A Russian tourist has criticized the Montenegrin resort town of Budva, describing its streets as dirty and comparing its seafront promenade to one from the 1990s, in a review shared with the travel portal Tonkosti Turizma and published on the Zen platform.
The traveler said her trip involved several problems she considered unusual for Europe. She said the streets were dirty and that Budva's seafront resembled a 1990s-era promenade because of the state of its paving. She called the beaches even more disappointing, saying sunbathers were packed so tightly together that it was sometimes impossible to walk between them, comparing the scene to the Soviet-era cartoon "Nu, Pogodi!" ("Well, Just You Wait!").
Budva and the Bay of Kotor
Budva is one of the best-known resort towns on Montenegro's Adriatic coast, popular with visitors from Russia and elsewhere for its old town and beaches. The Bay of Kotor, further along the coast, is a fjord-like inlet known for its historic towns and mountain scenery and is a common destination for boat excursions.
The tourist said she also ran into trouble during an excursion to the Bay of Kotor, complaining that staff from the company running the trip failed to help her. She said that despite having traveled to many countries, she had never encountered such a low "European" standard of service.
A beautiful country, with caveats
She concluded that Montenegro was a beautiful country if one could overlook toilets charging one euro to use, litter left lying around, a lack of service and train carriages covered in graffiti.
The review echoes an earlier account from a Russian man who relocated to Montenegro and described the country with the phrase "light and water can disappear." He said life there was far from ideal and that its downsides were not outweighed by its proximity to the sea.
