For some reason I’m not sleeping well. You would think with all that climbing I would be tired enough to sleep, but apparently not. I’m also getting up every morning with some strange sickness. I told Karlo that I have ‘morning sickness.’ I’m literally sick with a cold every morning. I get up with coughing fits, a runny nose and terrible sore throat. But my tea and honey at breakfast seem to fix me right up. So very strange. I must be allergic to something on the ship. Luckily I packed some allergy meds and they did the trick, which was a good thing because I needed my energy for more climbing. Montenegro has completely redefined the term
hilly ride. There is almost no flat ground anywhere. You are either riding UP or DOWN with not much in between. And the ups are serious ups, and the downs are serious downs. I’m starting to crave level ground. When the tour guides say “2 more hills” they don’t mean ‘hills.’ They mean mountains. The rides go something like this . . . 1 hour of pedaling up, 10 minutes cruising down, followed by another hour up, etc.
The day started off great. We took a bus ride to a place called Stari Bar. This was the fortress of the town of Bar and has been around since the 4th Century. It was ruled in the past by the Greeks, Venetians, and the Austrian/Hungarian Monarchy. Talk about old and old history. The place was amazing - a stone fortress way up on a hill built to protect the city. It was particularly fascinating to see how a recent (1979) earthquake destroyed some parts of it.
I had a ball running around taking photos.
Next, the bus took us to the Albanian border at about 900 meters (3,000 feet) in the air. We literally drove into the clouds to get there and my cell phone dinged with a message that said “Welcome to Albania.” Yikes, I didn’t realize we were that close. The drive up was crazy and the views out to Albania like nothing I’ve ever seen. I got an incredible feeling of being so small in such a huge expansive place. You could see for a million miles out over the mountains. Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures of this because I refused to take photos from the bus. OK, I did take one picture from the bus because I could never pass up photos of donkeys. These guys were running down the middle of the road in front of the bus. Too cute.
We started our ride at 3,000 feet and got to coast, zooming down the mountain for a good 3 km. What a ball that was, but of course we paid for it. What goes down must come up. We climbed and climbed for what seemed like forever until we finally saw the tour guides setting up our lunchtime picnic. The sight was like an oasis. Heaven.
We enjoyed a nice break up here and took in the awesome views. I even took the opportunity to stretch out a bit.
Then it was time for another thrill ride of zooming downhill for several kilometers followed by, you guessed it, more climbing. But that coast from the lunch break was the ride of all rides. It just doesn’t get any better than the views of Skadarsko Jezero (huge lake) as we snaked along the side of the mountain (coasting downhill no less). No words or pictures could do it justice. And my proudest statistic . . . 2 days, over 4,500 feet climbed and I never dropped to the first ring. Very proud of myself indeed.
For some reason I’m not sleeping well. You would think with all that climbing I would be tired enough to sleep, but apparently not. I’m also getting up every morning with some strange sickness. I told Karlo that I have ‘morning sickness.’ I’m literally sick with a cold every morning. I get up with coughing fits, a runny nose and terrible sore throat. But my tea and honey at breakfast seem to fix me right up. So very strange. I must be allergic to something on the ship. Luckily I packed some allergy meds and they did the trick, which was a good thing because I needed my energy for more climbing. Montenegro has completely redefined the term hilly ride. There is almost no flat ground anywhere. You are either riding UP or DOWN with not much in between. And the ups are serious ups, and the downs are serious downs. I’m starting to crave level ground. When the tour guides say “2 more hills” they don’t mean ‘hills.’ They mean mountains. The rides go something like this . . . 1 hour of pedaling up, 10 minutes cruising down, followed by another hour up, etc.
The day started off great. We took a bus ride to a place called Stari Bar. This was the fortress of the town of Bar and has been around since the 4th Century. It was ruled in the past by the Greeks, Venetians, and the Austrian/Hungarian Monarchy. Talk about old and old history. The place was amazing - a stone fortress way up on a hill built to protect the city. It was particularly fascinating to see how a recent (1979) earthquake destroyed some parts of it.
I had a ball running around taking photos.
Next, the bus took us to the Albanian border at about 900 meters (3,000 feet) in the air. We literally drove into the clouds to get there and my cell phone dinged with a message that said “Welcome to Albania.” Yikes, I didn’t realize we were that close. The drive up was crazy and the views out to Albania like nothing I’ve ever seen. I got an incredible feeling of being so small in such a huge expansive place. You could see for a million miles out over the mountains. Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures of this because I refused to take photos from the bus. OK, I did take one picture from the bus because I could never pass up photos of donkeys. These guys were running down the middle of the road in front of the bus. Too cute.
We started our ride at 3,000 feet and got to coast, zooming down the mountain for a good 3 km. What a ball that was, but of course we paid for it. What goes down must come up. We climbed and climbed for what seemed like forever until we finally saw the tour guides setting up our lunchtime picnic. The sight was like an oasis. Heaven.
We enjoyed a nice break up here and took in the awesome views. I even took the opportunity to stretch out a bit.
Then it was time for another thrill ride of zooming downhill for several kilometers followed by, you guessed it, more climbing. But that coast from the lunch break was the ride of all rides. It just doesn’t get any better than the views of Skadarsko Jezero (huge lake) as we snaked along the side of the mountain (coasting downhill no less). No words or pictures could do it justice. And my proudest statistic . . . 2 days, over 4,500 feet climbed and I never dropped to the first ring. Very proud of myself indeed.
1 comment:
i want to eat in that same spot and then do some yoga too.
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