Bečići Part 2

About 3.5 km in the opposite direction is Budva, the main town. We headed there when we needed something we couldn’t find in Becici or to explore the Old Town, which is very cool. Our favourite cafe there was Caffe Fiorino, especially for their salted caramel lattes! We often clocked up to 23,000 steps on our Budva days.

If you’re waited on at a table, they charge an extra 15%. Also, all-day breakfasts aren’t really a thing; they stop serving at 1 pm or even noon. And thanks to the language barrier, we had to be very careful ordering. Once I said, “We’ll get two sandwiches”, and the waiter brought us two each!

One day, while eating at a restaurant, we watched the local teenagers getting out of school. It was interesting, not a single girl had hair above her shoulders, and almost all the guys had very short haircuts. Once the girls leave school, they get their lips pumped up like you’ve never seen and then put lip liner around them to make them appear even bigger.

There’s an incredible amount of construction happening here. Huge apartment buildings and hotels are going up, sitting right next to old, derelict concrete structures that really should be torn down. Early in our stay, we noticed a lot of rubbish on the beach, but as we got closer to April, the cleanup crews arrived. Lawns were being mowed, and temporary beach bars, cafes, and loungers were being set up along the shoreline. The permanent restaurants moved their seating out onto the sand, where cats beg for scraps of fish from obliging patrons. There are also children’s playgrounds right on the beach, so parents can sit, drink (and smoke) while their kids play. The temperatures were consistently hitting 20°C+. Aside from a brief 34°C stint during our five days in Houston, it had been over a year since we’d felt real summer warmth. People started swimming at the beach and in our Airbnb pool. The deckchairs came out and the pool area filled with kids playing, people sunbathing, and quite a few Instagram models posing in g-string bikinis. The water was still too cold for us to swim, so we were happy to just sit by the edge in the company of a friendly cat and watching the wee house martins circling and dipping into the pool before flying back up to their mud nests under the eaves.

We could see this cool-looking island from our Airbnb, so we decided to visit. Every time we sat at the bus stop, a taxi would pull up. “Where do you want to go?” the driver would ask. “Sveti Stefan.” “10 euros.” “Never mind, we’ll wait for the bus.” “5 euros.” “Ok.” Since the bus would cost the two of us 5 euros anyway, we agreed. We seldom ended up catching a bus!

Sveti Stefan is an exclusive, fortified island, originally a 15th-century fishing village turned elite luxury retreat, famous for its red-roofed stone cottages connected to the mainland by a narrow isthmus. We walked as far as the public is allowed, then past the restaurants, through a lovely wooded area, and over to a gorgeous little beach village called Andalusia Beach. After a cappuccino each, we caught the bus back. The first part of the drive was pretty harrowing. The road only has room for one vehicle, but we kept passing cars with what felt like millimeters to spare.

Montenegro follows the Orthodox religion, so their Easter weekend was a week later than everyone else’s. There wasn’t a hot cross bun in sight! The only real signs of Easter in the shops were some displays of empty baskets and stickers, though I did spot a few Kinder chocolate bunnies.

In the Orthodox tradition, believers give up certain foods during the 40 days leading up to Easter, making Easter Sunday a highly anticipated feast. Central to the Montenegrin celebration is the egg, the seasonal symbol of new life. Families boil scores of ordinary chicken eggs at home on Good Friday. The tradition involves dyeing the first batch red (usually by boiling them with onion skins to get a nice color) and setting one aside until next year. This egg is called the “housekeeper,” referring to the belief that it will protect the home. On Easter Sunday, families take their baskets of colored eggs to be blessed by the parish priest. The red color symbolizes happiness, joy, rebirth, and the blood of Christ. After church, families have breakfast together and play a fun game where they crack their eggs against one another to see whose breaks first.

Just beyond Budva’s Old Town is Mogren Beach which is actually two beautiful beaches connected by a tunnel. This beach has received the blue flag, symbolizing high environmental standards and pure waters. It felt good to walk barefeet on the warm pebbly sand.