Northern Montenegro

Slicing through the mountains at the northern edge of the national park, the Tara River forms a canyon that is 1300m deep at its peak (the Grand Canyon plummets a mere 200m deeper). The best views are from the water, and rafting along the river is one of the country's most popular tourist activities. If you’d rather admire the canyon from afar, head to the top of Mt Ćurevac (1625m) – although even this view is restricted by the canyon walls.

The Prokletije Mountains (Проклетије) are a huge, hulking expanse of wilderness forming the border with Albania and Kosovo. They’re the southernmost – and highest – part of the Dinaric Alps. Surreally scenic and eerily remote, this magnificent area may well be one of Europe’s least explored corners.

In 2009 a 160-sq-km chunk of the Montenegrin side of the range was declared the country's fifth national park. Ambitious plans are afoot for the entire range to be declared a cross-border Balkans Peace Park (see www.balkanspeacepark.org). The epic Peaks of the Balkans hiking trail is a 192km circuit that crosses through all three countries.

Both the Montenegrin and the Albanian names for the range (Prokletije and Bjeshkët e Namuna, respectively) translate to the rather ominous-sounding ‘Accursed Mountains’. Leave your hoodoo at home; this is a reference to the harsh environment of these sky-punching, jagged peaks rather than any high-altitude jinx.

Nestled within the Bjelasica mountain range, pretty Biogradska Gora (Биоградска Гора) has as its heart 16 sq km of virgin woodland – one of Europe’s last three remaining primeval forests. If you’re knowledgable about such things, you’ll be able to spot beech, fir, juniper, white ash, maple and elm trees. Many of the trees in the forest are over half a millennium old, with some soaring to 60m high.

King Nikola is to thank for its survival; on a visit in 1878 he was so taken by the beauty of oh-so-green Lake Biograd (Biogradsko jezero) that the locals gifted him the land and he ordered it to be preserved. The park is also home to five high-altitude (1820m) glacial lakes.

Occasional tour buses pull in, but a 10-minute stroll should shake the masses and quickly return you to tranquillity.

Rožaje (Рожаје) is Montenegro’s most easterly town, nestled within the mountainous folds bordering Serbia and Kosovo. Almost 95% of its population are Muslim, and the song of muezzins can be heard echoing from its minarets at prayer times. It’s fascinating to sit by the main square and watch the evening promenade. While this social ritual is common to every town in Montenegro, here you’ll spot plenty of men strolling together arm in arm and some women wearing hijabs (head coverings).

With a backdrop of rocky cliffs and plenty of old wooden houses achieving a look bordering on designer decrepitude, Rožaje could be very pretty indeed. The main thing preventing that happening is the scandalous state of the Ibar River, which seems to be used as the main waste disposal. Plastic bags full of household refuse line its banks as it gurgles through town.

Along with its big sister Plav, 10km away, Gusinje (Гусиње; pronounced ‘gu-si-nye’) is the main gateway to the Prokletije National Park. It's a tidy, laid-back place with an idyllic setting, surrounded by verdant farmland and hemmed in by the rugged majesty of the Prokletije Mountains. You could easily lose a day exploring the back roads and villages by bicycle or car.

While the 1700-strong community is overwhelmingly Muslim, the town’s two mosques coexist comfortably with both an Orthodox and a Catholic church. The most architecturally impressive is the 1626 Vizier's Mosque, a stone structure with a wooden porch and minaret similar to – but better preserved than – the mosques in Plav.

In the centre of Gusinje you’ll find a post office, an ATM, cafes and plenty of options for pizza or burek (meat or cheese pastry).

The highway north from Nikšić meets the Piva River after passing through 40km of verdant farmland. It then tangos with the river until they both reach the border at Šćepan Polje. The river was blocked in 1975 by the building of the 220m-high hydroelectric Mratinje Dam (Brana Mratinje), flooding part of the Piva Canyon (Кањон Пива) to create the tremendously turquoise Lake Piva (Pivsko Jezero), which plummets to depths of more than 180m.

The road alongside the river is a feat of engineering in itself, clinging to the cliffs and passing through 56 small tunnels carved out of the stone. The narrow but equally spectacular route through the mountains from Žabljak joins this road near Plužine, the Piva region's unofficial capital. Heading north from here the route gets even more dramatic, with the steep walls of the canyon reflecting in the toothpaste-blue waters below.