Kotor, Montenegro

Today we hiked up the Ladder of Kotor, an ascent of 940m.

We dressed in layers. It was about 8C outside, which is perfect for hiking. We started in the morning so the first part was in the shade; at the top it was pretty windy (and probably a few degrees cooler), and on the way down we’d be in the sun. We were glad we took our toques - the wind was pretty cold at the top.

The trailhead starts outside the walls, near the Northern Gate. The path is quite obvious once you get on the trail; if you take a wrong turn trying to find the start (like we did), the locals are quite helpful in pointing out the way.

The trail zigzags up the hill, at a gentle slope. It’s covered with gravel and loose rock, very easy to hike.

At about castle level (260m), we could see the cutoff that leads to the castle wall, where a ladder was propped up to get through a window into the castle itself, where it’s then possible to take the steps down back into town.

We continued up. The path narrowed to about a cow width. Unfortunately there were also a couple cows walking up the path ahead of us so we were limited to their pace. The cows could actually walk up quite quickly, it’s just that they stopped frequently to munch on greens, chew their cud and look back disinterested at the tourists.

The views were great all the way up. Finally, we reached the top! The path continues further to the village of Njeguši, but we were keen to get back into town and have lunch.

We took a selfie (which we don’t do very often - maybe once or twice a trip), and then retraced our steps back to town.

It took us a total of 2.5 hours to walk up and back down, including time for pics along the way. The cows added about 15 minutes; so it’s probably just over a two hour round trip. (This is based on off-season - we saw less than ten other people the whole time.)

We tried another place for lunch, based on tripadvisor. It was average. I think most places inside the walls are varying shades of average, which is typical of a high tourist area. The best restaurants are outside of the walls.

After lunch we walked about 20 minutes around the bay to get pics of the walls at sunset.

Had drinks later on at Cesarica. It was a cosy place with nice atmosphere. Their food was okay but the draft beer was good!