I climbed Mt. Doom, and all I got was this stinking goat cheese

Did I mention that bus drivers around here are nuts, and usually half of the riders get car sick? No? Well, it's true. The drive from Budva to Koloshin was by far the worst, though. Crazy mountain roads that go up forever, hairpin turns on the way down, inches between you and the bus coming towards you, and not enough seats for all the passengers. Sounds like a good time to me. Aaaaand, after 4 hours of that, we wound up here:



We were the only people to get out at Koloshin station, and the building was a bombed out (literally) old building with one information officer who didn't speak a lick of English. We were heading to Biogradska Gora National Park, but had no idea how to get there from the station. Luckily we pieced together some info from a girl in the station store, and were on our way. After a 1 Euro bus, a 1km hike, and a 10 minute hitch-hike, we wound up at our destination.

By the looks of it, it was worth it:





Almost immediately, we ran into a backpacking American husband and wife team. There names were Jeff and Alisha, and they had spent the summer in Budapest doing an internship. They were real nice folks from Indiana, and were looking to get their hike on in the park. We joined them and headed up the mountain. Here's the gang about a quarter-way into the 4-hour hike:



When we finally reached the top of the mountain, we were greeted by this little scene here:



A woman and her son lived in this tiny little shack and sold juice and homemade goat cheese to hikers (mind you, this was a 3 hour walk from the nearest road, and over 2 hours from the base camp. What an amazing family. They washed their dishes and got their drinking water from a spring (whose water was perfectly drinkable and delicious, and came out of the spring almost freezing), shit in an outhouse, and basically lived off the land. The woman didn't even recognize the language we were speaking as English. She asked if we were speaking German or Hungarian (We were able to translate this after a lot of trouble and repetition). I'm pretty sure that is the only time this will happen in my life. Unbelievable. Despite our communication barrier, we drank coffee, talked a lot, and had a real nice time at the top of the most beautiful mountain I've ever been on. She gave us the coffee and cheese for free, even though we insisted on paying her.

Hail, hail, the gang's all here:



She let me chop some wood. This will be considered my stunt for Biogradska Gora, because this thing was basically a slightly modified battle axe. I took a few mighty swings, which yielded exactly no wood. She, on the other hand, took a few meek whacks, and broke off all sorts of chunks. Takes a little experience, I suppose:



Buying spring water is for suckers...go to the source, son!



Other awesome things from Kolashin/Biogradska Gora:

I caught a huge toad!



We walked down a 3km hill a few times!




Met a totally radical Montenegrin train station controller named Jovan!



Hung in the amazingly beautiful Kolashin Train Station!



Biogradska Gora was amazing. It is the type of place that you'd have to book 2 years in advance in the US, and yet we were able to walk up on a Saturday and get a radical little cabin for 23 Euros a night. Highly, highly recommended. You know, if you're ever in the area...

Inching along:



Next up, Belgrade...again!

Budva, AKA "The Montenegrin Miami"

In retrospect, Budva is the type of place that you're glad you went, but probably wouldn't recommend to anyone else. It's crowded, the beaches are pretty dirty, and it's utterly impossible to escape the cacophonous sounds of competing techno beats. Every girls has fake boobs and lips and weighs 14 pounds, and every dude is 6'5 and all rippled-like. According to the locals, a vast majority of the tourists here are either Serbian or Russian. It's all the same to us, but I figured I'd mention it for posterity.

Anyhow, we got a cheap room, we were close to the beach, and we got to hang out with a Scottish Terrier named Benny. We are now deep into "No English Country," which has been pretty entertaining. I'm not sure if I mentioned it yet, but being tattooed Americans in the Balkans has been an interesting experience. We've been met with outright rudeness, and in some cases, unwillingness to serve us, on an almost daily basis. Every now and then we meet radical folks, but it's becoming kind of few and far between. But, getting tattooed is a personal choice that, by now, we're quite aware that some folks will never understand. Not a problem.

Side note: We haven't met a fluent, or even passable English speaker in a while. We're getting very good at home-made sign language.

Okey Dokey...here we have a totally lame beach. Much of Budva was like this:



This is what passes for a footbridge in Montenegro. I'm not sure what this pit underneath is was, but it didn't smell to good. You do the math...



We did end up finding a great swim spot, a little bit off the beaten path. I think Taylor liked it:



And at said beach, I pulled one of these!



Disclaimer re: the above photo: While it may look extremely extreme (which is basically was), this is photographic evidence of me being out-stunted. While this is more rare than seeing a leprechaun on your birthday, it does happen from time to time. A pair of burly Russians climbed a cliff WAAAAAAAAAY above where I jumped from and did some radical stunts. Whatever...at least my parents weren't commies.

While Budva wasn't the most radical place on earth, we did have a pretty good time. We made a hasty decision to head inland, and had to say "bye-bye" to the beach. Thanks for the good swims, snorkels, and stunts. Till next time!



Nonsensical Route Planning!