine tasting, but we still had to drive and therefore bought some recommended red wine to try it later.
West of Podgorica we passed Skadar Lake national park, a wide lake and wetland area. It must be super-beautiful in spring when all the birds are here. After crossing the lake we drove through a 4 km tunnel to Durmani and reached the Adriatican sea. We turned towards north and reached Sveti Stefan at 4:30 pm – just in time to move to our apartment and watch the sunset from the terrace.
Sveti Stefan was a fishing village on an small island – now turned into a luxury beach. The island can be visited only by groups or upfront reservation. We enjoyed the view on it from the apartment which was very nice, clean and with a balcony facing the sea.
We drove 353 km that day, total 1071 km from Sibiu.