The Montabo walking trail

 One of the really easy and picturesque walks to do around Cayenne is along the Mantabo trail.  It takes about two hours round trip and you progressively walk through luxuriant plant life along the beach front into rain forest before arriving at the beach on the other side of the mountain.  (Click on photos to enlarge)

 We were surprised to spot lots of flowers we'd never seen before like this reddish cluster that sort of ressembled honeysuckle.

 We also caught a glimpse of the giant blue morpho butterfly, here with its wings closed. (Sorry!)

 On the other side of the mountain, we overlooked the beach where Jack and I regularly go for a swim. Here it's high tide so it doesn't look like much of a beach.

 Unfortunately, we found no garbage cans or bags along the trail. As in many countries, the unconcerned hiker just carelessly throws their trash onto the forest ground and spoils the landscape. Yet if man can do such incredible things like send satellites into space, create new and amazing computer technology or discover cures for mortel diseases, why is it impossible for him to just keep a forest clean?!

Visiting Montenegro

During our summer holidays in July, we went back to France to see family and friends. We were also lucky enough to be able to schedule a one-week guided tour through Montenegro with Niels and Julia.

Montenegro is part of ex-Yugoslavia and it is also a very mountainous country that borders the Adriatic Sea. The landscapes are truly marvelous. (Click on photos to enlarge.)

 We visited a 17th century monastery called Ostrog built high up on a high vertical cliff...

 The churches are mostly Orthodox and some are very small like here in Cetinje (Montenegro's former capital).

 One of our favorite sites was the Black Lake near Mount Durmitor.

 We were 15 people in all on our guided tour, and everyone got along well.

Prices are a lot lower in Montenegro than in France which made eating out and buying souvenirs very affordable. I guess our one disappointment was the difficulty we faced communicating and the somewhat cold reactions given by many people. Although our tour guide had taught us how to say "Hello" and "Thank you" and "Please" and "Goodbye" the most frequent response we received from Montenegrans was just silence and a scowl. Hmm... we were not too sure how to interpret that.