A village most day trips skip
Most people who come to Lake Skadar from Kotor see it from a boat: reeds, water lilies, a heron or two, a stop for photos near Virpazar. Godinje isn’t on that itinerary. It sits above the lake’s south-western shore, in the Crmnica hills, reached by a narrow road rather than a jetty, and it has no restaurant terrace angled at the water. What it has instead is stone houses — some restored, several still roofless — and a handful of small wine producers who will pour you a glass of vranac in their own cellar if you knock, or better, if you’ve called ahead.
This page treats Godinje as what it is: a wine stop, not a lake viewpoint. If you want the classic Skadar postcard, that’s the Lake Skadar boat tour guide or Rijeka Crnojevića. If you want to taste the grape the whole region is proud of, in the place it’s actually grown, keep reading.
Where Godinje is, and why the road matters
Godinje lies in the Crmnica, the wine-growing district that runs along the lake’s southern edge between Virpazar and the Montenegrin coast near Bar. From Kotor, the drive takes roughly 1h15 to 1h30, either via Cetinje and the old road over Njeguši, or down to Podgorica and back up along the lake. Neither route is fast. The Cetinje road has the hairpins the region is known for; the lakeside road narrows to one comfortable lane in places, with stone walls on one side and vine terraces on the other.
There is no bus service to Godinje itself, and no organised transfer that stops there specifically. That is the honest limitation of this page: without a rental car, a private driver, or a taxi negotiated for the return trip, Godinje is difficult to reach independently.
The Montenegro without a car guide covers the alternatives if you’re relying on buses and boats for the rest of the trip — for most people that means treating Lake Skadar’s boat tours as the lake experience, and leaving Godinje for a day when you do have a car, ideally as part of a wider Crmnica wine tasting loop through Godinje, Murići and Karuč.
If you do have a car, treat the drive itself as part of the appeal. There is little traffic, the lake appears and disappears between the vine rows, and stone hamlets line the road well before you reach Godinje’s own cluster of houses.
The vranac grape and why Godinje is known for it
Vranac is Montenegro’s signature red grape, grown across the Crmnica and around Podgorica, and Godinje is one of the villages most associated with it locally, alongside neighbouring hamlets on the same slope. The name means roughly “black stallion” — a reference to the grape’s deep, near-black skin. Wines made from it are full-bodied, tannic when young, and softer with a few years in bottle; the better Crmnica producers age it in oak before release.
The other grape worth knowing is krstac, a white variety grown in smaller quantities on the same slopes, usually dry and higher in acidity than the reds. Between the two, a Crmnica tasting will usually cover both, even at a small family producer. The background on both grapes, and on how Montenegrin wine labelling actually works — most producers here are unlicensed for export and sell almost entirely to visitors and local restaurants — is in the Montenegrin wine guide to vranac and krstac.
Vranac from the Crmnica has a reputation among Montenegrins as being a notch above vranac grown elsewhere in the country, on account of the limestone soil and the lake’s moderating effect on temperature. Whether that holds up glass to glass is a matter of taste, but it’s the reason wine lovers make the detour to Godinje specifically rather than buying vranac at any coastal supermarket.
Tasting at a producer, not a viewpoint
This is the part that distinguishes Godinje from almost everywhere else on the Lake Skadar itinerary: there is no ticketed tasting room, no vineyard with a car park and a gift shop. What exists is a small number of families who make wine in cellars attached to their houses, sell it in refilled plastic bottles or unlabelled glass, and will pour a taste for anyone who turns up in good faith — more generously if you’ve called or been introduced by a guide beforehand.
A realistic visit looks like this: you arrive, ask (or your driver asks, if your Montenegrin doesn’t stretch that far) whether a tasting is possible, and if so you sit at a table in a courtyard or cellar and try two or three wines, usually a young vranac, an older barrel-aged one, and sometimes a krstac.
Some producers pair the tasting with a plate of prsut and cheese, similar in spirit to what you’d find on the Njeguši prosciutto and cheese guide, though the cheese here is more likely to be a local cow’s-milk variety than the smoked pork from the mountain village. Expect to pay for what you drink — often a flat, low price per glass or bottle rather than a fixed tasting fee — and it’s normal, even expected, to buy a bottle to take away if you liked what you tried.
There is no fixed opening schedule. This is not a commercial estate with hours posted online; it is someone’s home cellar, and the honest advice is to go through a local guide or driver who already has a relationship with a producer, or to book a Crmnica wine day that includes Godinje as a stop, rather than showing up unannounced and hoping. If you want the boat side of Lake Skadar covered on the same day before or after, a full-day option exists:
a full-day Lake Skadar boat tour that can be combined with a Crmnica wine stop by arrangement, rather than a fixed two-hour loop.
If you’d rather keep the water and the wine as two separate outings, the shorter option is:
a half-day Skadar Lake cruise, which covers the reed channels and Rijeka Crnojevića side of the lake and leaves the afternoon free for the drive up to Godinje.
Walking the village: restored houses and empty ones
Godinje’s population fell sharply across the twentieth century, as people left the Crmnica’s stone hill villages for the coast or emigrated abroad, and for decades many of its houses stood roofless with trees growing through the walls. That decline is still visible: walk the lanes and you’ll pass restored stone houses with new roofs and working shutters standing directly next to shells with no roof at all, walls held together mostly by habit. It is not a preserved open-air museum — it’s a village that lost most of its people and is being pieced back together unevenly, house by house, as families invest in a home, a guesthouse, or a wine cellar.
That’s worth setting expectations for. There isn’t a marked walking route, an information panel, or a café to anchor a stroll. What there is: narrow stone lanes, old wine presses left outside some houses, vine terraces climbing the slope behind the village, and views down towards the lake through gaps between buildings. Give it 30–45 minutes on foot if you’re not stopping for a tasting, longer if you are.
For context on how the wider Crmnica has handled its own depopulation and slow repopulation by returning families and a few outside buyers, the Crmnica wine tasting guide covers the pattern across several villages, not just Godinje.
Combining Godinje with the rest of the Crmnica and the lake
Godinje works best as one stop in a half-day loop rather than a destination on its own. A practical order, starting and ending at Kotor:
| Stop | Approx. time from Kotor | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| Cetinje | 1h | Old capital, monastery, museums |
| Virpazar | 1h15 | Lake Skadar boats, restaurants on the water |
| Godinje | 1h20–1h30 | Wine tasting, quiet stone lanes |
| Murići or Karuč | 1h30–1h45 | Lake beaches, swimming in season |
Doing all four in one day from Kotor is a long day — realistically 9 to 11 hours out and back, most of it on narrow roads — so most visitors either base themselves closer, in Podgorica or Virpazar for a night, or accept that Godinje replaces one of the other stops rather than adding to all of them. The how many days in Kotor and the bay guide has the wider trade-off between staying coastal and adding an inland night for exactly this kind of detour.
If wine is the actual goal for the day, and the lake itself is secondary, it’s worth considering a stop in Podgorica on the way back — the capital has its own wine bars pouring Crmnica and Plantaže labels side by side, useful for comparing what you tasted in Godinje against the country’s larger commercial producer. A short walking option there:
a Podgorica walking tour covering the capital’s centre, which pairs reasonably with an afternoon that started in the Crmnica.
Food and drink around Godinje
Don’t expect a restaurant in Godinje itself — plan to eat in Virpazar, where several lakeside places serve carp and eel from Lake Skadar, a Crmnica speciality covered in the Lake Skadar carp and eel guide. A typical fish lunch in Virpazar runs €10–18 for a main course, more for a whole grilled carp shared between two or three people. Pair it, unsurprisingly, with a glass of the same vranac you tried in Godinje an hour earlier — several Virpazar restaurants buy directly from Crmnica producers, sometimes the same families.
Practicalities: getting there, what to bring, what to skip
- Roads: narrow, with limited passing space in the village itself. A small or mid-size rental car is easier to manage than anything larger.
- Fuel and facilities: no petrol station in Godinje; fill up in Virpazar or on the main road before turning off.
- Cash: producers dealing informally in home-poured wine will expect cash in euros, not cards.
- Timing: aim to arrive by mid-afternoon at the latest if you want good light for photographs and enough daylight for the drive back over Njeguši, which is not a road to drive after dark if you can avoid it.
- What to skip: don’t expect signage, English menus, or fixed prices. If that sounds like more uncertainty than you want on a first visit to Montenegro, stick to the boat-based Lake Skadar itinerary and treat Godinje as a stop for a second visit, or one arranged in advance through a guide.
Frequently asked questions about visiting Godinje
Is Godinje worth visiting if I’ve already done a Lake Skadar boat tour?
Yes, for a different reason. The boat tours cover the lake’s water, reeds and birdlife; Godinje covers the wine side of the Crmnica, which the boats don’t touch. If wine doesn’t interest you, the boat tour alone is a complete Lake Skadar visit and you can skip Godinje without missing anything essential.
Can I visit Godinje without a car?
Not easily. There’s no direct bus service and no fixed tour transfer that stops there specifically. Realistic options are a rental car, a private driver for the day, or a wine-focused day tour that includes a Crmnica stop by arrangement. See the Montenegro without a car guide for the wider picture if you’re relying on public transport.
How long does a wine tasting in Godinje take?
Informally, 30 to 60 minutes at a producer’s cellar, including a short chat and two or three wines. There’s no fixed schedule or booking system for most family producers, so build in flexibility rather than a tight itinerary.
Is Godinje the same thing as Lake Skadar National Park?
No. Lake Skadar National Park covers the lake and its shoreline, including Virpazar, Rijeka Crnojevića and the boat routes. Godinje sits above the lake in the Crmnica hills and is a village, not part of the protected lake area itself, though it shares the same wider region.
What is vranac, and why is it associated with this village?
Vranac is Montenegro’s principal red grape, grown widely in the Crmnica district around Godinje on limestone slopes above the lake. It produces a dark, tannic wine that softens with age. Godinje is one of several Crmnica villages known for growing it, alongside a smaller amount of the white krstac grape.
Is Godinje safe to visit, given how many houses are abandoned?
Yes. The empty houses are a sign of depopulation, not danger — there’s no particular safety risk beyond the usual caution around loose stone and uneven ground near derelict buildings. Wear proper shoes rather than sandals if you plan to walk the lanes.
Is there anywhere to eat or stay overnight in Godinje itself?
Very little. Eating options are essentially limited to what a producer might offer alongside a tasting, such as bread, cheese and prsut. For a proper meal, drive down to Virpazar. A small number of restored houses in the Crmnica operate as guesthouses, but availability changes year to year — check locally or through a guide rather than assuming a booking platform will list them.
When is the best time of year to visit Godinje?
Late April through June, and again September into October, when temperatures are comfortable for walking and the vines are visually at their best — green and full before harvest, or turning colour after it. High summer is workable but hot for walking the exposed village lanes; winter sees many producers less available, since it’s outside the main visitor season.
