The remoteness of Montenegro in South-eastern Europe makes it a challenging destination to deliver superyacht supplies to, however more and more yachts are choosing to cruise there. Montenegro has become a popular base for charter activity in the Adriatic, particularly for superyachts cruising in Dalmatia.
Lake in Durmitor National Park by Wikipedia
Mike Shore, executive director at Berba, a leading wine supplier explained, “Despite Montenegro’s growing popularity, flight connections remain limited and there are no direct flights from large cities such as London or Nice. This makes it a very exclusive destination, but also makes it very difficult to ship goods to Montenegro, particularly at the last minute.”
Many superyacht charters are combining a trip to Montenegro with one to Croatia and even Venice. Montenegro covers approximately 14,000 km2, has 670,000 citizens and 72 km (45 miles) of beaches. It has a wealth of cultural and religious monuments, a beautiful rainforest and one of the deepest canyons in the world.
Porto Montenegro has a range of berths for yachts from 12m to 150m and is located in the Bay of Kotor within a retail and entertainment village.
Mike from Berba added, “There is a host of reasons to visit and particularly cruise Montenegro; if superyacht owners and crews plan ahead, they can get anything they need on board, but last minute bespoke requests can be tricky.
“We supply vintage wines to yachts in the Adriatic; to meet the demand in Montenegro we’ve built a large, climate-controlled warehouse to store wines and provisions adjacent to the Porto Montenegro development. It is kept at a constant 13 degrees Celsius and 70% humidity.
“We have double walls, vapour barriers and back-up systems to house the 60,000 bottles of wine. To meet a diverse range of demands we stock 500 different types of wine and 30 variants of champagne. Provisioning in Montenegro is tax free, which is another reason why superyachts replenish their stock here.”
Berba is an experienced luxury wine provider that services a number of yachts in the Adriatic. The company works with Yachting Pages, a specialist in superyacht products and services to offer their wine selection to visiting superyachts.