So I thought I’d get my bit in first this time and give you the driver’s

“View from the cockpit”.

The Durmitor Ring is a 76k circular route through some of the most spectacular mountainous regions of Montenegro. We drove up from the 1450m town of Zabljak, to a maximum height of 1,950 m, which believe you me is high, even with my semi-conquered vertigo. I’ve put some videos in, it’s first time we’ve tried YouTube links, so let’s see how this goes. Please let us know, it’s not always easy seeing the final product on our slow campsite internet connections, so all feedback welcome. I did want to put some music to the vids, but that’s beyond me atm. I’ll ask my children how to do it later. So lets fire the engine up.

This clip of the first section is part of the ascent to the Durmitor Ring. Apart from a significant “Dip” in the nothernmost section, to cross a glacial river, it’s a reasonably level drive – for Montenegro that is.

Durmitor Park has many geological features, including its 18 Glacial Lakes, the 748 springs, countless caves and one of the southernmost Glaciers in Europe. We didn’t see the bears, boar, deer or capercaillie, as much as we looked out for them., but we did see snow . We also saw many sheep, and having tasted Durmitor Lamb, and the Durmitor Smoked Lamb the night before I can see why they are so tasty ! Fresh pure alpine meadows are their grazing grounds as you will see in another clip.

After the ascent to the National Park took around half an hour, mostly in second gear, luckily not too many cars around, the road was single track, although we did meet a few cars coming the other way, and one car actually overtook us at speed.

To the right of the next two clips you can see the Tara Canyon, we stopped for the view, where we could, the beauty of it is breath-taking, literally, but I think most appreciated from solid water.

These believe it or not are not the worst roads we have been on, the Durmitor ring is fully paved, and having done it not too bad to drive. We encountered a couple of sections where rockfalls were scattered across the road, but obviously had the clearance, tyres and confidence to just get on with it.

After the glacial descent/ascent things got a little less scary, and since there was no opportunity for turning back we continued on. The road sort of levelled out into alpine plains, the meadows were full of wildflowers, the lambs were fattening up nicely.

You can hear Blanches pace notes, being read out in the next clip, as we managed to get into fourth gear for a change, although we were not exactly on two wheels going round these bends. The little huts are not for rabbits btw, they are “Eco Campings” which I don’t think we will be doing sometime soon.

At the three quarters mark the scenery became even more breathtaking, I’ve copied a part of the World heritage description below, if you want the full description here’s the link.. DURMITOR NATIONAL PARK – World Heritage Datasheet (unep-wcmc.org)

“Because of its location and altitudinal range, the Park has both Mediterranean and alpine microclimates, resulting in an exceptional range of species. The dominant geological features are very thick, often savagely contorted, limestone formations of the middle and upper Triassic, upper Jurassic and upper Cretaceous, notably the Durmitorean flysch, though more recent rocks are also present.”

The stunning views, and a equally stunning lady in a landy, in no particular order, what a a wonderful 5 hours session.

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And here’s the final video of the Durmitrean Flysch, enjoy….

View from the rear

I wish I had that luxury but I’m always in the passenger seat ready to stick my head out of the window to be able to tell Steve the road is clear, particularly for right hand turns!

As usual, when we intend leaving early, which suggests around 7am, by the time we had packed, loaded the Poacher, taken Stella for a walk and said goodbye to Danilo, who provided the apartment and raft experience, it was well gone nine before we were on our way to Drive the Ring

Once on The Ring, the driver is more or less committed to completing the circuit, so I settled down for the tour whilst Steve drove superbly, despite sheer drops on either side.

Thank you Steve for writing this post. You’ve done it more justice than I could ever have done. The various views were amazing which ranged from hot and steep to cold and level. Your photography excelled as usual.

Having successfully completed and enjoyed The Ring, we then continued our journey to Biogradska Gora Forest.