Bar is on the coast and is a popular beach resort especially for Serbian and Russian vacationers. It gets really crowded in July and August and accommodations are scarce and expensive. So I hopped on the train from Bar through the capital Podgorica up to Kolasin, Crna Gora.
Kolasin is ski resort in the winter time. Summer is the low season, but there are beautiful green mountains and the weather is perfect. 25% C during the day, cool enough at night to wear a sweater or jacket.
The Kolasin train station is high up above the town. When I got off the train, I had no accomodations lined up so I started hiking towards the town center. Within a few hundred kilometers I passed a farmhouse and out front was a 21-year-old girl–farrmer’s daugher. Using my very limited knowledge of Crnogorsky I ask if she knew anyone that could offer accommodations. Turns out they had built a cabin out back for hosting skiers during the winter ski season. Being summertime I got the cabin all to myself. What luck.
I walked into town and asked a couple of teenagers if there was a good restaurant in town. They pointed me to a place which I ended up eating at every single day. In my opinion the restaurant is a 5-star restaurant and it was very inexpensive. The main course was maybe three Euros. The main courses were all grilled meat-lamb, pork, beef, chicken, lamb boiled in milk–there were many choices. Every meal I ate a Shopska salad and drank a jelen pivo. Jelen means deer and of course pivo is beer. The whole bill was maybe six Euros.
I actually wouldn’t mind staying in Kolasin for the whole summer. The town and people are wonderful. One of my favorite things about was nobody spoke any English. In fact, when I told people I was American and asked how many Americans they had met, the answer was always NONE.
