In our (admittedly limited) experience, the transition from Montenegro to Croatia has been hard. It’s a big day to check out of one country and into another with a longish distance between the ports of exit and entry and then onwards to somewhere for the night On top of that there has always been the change of attitude between the more easy going Montenegrins and the more stolid Croatians/Dalmatians.
But beware of extrapolating from limited data.
We tried to streamline the process of our exit from Montenegro. Some of you with experience of the former Yugoslavia are saying “Well that was your first mistake!” And you are right.
Our idea was, as we have done in other countries (and even in Montenegro) before, to check out with the Harbormaster the night before and then with police and customs the morning of our departure. The reason for this is that the Harbormaster has limited hours (many breaks) and they are never around early in the morning - often not before ten. A few years ago we had to delay our departure from Budva for 36 hours because the Harbormaster never turned up.
You’d think we’d learn. But, in our defense, Porto Montenegro is the epitome of modern forward-looking Montenegro. Sure …. up to a point.
The marina helps us check out from the Harbormaster the night before we leave; we have our paperwork with the necessary stamps on it; I go to the Police the next morning.
The Police say “No.” The date is wrong; you can’t do that. We need a new stamp from the Harbormaster.
The Harbormaster is on break you knew that was coming didn’t you). We will have to wait until 11:00, two hours after our planned departure time.
11:00 becomes 12:00 with nothing happening. I go back to the marina folks and say "I would like to complain and I would like you to fix this”.
The look on their faces tells a story. “This does not compute” comes to mind. They had no way to handle the fact that their ”procedures” have failed. There is much shifting of feet and non-verbal “I’m not really here” communication going on.
At 12:45 they finally sort it out and say that they paid for a new cruising permit for us. The Harbormaster said that our permit had run out about noon time and that we’d have to have a new one. The fact that it was his fault that the permit ran out was apparently irrelevant.
To be fair, we see a generational divide in Montenegro and Croatia; the older generation is still stuck in the Communist ways; the younger generation is not and really wishes the old one would step out of the way.
Croatian castle overlooking the entrance to the Bay of Kotor in Montenegro
Anyway, on to Croatia nearly four hours late. This means we sail through a thunderstorm I had hoped to avoid - 25 knot gusts and torrential rain with no visibility except during the frequent flashes of lightning.
But we make it into our Croatian port of entry (which is almost deserted because of the weather). And here we meet the younger generation of Croatians. Carlo, the marinero is helpful and friendly; the police are all in their thirties and equally friendly and watching Croatia in the World Cup, Croatia are doing well, so everything is fine. The Harbprmaster is a young lady who is happy to help everything go smoothly and quickly.
So we leave our port of entry not quite as late as we might have been. It’s still a long way to our mooring but we decide to shoot for it anyway. We arrive close to 10:00pm and it’s dark.
Radar, AIS and knowledge derived from having been here before all help. But avoiding buoys in the dark is still a bit challenging. Our restaurant folks come out to help us moor and say “Do you still want to eat?”
“Are you still open?”
“Of course, for our guests.”
Goat "under the bell" - we still think this needs more herbs
Sweaty and salty we have a lovely meal. We’re the last people there but they are happy to talk with us and make us feel comfortable.
We sleep well and decide to stay a second day.
The social objective of this trip to Croatia is to meet up with Peter and Jane again who will have a new crew and be heading back down in our direction to reach Dubrovnik. We meander north to align with their schedule. We spend a remote night at anchor under the stars with only seagulls and goats to keep us company.
Talking about goats, do you know the story of “Lori and the Vengeful Goats”? It all started when Lori learned to sail in the BVI and was involved in the lucrative but highly dangerous goat-running trade. That's a story she'd best tell you herself but the next episode took place about three or four years ago on the island of Ithaca in Greece. We had dinner and Lori had goat stew - delicious. Anyway, the next morning we are walking up on the hill behind the tiny harbor and we come upon a herd of goats. It was OK for a while until we came across numero uno goat. All his ladies were behind him and so a macho gesture was needed. He looked at Lori and snorted; we moved more cautiously forward and he emitted a mixture of a hiss and a grunt. For other goats and apparently Lori as well, this is very intimidating.
Lori decides 1) that we can’t go any farther and 2) that he smells the goat from last night on her breath and he is angry about the untimely demise of his cousin. Logic is of no use in such circumstances so we beat a dignified retreat.
Incident over, or so we thought.
So, the night before our anchorage on this trip, Lori and I eat goat. And tonight, out of nowhere, a little string of goats appears on the land - all of them looking at Lori. The leader does not look happy.
“They know!” she says. “Goats can’t swim. Can they???”
Fortunately it appears not. Lori sneaks away incognito and lives to eat goat another day.
The goats were foiled this time but they disappeared muttering like "Wait till next time. We will build a raft!"