Palace Jelena in Perast

Palace Jelena occupies the Lučić-Kolović-Matikola Palace, a stone building dating from 1779 on the waterfront of Perast, part of the Kotor Bay UNESCO World Heritage area. The three-story palace has been carefully restored, with handcrafted furniture throughout its four double rooms, each opening onto a balcony facing the bay. Your booking covers one of these rooms: a single bedroom with one bed, sleeping two guests, plus a private bathroom. Rooms include wireless internet, air conditioning, a plasma TV with cable channels, and a mini bar, while the bathroom is fitted with a tub, hydromassage shower, sauna, and Jacuzzi. Perast is a small, car-free-feeling coastal town, well suited to couples who want panoramic water views and historic architecture within walking distance of the seafront. The setting makes it a straightforward base for exploring the bay and the surrounding Montenegrin coast.

About the area

The western end of Perast's waterfront is its quieter half, and it reads like a catalogue of the town's good century. The palaces along here went up through the sixteen and seventeen hundreds, when Perast's captains carried Venetian cargo and the town was organised into kazade, the clan-based companies that manned its ships and shared out the duties of defence. Family crests, dated lintels and rooftop lookout galleries are still on the facades, and the whole ensemble is protected as part of the bay's UNESCO listing.

It is a two-minute walk from here to the square and the bell tower of St Nicholas, and about the same to the quay where boats leave for Our Lady of the Rocks. In between there is little to do beyond swimming off the stone platforms, looking at churches and eating slowly, which is rather the point. The Bujović palace houses the town museum, with model ships, portraits and weapons from the seafaring years. Above the roofline, stepped lanes climb into olive terraces on the side of St Elijah Hill, and the bay below stays flat and clear enough to see the bottom well out from shore.