Podgorica

Population:150,977 (2011)
Area:1,205 km²
Elevation:49 m
Key Areas:The centre — boulevards, cafés and the civic buildings, walkable end to end · The old quarter by the river — low houses and the clock tower, the oldest surviving fabric · The riverside — parks, the bridges and the approach to the gorge

Overview

Montenegro's capital and largest city, on the plain where the country's rivers meet — the transport pivot between the coast and the northern mountains rather than a destination in its own right.

Culture

Podgorica eats from the plain and the lake rather than the sea: freshwater fish, grilled meat, and the smoked ham and hard cheese that come down from the mountains. It is also the best place in the country to drink the two native grapes where they are grown, since the vineyards start immediately south of the city.

Practical Info

Safety: A safe city with low crime and the ordinary precautions of any capital. The greater practical hazard is summer heat: the plain traps it, there is no sea breeze, and the middle of an August day is genuinely punishing rather than merely warm. Language: Montenegrin, written in the Latin alphabet. English is widely spoken among younger people and in anything tourism-facing.

Travel

Podgorica is the least-visited capital on this coast and it is worth being straightforward about why: it was heavily rebuilt in the twentieth century after wartime destruction, so it has almost none of the walled-stone character that draws people to Kotor or Budva, and nobody plans a Montenegrin holiday around it. What it has instead is position. The airport is here, the railway from the sea turns north here, and the roads converge here because the terrain finally lets them. Almost every itinerary in the country passes through, and the travellers who get something out of Podgorica are the ones who treat that pass-through as an hour to use rather than a delay to endure — a river gorge on the eastern edge, a wine plain to the south, and a café culture that is the most ordinary and least performed in the country.

A capital that was rebuilt

The city was extensively destroyed in the Second World War and rebuilt afterwards, which explains almost everything about how it looks: wide boulevards, mid-century blocks, later glass, and a small surviving quarter of older low houses near the river where the Ottoman-era town stood. The result is a working city rather than a display one. Visitors who arrive expecting an old town find a modest remnant of one and are disappointed; visitors who arrive expecting a functioning Balkan capital with good coffee and no queue for anything are not.

The river gorge on the edge of town

The best thing in the city is a few minutes from the centre and almost absent from itineraries. The river along the eastern side has cut a narrow gorge into the rock, with a broad waterfall that spans the riverbed after rain and reduces to a chain of pools by late summer. Residents swim there. It is the one place in Podgorica that feels like the rest of Montenegro, and whether it is impressive or modest on the day you go depends entirely on how much water is coming down — which is worth checking before making the trip in August.

Coffee, and the pace of the place

Podgorica's social life runs on coffee taken slowly, outdoors, for a long time, and it is the least touristic version of that habit anywhere in the country — nobody is performing it for visitors because there are hardly any. An hour at a pavement table here tells you more about how the country actually lives than a day on the coast will. The city is also markedly hotter in summer than either the sea or the mountains, sitting on a plain with no breeze, so the rhythm shifts late: quiet afternoons, and streets that fill again after the heat goes.

Where you go from here

The city's real function is as a junction. The coast is under an hour away through a tunnel that cuts under the mountain, the northern mountains are reachable by the railway that climbs out of the city, and the lake begins immediately to the south. Almost nobody's Montenegro is centred on Podgorica and almost everybody's passes through it, which is why the useful question is not what to do here but what to do with the hour you have — and getting around covers why that hour exists in the first place.

Frequently asked questions

Is Podgorica worth visiting?

Not as a destination, and it is fairer to say so. It was heavily rebuilt in the twentieth century and has little of the character that draws people to the coast. As a stop it is genuinely useful — the airport and rail junction are here, there is a river gorge on the city's edge that almost no visitor reaches, and the wine plain begins immediately south.

How long should I spend in Podgorica?

An hour or a night, set by your connections rather than by the city. It is the pivot between coast and mountains and between air and rail, so most people are here anyway. An hour is better spent walking to the river than sitting at the station.

What is there to actually see in Podgorica?

The river gorge and waterfall on the eastern edge, which residents swim at and visitors rarely find; the small old quarter by the river, which is what survived the wartime destruction; and the riverfront walk. Beyond that the city's appeal is its ordinariness — a pavement coffee here is the least touristic hour in Montenegro.

How do I get from Podgorica to the coast or the mountains?

The coast is under an hour by road through a tunnel under the mountain. The mountains are reached by the railway that climbs north out of the city, which is one of the more spectacular rail journeys in the region and the reason a car-free trip through Montenegro is workable at all — see getting around.

Diplomatic missions in Podgorica

2 embassies based in this city, grouped by region.

Europe2

This overview comes from Visaja's worldwide missions database (visaja.com), checked against official government sources; for binding answers, the mission itself always has the final word.