Perast and Risan

 

Our Lady of the Rocks

When we first sailed over to the other side of Kotor Bay we were stunned to see two small islands with churches on them right out in the bay.  Our Lady of the Rocks Church sits on a man made island created by rocks and sunken ships that were filled with rocks.  In 1452, local seamen found an icon of the Madonna and Child on a rock in the sea.  Apparently over time they had created an small island.  Once they had an island then, of course, they built a church on their island.  Even today they continue the practice of adding rocks to the island.  Every year at sunset, on July 22nd, the men of Perast row boats out to the island and add to the rock collection.  

Boats ferrying folks from Perast

And now, in Perast, there are all sorts of folks with boats that make it their business to ferry folks out to Our Lady of the Rocks for a look around.  St. Georges island, which is a natural island, is very near Our Lady of the Rocks but this island is officially not open to the public.  On this island sits a small monastery and an ancient cemetery.  The island is also known as the "Island of the Dead" due to all the ship captains from Perast and others who were buried there.  Sadly, not much remains of the cemetery.  We saw folks over on St. Georges but it is actually forbidden to step foot on the island so we did not. 

Our Lady of the Rocks

Our Lady of the Rocks has a small museum as well as the Church which is definitely worth a visit.  Inside the museum are all sorts of things that have come from old ships. We found it interesting for the nautical collection.  A short bus ride from Perast is the small town of Risan (pronounced: reason).  Risan is the oldest settlement in the Bay of Kotor and was once the seat of the Illyrian Queen Teuta.  But, of course, the Romans conquered the Illyrians and then Risan became a Roman town.  Uncovered by archeologists, in the town, are the foundations of an ancient Villa of some nobleman.  Unique to these mosaics is the one of the god Hypnos.  This mosaic is the only one in the world that depicts this god.  

Roman Mosaics - Hypnos

Mind you these mosaics are two thousand years old and still they are in pretty good shape.  After visiting the mosaics we decided to have lunch in the small park nearby before heading back.  Over lunch is when things became unreasonable in Risan.  I saw this fellow walking towards the picnic tables where we and other customers at the restaurant were eating. And then he seemed to be walking towards Michael coming up from behind him.  I did not think much about it and actually wondered if Michael had met him somewhere (we meet a lot of people).  I was still thinking that Michael must know him when he grabbed Michaels neck from behind.  But then he started yelling "who are you?  who are you?".  Michael tried to defuse the situation and told him his name and then the guy smacked Michael in the face.  Thats when we both jumped up and told the guy to leave.  The surprising thing is not one single person in the restaurant batted an eye.  They just went on with their lunch as though nothing was happening.  Michael grabbed the guys arm hard and told him to leave right now.  Finally, he started asking Michael to let go of his arm and said he was sorry.  He said he was confused but would leave if Michael would just let go.  So... Michael let go and he did indeed leave.  Of course, he was not right in his head.  So the really surprising thing for us was the lack of reaction from the other customers.  We decided it was definitely time to leave Risan and just grabbed a taxi instead of waiting for the bus.  Too much excitement for one day!  

 

Easier to see depiction of Hypnos

We are now waiting for the third thing to happen so our bad luck will be over.  The lightning strike and now the assault.  One more thing and our string of bad luck will be over (we hope)😊

Old church in Risan

 

 

Tomorrow is another day - we are hoping to get the engine running and the estimates completed so they can get started on the actual repairs.