Montenegro

Kotor is stunning and gets four cruise ships a day. Time it

Montenegro is smaller than Yorkshire and contains a fjord-like bay, a proper Mediterranean coastline, canyons, glacial lakes and mountains over 2,500 metres. The Bay of Kotor is the headline, a flooded river canyon ringed by mountains with a walled medieval town at the end of it, and it is as good as the photographs suggest.

The problem is scale. Kotor receives cruise ships that unload more people than the old town comfortably holds, and between about ten and four in high season the marble streets are simply full. Stay overnight and walk the walls at seven in the morning and it becomes an entirely different, far better place.

The interior is where Montenegro stops being a coastal add-on and becomes its own destination. Durmitor National Park has the deepest canyon in Europe, Biogradska Gora has one of the last old-growth forests on the continent, and almost nobody who comes for the beaches goes to either. Prices inland drop sharply too.

Annual events and festivals

• Mimosa Festival, Herceg Novi (Feb) — the first festival of the year, celebrating the mimosa bloom.
• Kotor Carnival (Feb) — masked parades in the old town.
• Boka Night, Kotor (Aug) — decorated boats parade round the bay at night, followed by fireworks.
• Sea Dance Festival (Jul-Aug) — a large electronic and rock festival on Jaz beach.
• Kotor Art (Jul-Aug) — a summer season of classical music, theatre and visual art.
• Petrovac Night (Aug) — a coastal town festival with music and fireworks.
• Statehood Day (13 Jul) — marks recognition as an independent state in 1878.
• Independence Day (21 May) — the 2006 referendum that separated Montenegro from Serbia.
• Wine and Bleak Festival, Virpazar (Dec) — a Lake Skadar festival built around local wine and a small fish.
• Orthodox Christmas (7 Jan) — badnjak oak branches burned outside churches on the eve.