Kayaking in Kotor

I woke up in the morning still in pain, mad at people and mad at Budva. My knee had swollen up and bit more and was all sorts of ugly. I had lots of other unpleasant scrapes and bruises. I decided to to get on the bus and move on to Kotor. I looked up the buses online and they were frequent so I went into town to find the Ballerina statue. It’s a nice place for a photo but there is not to much around it. This went down to check out. I asked about a Taxi to the bus station because it was quite the walk and I didn’t want to carry my bags while I was cranky and in pain. He called for one of the local drivers that charges less than the tourist taxis.

I made it to the bus station and waited about 15 minutes for the next bus to depart for Kotor. They walk to old town was sort and mostly down hill. I found a hostel to stay in inside the old district of Kotor. The hostel was great with lots of events. The bad thing was it also had lots of stairs that killed my knee.

There were two girls in the room when I got in. Chelsea was an Australian who had been travelling for about 3 years. Lonneke was from the Netherlands and was on holiday. We talked about our travels and other things. We decided that we were going to take the bus down to Perstar beach. There are two small islands near there that you can take a boat or a kayak too. There is a church and a private residence on the islands respectively.

They kayaks were advertised as singles and doubles. We were okay with getting two but the guy in-charge said it would be fine if we all rented one together. We rented a kayak and began our adventure to the island. And it was an adventure. Despite being born and raised on an island kayaking was not a sport I had done a lot of. All three of us were in the same boat. But with three of us in one kayak we managed to get the the island with the church.

We arrived at a good time because it was between boat runs. This means that no one else was on the island at the time. We were able to get lots of nice photos before the next bus load of people arrived. When they did we got back into the kayak and went off to the other (probably private) island. We pulled our lunch out of the dry bag and had something to eat and drink. We spent time chatting and enjoying the view and the weather.

We headed back to the mainland to return the kayak before our two hours was up and we had to pay for a third hour. As we were rowing I put my phone in the life-jacket so it wouldn’t get wet because I was at the back and getting splashed. I hadn’t put it in the dry bag so I could take pictures.

When we got to the mainland we got out of the kayak and returned the life-jackets. We pulled our stuff out of the dry bag and I couldn’t find my phone. When I looked back it was sitting at the bottom of the bay where I had gotten out of the kayak. I had dropped my phone in the drink and left it there for close to 5 minutes before I realized.

We found a grocery store and they had rice. I bought it and we put the phone in right away. I was worried about all the photos I would end up losing if my phone didn’t work again. I left the phone on my bunk and signed up for a BBQ dinner that night. Hoping that being out with people would take my mind off my phone.

We were headed to the beach to light a fire. We ran into a weather related problem though. It was really windy and we couldn’t get the fire or the BBQ lit. The organizer had a back up plan that was a small shelter near the water. We got there and began to set up. We ran into a guard who tried to chase us off. The hostel guy called one of the owners and got permission for us to be there. The guard called the other owner to get the permission rescinded. To keep the peace we were forced to leave.

We looked for other spots and couldn’t find anywhere. It was decided that we would go back to the hostel and have dinner there. The hostel has a large reception area where people could sit around and talk while eating. I stayed until people began departing for the pub crawl. Then I snuck off to my dorm. I checked my phone and it turned on and began to work. To be safe I left it in the rice overnight.