The Durmitor Ring: 80 km, One Day, Fifteen Stops

The shape of it

Officially the *Durmitorski prsten*, a loop from Žabljak over the Sedlo pass at 1,907 metres, down the western side, and back through the Šarani plateau. Eighty kilometres of two-lane mountain road with almost no traffic and almost no barriers.

Which way round

Clockwise, leaving Žabljak towards Sedlo. Two reasons: the steep climbing happens in the morning while you are fresh and the road is empty, and the western descent puts the best long views into the afternoon light rather than into the sun.

The stops, in order

• Black Lake, before you start, if you have not already walked it
• Sedlo pass — the high point, bare rock, and the trailhead for Bobotov Kuk
• Dobri Do valley — grazing land under vertical walls, katuns in summer
• Trsa and the Piva plateau — the western descent, and the widest views
• Nedajno, a village at the head of a canyon most people never hear of
• Sušica canyon, deep and largely unvisited
• Šarani plateau, with the return to Žabljak across open pasture

What the road is like

Paved throughout, but narrow — two cars pass comfortably in most places and not in all of them. There are unfenced drops, particularly on the western descent. The surface deteriorates in patches where winter has broken it up, and repairs happen slowly.

There is very little traffic. The main hazards are livestock standing in the road on blind crests and the occasional tour minibus coming the other way.

When it opens

Sedlo pass holds snow into May and sometimes June after a heavy winter, and closes again from about November. Žabljak itself stays open all year, but the ring does not — asking locally before setting out in early June or late October is worth the thirty seconds.

What you need

• A full tank, as above
• Food and water — there are a few katuns selling cheese and little else
• A jacket. It is fifteen degrees colder at Sedlo than in Žabljak, and windy
• An offline map. Signal disappears for long stretches
• Park ticket, €3, if you stop at the lake

Doing it without a car

Agencies in Žabljak run the loop as a jeep tour, which includes the stops and someone who knows where the katuns are. For anyone without a vehicle that is the only practical way to see it, and the driver stopping where the view is rather than where the layby is has some value even for people who could drive it. See Jeep Safari: The Ring of Durmitor.