Biogradska Gora, the primeval forest around Lake Biograd

Of Montenegro’s national parks, Biogradska Gora asks the least of its visitors. You drive almost to the lakeshore, walk round in an hour beneath towering beech and fir and, if you like, hire a rowing boat. What makes it special is the forest itself, 1,600 hectares that have never been logged. The national tourist board bills it as one of the three primeval forest reserves left in Europe, and while I haven’t found which the other two are, a short walk among those trunks makes it clear why it’s protected.

A forest protected since 1878

The park’s story starts before the modern state’s. According to the national tourist board, King Nikola banned commercial use of the forest in 1878, and it became a national park in 1952. Today it covers 5,650 hectares of Bjelasica between the Tara and Lim rivers, ranging from 832 to 2,139 metres.

The Kolašin tourist board supplies the natural history. Around 2,000 plant species, 20% of them endemic to the Balkans, 26 plant communities dominated by beech and fir, 86 species of trees and shrubs and about 200 bird species. Wolves, bears, foxes, roe deer, squirrels and dormice live in the woods, and the biggest trees top 40 metres and are around 500 years old.

Lake Biograd and the walk around it

The centrepiece is Lake Biograd, a glacial lake at 1,094 metres covering 0.23 km², according to MONSTAT, which drains via the Jezerštica stream into the Tara. The Kolašin tourist board calls it the largest of Bjelasica’s six lakes and tells its legend. Where the water now lies there was once a field farmed by two brothers; the younger killed the elder in a row over the harvest, and their mother’s curse made the ground give way.

The lakeside loop is the classic outing. The parks body measures the educational trail at 3.3 km and about 40 minutes, the tourist board at 3.5 km and an hour. It’s flat and suits children and bikes. By the lake you’ll find a visitor centre, a restaurant, boats, kayaks and the bungalows, and the national tourist board even suggests a dip. For the view from above, the tourist board rates the Bendovac viewpoint, at 1,774 metres, as the finest in the park.

To sleep close to everything, search places to stay in Kolašin on Expedia and filter by area before price.

Hiking, biking and fishing

If you want more, the parks body lists six waymarked trails up to the peaks of Crna glava (2,139 m), Troglava and Zekova glava (2,117 m) and on to the other lakes. There’s also a 2.5 km, one-hour themed trail about life in the katun, the summer shepherds’ settlement, and a 63 km mountain-bike route, «Two peaks and five lakes», for a full day of 8 to 9 hours. Park guides cost €40 for four hours and €80 for eight.

Fishing is regulated. A day permit costs €20; on the lake you can take a maximum of five trout of at least 25 cm, and on the park’s stretch of the Tara it’s fly fishing only, catch and release. The park’s protection zone also takes in the remains of the medieval mining town of Brskovo.

Staying in or near the park

The parks body rents out 12 wooden bungalows by the lake, four doubles and eight triples of 12 m², 32 beds in all, and at the park entrance, at Kraljevo kolo, runs a camp with mobile homes at €20 a day. Near the lakeside visitor centre, pitching your own tent costs €3 a day and renting one from the park €8. In summer, the national tourist board recommends Bjelasica’s eco katuns, where you sleep above 1,500 metres and eat kačamak with homemade sour milk.

For a hotel, Kolašin is 22 km away and has the widest choice, covered in hotels in Kolašin. Mojkovac is even closer, on the park’s northern side.

To sleep close to everything, search places to stay in Kolašin on Booking.com and filter by area before price.

Getting there and when to go

From Kolašin, take the main road towards Mojkovac. After about 20 minutes, a small bridge on the right leads to the barrier where you pay, and from there it’s 4 km of tarmac to the lakeside car park, according to the Kolašin tourist board. The sources disagree slightly on the distance from town, between 22 and 23 km. If you’ve hired a car at Podgorica, it’s a straightforward drive north on the right-hand side.

The national tourist board recommends spring and summer. Winter is a different matter. In 2023 the park closed from 1 December 2023 to 1 May 2024, and trails above 1,500 metres were shut for the winter. I haven’t found the schedule for winter 2026-27, so out of season I’d ring the park first. For the rest of Montenegro’s high country, see the guide to Durmitor, the north’s other great national park.