If It's the 4th of July This Must Be . . .

Montenegro.  I just returned from an absolutely amazing trip to Croatia, which will be dominating the blog for a while.  During the trip I rented a car, which gave me a lot more freedom to get around.  I did that for the first time on my recent trip to Salalah, Oman, and I'm now completely sold on the concept.  I had somehow convinced myself that renting a car overseas would be difficult, but nothing could be further from the truth.  I've now driven in Oman, South Africa, Croatia, Montenegro and Canada (although since I live in Vermont that probably shouldn't count).  Because I had the car I also had the opportunity to partake in one of my odd traditions: spending the 4th of July off the beaten path overseas.  It certainly didn't start as a conscious decision, but has grown into something akin to a quest.  Kotor, Montenegro has now joined the ranks of Agra, India; Bruges, Belgium; Bratislava, Slovakia; and Alexandria, Egypt.  This trip also shows how much I've grown as a foreign traveller.  It wasn't that long ago that my friend Michelle Miller was patiently explaining to me the difference between a passport and a visa, and now I feel comfortable enough to rent a car and skive off into Montenegro without a map and only the vaguest idea of their currency (by the way it's the Euro, although they're not a member of the EU, but more on that later).  Everyone I met in Montenegro was really friendly, and the border guard who stamped my passport was very pleased that an American was visiting, and jokingly asked if I was there to celebrate the 4th of July (yet another example of the dominance of American culture).  The country itself was stunningly beautiful, and seemed to be completely dominated by the ocean and mountains.  Here's a picture I snapped that might as well have been taken in Vermont.

A picture I snapped on the road to Kotor.  The main road winds along the Adriatic Sea that cuts deeply into the interior and forms, for lack of a better word, fjords.