Epic trip of 2015: part III; Kotor, Montenegro

On Saturday, November 14th we boarded our ship, the Splendour of the Seas.

We got comfortable and explored on board, had dinner and met our table mates for the week (we loved them, four older couples from different parts of the UK), and watched as we left Venice after dark had fallen.

I was reading Gordon B. Hinkley's biography on this trip and was able to start and finish it, so nice to have the time to do so, and such a good man to learn about.

The next morning we approached Kotor throughout the morning.

The approach was part of the experience as it was through a relatively narrow waterway surrounded by mountains and small villages.

Very pretty.

 

{Kotor is on the right hand side in this picture, you can see the path up to the fort on the mountain above}

The mountains reminded me of my Utah mountains.

{people congregating for a look at our first port}

Kotor is so small that it's dock is too small for a cruise ship, so our ship got out it's little tender boats to ferry us back and forth. It worked better and quicker than I anticipated.

{you might notice that I love all the laundry out to dry at all of our stops}

Kotor is a pretty well preserved medieval town surrounded by a wall that the Venetians built. 

 

 

We hiked up towards the fort and were rewarded by some fabulous views.

 

We didn't get all the way to the top because I didn't want to kill my bum knee and it was getting dark.

Turned out to be a good choice, we saw bobbing cell phone lights of people trying to get off of the mountain later.

 I also loved seeing the different styles of jewelry in each port we stopped in, you could tell a bit about which spots shared a culture and which didn't by how similar or dissimilar the designs.

 {different walls and fort parts lit up on the ferry ride back to the boat}

Overall, this was my favorite stop on our cruise.

We had a lovely dinner and show on board and called it a night.

 And looked and looked at this cute picture mom sent of the kids from that day.

{Evie is wearing the pink boots grandma got her for her birthday}