Plužine, the town that moved to the shore of Lake Piva

Plužine is one of those places whose story fits into a single picture. The town you stay in isn’t the original. The real one lies at the bottom of Lake Piva, under the water since the hydroelectric dam was completed in 1975. The municipality explains that the new centre was built right beside the reservoir, which is why Plužine now looks out over a turquoise lake ringed by mountains. It’s small, 1,102 people in the town at the 2023 census, but it sits in a corner of the country with plenty to see.

A municipality of mountains and canyons

Plužine municipality covers 853 km² on MONSTAT’s figures and is the country’s seventh largest by area, according to the council. It runs from the Bosnian border to the crests of Durmitor, and its boundaries are almost all natural. The Tara closes it off to the north-east and the Sušica and Komarnica canyons to the east. The highest point is Bobotov Kuk, whose summit carries the boundary with Žabljak, and the lowest is Šćepan Polje, at 433 metres, where the Piva and Tara meet to form the Drina.

It’s also one of the least populated municipalities in Montenegro, with 2,177 people in 2023, and the Pišče plateau, the villages of Trsa and Nedajno and the katuns, the summer herders’ settlements, still shape life in the Piva area.

Lake Piva and the Mratinje dam

The star turn is Lake Piva, 112.5 km² of impounded water on MONSTAT’s figures, which Piva Nature Park describes as 42 km long behind the 220-metre Mratinje dam, one of the tallest in Europe. Building it meant moving Piva Monastery, which was taken down and rebuilt on higher ground with its frescoes. The national tourist board suggests cruises, swimming, fishing, kayaking and a zip line on the lake.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Plužine before prices climb.

Piva Nature Park

Much of the municipality is taken up by Piva Nature Park, which runs from the Bosnian frontier to the edge of Durmitor National Park. The park describes itself as the natural link between Durmitor and Bosnia’s Sutjeska National Park, with more than 1,500 plant species, around 2,000 kinds of fungi, bears, wild boar and roe deer in its forests and brown trout, grayling and Danube salmon in the Tara and Piva. It has mountain lakes such as Trnovačko and the Stabna lakes, and around twenty villages with their traditional buildings.

At Goransko, near Plužine, stands the tower of Duke Lazar Sočica, built during the later 1800s. The park says King Nikola nicknamed him Munjica, the lightning bolt, for his speed, and that the geographer Jovan Cvijić called it the tower with the finest view in the Balkans. A 1976 memorial by the sculptor Luka Tomanović commemorates the roughly 520 people, 107 of them children, killed on 7 June 1943 in several Piva villages, according to the park.

Things to do and getting there

From Plužine you can get down to the last stretch of the Tara Canyon. The national tourist board highlights the 18 km rafting run from Brštanovica to Šćepan Polje, and the Šćepan Polje border crossing into Bosnia is 25 km from town. To the east, the Trsa road climbs into Durmitor and joins the scenic ring road, and the park announces each spring when it reopens after the snow.

The Podgorica to Sarajevo road runs through the municipality. Piva Nature Park reckons 109 km to Podgorica, 58 to Nikšić and 123 to Sarajevo, and if you’re driving up from the coast in a hire car, expect slow, winding mountain roads. For food, the national tourist board recommends the Pišče plateau for Piva skorup, prljo cheese and grušavina, and the town for homemade brandy and mead.

If you would rather have a local show you round, book a guided tour in Plužine and choose by the reviews.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Plužine before prices climb.