Radavc Cave, beside the source of the White Drin

Radavc is the short outing I would suggest to anyone spending two nights in Peja. In one corner you get a cave with Stone Age traces, a spring that supplies a good part of the town and a waterfall, all about 11 km from the centre.

A cave used in the Palaeolithic

Radavc Cave (Shpella e Radavcit) appears in the Kosovo Culture Ministry’s heritage database, the DTK, as a Palaeolithic archaeological site under provisional protection. The government tourism portal, currently being rebuilt and cited here through its 2021 archive.org copy, adds some specifics. The entrance faces north-east, measures 2.80 m high by 2.20 m wide, opens onto a 2.50 m tunnel-like passage and sits at 578 m. A natural window high up lets in the light.

The same text says it was first described by the researcher J. Petrović and that the archaeologist M. Garašanin saw it as a Palaeolithic shelter. With a caveat, mind you, because the portal itself speaks of indications and admits the Palaeolithic is not yet confirmed in Kosovo. Even so, that is what interests me most here, more than the formations.

What you see inside

On pejatourism.org, Peja’s tourism site (secondary, since nobody signs it), it also goes by Sleeping Beauty Cave. The site says that after some small works the cave opened to visitors all year and is used for school activities. It has three parts, the entrance passage, the central gallery and a passage known as the baths, with stalactites and stalagmites.

I have not found opening hours or prices on any official source. Out of season, ask at the tourist office in Peja before heading out.

If you are staying the night, see the best hotel deals in Peja for your dates: the well-placed rooms go fast.

The White Drin spring and waterfall

Next to the cave is what Peja’s tourism website presents as the source of the White Drin, at the foot of Rusolia mountain, and a 30 m waterfall whose flow varies with the season. The website adds that the area has been a natural monument since 1983 and that the spring supplies part of Peja with drinking water and goes into Peja beer. ASK, the Kosovo Agency of Statistics, puts the White Drin at 112 km inside the territory; the municipal website says 122, and I go with the official figure.

Getting there and how long to allow

There are two ways in. One leaves the hydropower plant road and follows a shady path of about 300 m by the river; the other takes the main road to near the trail, then on foot. With the cave, the waterfall and the walk, allow two to three hours.

Radavc village had 1,013 residents in 2024 according to ASK. If you want more caves, I cover Gryka e Madhe in the canyon and Gadime in Kosovo’s caves and waterfalls. And for fitting Radavc in with Rugova and the Istog monasteries, see the Peja region.

If you are staying the night, see the best hotel deals in Peja for your dates: the well-placed rooms go fast.