Montenegro

The Durmitor National Park pushed me to the edge.
Five hours of pure climbing – steep, endless, brutal.
It asked for everything I had.

The night before, we had camped in the woods.
It was cold, dark, and at some point, we saw flashlights moving between the trees –
maybe rangers, maybe someone else.
We didn’t know.
But somehow, we slept.

The next morning, the world opened up.
We followed the trail out of the forest,
and suddenly stood in front of a view that felt otherworldly –
like a moon landscape.
Vast, silent, silver.
Unreal. And beautiful.

Then came the Tara Canyon –
the second deepest gorge in the world.
We didn’t know we would pass it.
But there it was – breathtaking.

After a long descent,
we camped at the edge of the park near the Black Lake –
illegally, again.
There we met a Serbian influencer, asked for a short interview,
and were suddenly surrounded by a Chinese tour group
taking photos with us.

On we rode, toward the coast.
More cyclists crossed our path.
One morning, we woke up to dogs sniffing at our tent.
Later, we hiked to a monastery carved into the side of a cliff,
with views across the valley and mountain ranges opposite.
Sacred. High.

And then – Kotor.
The southernmost fjords of Europe.
A sight I won’t forget.

We camped at the water’s edge,
with a view of the fjords and ships gliding in.
The perfect place.

A  bike crash that left with a swollen knee –
and a new perspective.
We adjusted our route.

And while all of this was happening –
so many moments, people, places –
we didn’t know that the next country,
just a brief detour,
would change the way we saw travel altogether.