A new country on the list – let’s go to Montenegro.

Coastline – check

Beautiful beaches – check

Oh, wait a minute.

Should we have researched a little more before coming here?

We booked 3 nights in Sveti Stefan because the most beautiful Montenegrin beach I found online was close-by: Queen’s Beach (Kraljičina Plaža).

But when we got there – big deception: This beach is not acessible AT ALL.
You can’t even see it from above or anything, because it’s part of a luxury hotel chain called Aman resorts.

As the beach is only accessible by the resort’s spa building, there is no chance you could even look at it.

a picture of Queen’s Beach I found on the internet

The beach next to it is called King’s Beach (Miločer Beach) and belongs to Aman resorts as well.
BUT you can see the beach and you could even access it if you like. It will cost you 120€ though.

Miločer Beach

Miločer Beach Set Rental Price List

My boyfriend and me were wondering why a country would allow some hotel chain to do this to one of the country’s most beautiful beaches?
Couldn’t they start a petition for the beach being accessible by the public?
Or at least part of it?

When I asked that (in a nice way!!) on Instagram and tagged Montenegro’s National Tourism Organization (Instagram: @gomontenegro) they blocked me.  (O_O)

Uncomfortable topic?

Well… I don’t know what kind of resort this is, I just think it’s a pity that you find pictures of those beaches online, but can only access them if you are able to pay 800€+ per night.

I found out that they blocked me only because I wanted to tag them in my pictures I took around Montenegro as they suggest on their website.

Is it the right way to block travellers to your country who ask questions about the country?
Considering they seem to desperately want to attract tourists paying high-profile bloggers like gypsea_lust, doyoutravel and taramilktea to visit Montenegro…
Jack Morris (2.7 million followers on Instagram) and Lauren Bullen (1.9 million followers) from doyoutravel and gypsea_lust stated in an interview that they don’t publish a picture for less than 5000 US-$. Each of them published 3 pictures with the @gomontenegro tag, so it seems Montenegro wants to invest in tourism.

Why we thought of a petition is because we had heard about those kind of cases in other countries like Brazil, France, St. Lucia, Malaysia and Canada.

Of course we didn’t give up on Sveti Stefan and had a great time there.

We looked to the other side of Sveti Stefan island and found out, that the beaches to the South don’t belong to the resort.

As we didn’t have a car, we explored the beaches in walking distance. Altough we found some amazing looking bays on Google maps further South, we didn’t want to risk taking a bus there and then not being able to climb down the cliffs or finding a closed, private beach again.

Sveti Stefan beach is a good option if you don’t want to spend money on deck chairs as they have a free part on the beach. But if you’d like the shade and the comfort, you can also rent sunbeds and an umbrella here. Plus you are close to kiosks and restaurants.

Sveti Stefan beach sunbed pricelist

In walking distance from Sveti Stefan village you find Crvena Glavica Beach (800m) and Galija Beach (Plaža Galija, 1.4km from the South side of Sveti Stefan town where we were staying).

As on Google Maps we liked the aspect of Plaža Galija more, we decided to go there.

Arriving there after carrying my huge flamingo float all the way down to the beach, we found out, it’s a paid beach as well, but with ok prices. But everything was booked out 🙁 We then climbed over some cliffs to get to a more secluded part of the beach where you could lie down without having to pay for a deck chair.

carrying a flamingo float for 1.4km

And we reserved a set of sunbeds for the next day in order to be able to just have a relaxed day at the beach without the excitement if we’d manage to get to some other beach found on Google Maps and if it would be accessible.

So on day 3 in Sveti Stefan we arrived early for our desk chairs which had been reserved, paid 15€ for them, got a bottle of water for free, and enjoyed a day at the beach, in the shade, ordering drinks and food from the appendant restaurant.

15€ Sunbeds at Galija Beach

Altogether we had a great time in Sveti Stefan and found beautiful beaches (although those were others than we had expected to visit).

To sum it up:

The beaches north of Sveti Stefan island are property of the Aman resorts chain and private property. Be a hotel guest or have no or respectively paid access.

South of Sveti Stefan island, starting with the shoreline close to Sveti Stefan centre and all the beaches further South: those beaches are free or have sunbed service for a more affordable price.

My tip:
Plaža Galija for 15€ a day for 2 deck chairs + umbrella

at Galija Beach you can rent a set of deck chairs for 15€ per day

or a bit more posh and comfy, 50€ for a big sunbed plus table and chairs, including 1 bottle of water and 1 bottle of prosecco

or climb over some cliffs and you get to lie at a secluded part of the beach without having to pay for it

Overview of Galija Beach