Where Have All the Honest Travel Writers Gone?

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Marco Polo's Birthday, 2006

On my way home from my recent trip to Montenegro, I met two middle-aged Irish ladies at Tivat airport. They agreed Montenegro's landscapes and sea vistas were fabulous, but were grievously disappointed with their holiday at Becici.

"We hadn't imagined everywhere would be so crowded. From what we'd read, we thought we'd be coming here first…before Montenegro was discovered by everyone else."

Blessed with a jigsaw puzzle coastline, walled medieval towns and soaring mountains, Montenegro is scenically gorgeous. But in the media conspiracy to get you to this "new destination," there's a lot of hype--and much goes unmentioned.

For example, the genteel Irish twosome had expected Becici to have a sandy beach--not an expanse of gritty shingle overloaded with donut-munching Serbs and Russians. They'd envisaged quiet evening walks along an elegant esplanade toward neighboring Budva. Nothing they'd read suggested this promenade would resemble a fairground midway with eardrum-destroying music spilling from every bar.

But as the Financial Times describes Montenegro as "Europe's undiscovered playground," it's quite understandable why many vacation brochures follow suit. Presumably Serbs, Bosnians, Kosovans, Slovenians, Russians, Poles, Czechs, and Italians don't count. Fact is, battalions of eastern European vacationers have rediscovered Montenegro in the past three years. Italy is but a ferry ride away across the Adriatic. And Serbs from all over the former Yugoslavia never really went away at all.

The hype often borders on the outrageous. "A land of untouched white sands," insists Travel & Leisure. Beaches might be untouched in winter, but "white sands" are a product of some lunatic's delusions. I traveled the length of the country from the Croatian to Albanian borders and found nothing that came close to white sand…and little real sand of any color at all. Any article that claims Montenegro has over 100 sandy beaches (and many do) is spouting nonsense.

Concrete bathing platforms and rocks in the north; gritty shingle and pebbles in the center. Yes, there are sandy beaches in the far south, but they're donkey-brown, not white. With all the western tour operators based in northern Montenegro, the only time visitors glimpse true sand beaches is from coach windows when they pass through the southern border town of Ulcinj on a $64 day-trip to Albania.

My sympathies go to Irish readers of the Sunday Business Post. They must be thoroughly confused because Montenegro apparently "boasts some of the finest sandy beaches in the Aegean." Really? Montenegro is on the Adriatic; the Aegean Sea surrounds Greece.

Having stayed in Budva, Montenegro's largest resort, I was amazed to learn it's the country's St. Tropez: "Fast regaining its status as one of the most voguish destinations on the Adriatic." (Well, according to the UK Guardian's travel section, it is.)

"One of the gaggle of towns on this coastline that's referred to as the St. Tropez of the Adriatic," echoes The Washington Post.

Referred to as St. Tropez by whom? The 2,500 + guests staying in Slovenska Plaza's ghastly holiday village? Thanks to its old town, Budva looks pretty, but its beach neighborhood is almost as downmarket as Bulgaria's Black Sea resorts. Budva is the summer playground of Balkan factory workers and nouveau riche Russians--not some glamour destination crawling with French starlets.

But my favorite piece of hype is this, from a Montenegro Properties website: "The shopping in Budva old town is finer than Milan and fitted out like Paris."

Words fail me, and if you scout around Budva's shops, words will fail you, too.

But here's my point. All the above guff reminds me of the old Chinese fairytale about the Emperor having no clothes. Nobody dared point out the fact--and when it comes to coloring destinations, it's the same with a lot of travel writing.

It seems if one publication says Montenegro is undiscovered and abounds in sandy beaches, then everyone has to sing from the same hymn-sheet. Do writers no longer believe the evidence of their own eyes?

Overall I liked Montenegro and its people immensely. I already knew its beaches weren't Caribbean-like, so my only real complaint would be the dire accommodation and late-night noise in resorts. While mentioning this might deter some potential visitors, I think readers deserve the whole picture instead of a concoction of half-truths and fantasies.

Steenie Harvey
Roving Travel Writer, International Living

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Editor's note: A fitting end to Happy Birthday, Marco Polo! week, as Marco's fame originates from The Travels of Marco Polo, a book he wrote while imprisoned in Genoa. The journeys to the unknown Far East taken by the sensational Polos were never fully believed in their lifetime, and even today questions remain about whether or not Marco, his father Niccolò, and uncle Maffeo truly did travel to the exotic places they described.

Was Marco Polo the type of travel writer our own Steenie Harvey would applaud or censure? Rather than try to answer that, instead consider this: Christopher Columbus traveled with a battered and much-loved copy of The Travels of Marco Polo. And what better review can there be than when your travel writing inspires the explorers who follow? Happy birthday, Marco Polo.