An Ottoman market town in the upper Lim valley, under the highest mountains in Montenegro — with about ten people abroad who call it home for every one still living in it.
Gusinje er en liten fjellby nær den albanskegrensen, som tjener som inngang til Prokletije National Park og Prokletije-massivet bak. Ali-Pasha Springs, også kjent som Oko Skakavice, slår ut fra fjellene i et fantastisk turkis basseng omgitt av høye fjellvegger. Grebaje Valley i nærheten tilbyr vandring under de uregelmessige toppene av Accursed Mountains. Byen blender ottomansk arv med fjellkultur, og beliggenheten gjør den til en ideell utgangspunkt for å utforske Montenegros villeste hjørne.
Gusinje & the Prokletije
The small end of the country
Residents by municipality, 2023 census
Gusinje is the fifth-smallest of Montenegro’s twenty-five municipalities: 3,933 people across 157 km², of which the town itself is 3.73 km².
MONSTAT, Census 2023, municipality level
Where Gusinje actually lives
People who count the town as home, by where they are
For every person living in the town, about ten more abroad — mostly in the United States — count it as where they are from. The emigration came in waves after 1913 and never stopped.
Municipality of Gusinje diaspora figure; MONSTAT, Census 2023
Hvem besøker Montenegro
Andel av utenlandske gjesters overnattinger, 2025
MONSTAT · 2025
Hvem bor her
Folketellinger, Gusinje kommune
The municipality has lost one resident in nine since 2003, and all of the loss is in the villages: the town itself went from 1,673 people in 2011 to 1,877 in 2023 while Gusinje as a whole fell from 4,027 to 3,933. Its real size is somewhere else — the municipality reports 18,400 people who trace their origins to the town, most of them in the United States.
Ottoman for four and a quarter centuries
From the tax register of 1485 to the First Balkan War, Gusinje was an Ottoman town for 427 years. Widths are to scale.
Ottoman defter of the sanjak of Scutari, 1485; Mariano Bolizza, 1612–14; Battle of Novšiće; MONSTAT.
A day at 1,014 metres
Walking hours, not beach hours
06:00the peaks light first; the valley floor stays cold well after sunrise
08:00eight kilometres of valley road to the head of Grbaja
14:00the Ali Pasha springs, two kilometres south: the source of the Vruja, and the town’s picnic ground
19:00the walls take the sun early — bring a layer even in July
1879
I mellomtiden, i 1879
The year the annexation failed
Novšiće —on 4 December 1879 League of Prizren forces under Ali Pasha of Gusinje beat back Marko Miljanov’s Montenegrins about four kilometres north of Plav. The Treaty of Berlin had awarded Plav and Gusinje to Montenegro the year before; the award was never carried out. The Ottoman press called the fight the Gusinye Incident.
Istanbul —in 1880 the Great Powers gave up on the handover and the Ottomans ceded Ulcinj on the Adriatic as compensation instead. Gusinje stayed Ottoman until the annexation of October 1912.
Peja —Ali Pasha — born Ali Hasan Shabanagaj in Gusinje in 1828 — was made mutasarrıf of the Ottoman sanjak of İpek in 1881, and died there in March 1888. Gjergj Fishta made him the central figure of the eighth canto of Lahuta e Malcís.
Menlo Park —Edison’s carbon-filament lamp burns through the night of 21 October 1879.
Stemmer
“A lively Albanian town.”
Evliya Çelebi, 1675
Çelebi recorded the town in his Seyahatnâme sixty-three years after the fortress was finished. The bazaar was why the place existed: the Kosovo Vilayet register of 1852 counted 350 shops, eight madrasas and five mosques against 1,500 households, and in 1893 there were still 240 shops.
Sammenlign alle hoteller i Gusinje
Søk blant tusenvis av hoteller og leiligheter med oppdaterte priser.
Gusinje ligger helt øst i Montenegro, om lag 10 km bortenfor Plav, i en kjele av Prokletije-fjellene tett inntil grensen til Albania. Det er rundt to timer fra Podgorica og siste tettsted før de høye toppene.
Hva er Ali pasjas kilder?
En gruppe kraftige karstkilder en kort spasertur fra stedet, der Vruja kommer ferdig dannet opp av bakken under fjellene. Engene rundt er lokalt utfluktsmål og den enkleste korte turen fra Gusinje.
Hva er Grebaje-dalen?
En bredal sørvest for stedet, lukket av de loddrette veggene til Karanfili-toppene. Det er det mest fotograferte stedet i Prokletije, har noen hytter og en campingplass, og er utgangspunkt for nesten all seriøs fottur her.
Er Gusinje bra for fotturer?
Det er en av landets beste baser. Ruter går opp til Volušnica for den klassiske utsikten mot Karanfili, over grensen til Theth i Albania og inn på rundturen Peaks of the Balkans. Guider finnes i bygda.
Hvordan er stedet?
Lite, i hovedsak albansk og bosniakkisk, med moskeer, et marked og en sterk utvandringstradisjon — mange familier tilbringer deler av året i utlandet. Om sommeren fylles stedet, både av hjemvendte familier og av turgåere.
Trenger man tillatelse for grensestiene?
For å krysse til Albania eller Kosovo på fjellrutene, ja: en grensepasseringstillatelse må ordnes på forhånd, som regel gjennom nasjonalparkkontoret eller en lokal guide. Sett av flere dager.
Har Gusinje flyplass?
Nei — den nærmeste er Podgorica lufthavn (TGD), 124 km unna langs vei.
Hvor langt er det fra Gusinje til Podgorica?
74,6 km langs vei, omtrent 1 t 54 min med bil.
Er Gusinje trygt?
Det britiske utenriksdepartementet (FCDO) fraråder ikke reiser til Montenegro; rådene ble sist gjennomgått 13. august 2026. Det er deres vurdering av landet som helhet, ikke vår og ingen dom over Gusinje — les den selv før du reiser. Nødnummeret i Montenegro er 112.
Gusinje gjennom året
junLake Ropojana at its fullest — the seasonal lake at the head of the Ropojana shows at the beginning of summer and dries to a grassy meadow by August or September
augThe gathering at the Ali Pasha springs — on 2 August thousands come out to the springs for music, dancing and food — the town’s own holiday
First recorded 1485, in the Ottoman defter of the sanjak of Scutari
Gusinje i tall
1485
Grunnlagt
96 households, 21 unmarried men and four widows on an imperial tax register
1,014 m
Høyde over havet
the valley floor; Zla Kolata, 2,534 m and the highest point in Montenegro, is about 10 km south
1,877
Innbyggere i byen
2023 census, the town itself — 3,933 in the whole municipality
1765
Moskeen
the Vizier’s Mosque, built by Kara Mahmud Bushati on the site of a mosque of 1626; the Čekića mosque is older still, 1687
2009
Parken
Prokletije becomes Montenegro’s fifth and newest national park, 16,630 ha across Plav and Gusinje
2014
Øya gjenåpnet
its own municipality again, 61 years after the status was revoked
MONSTAT, Census 2023 · Ottoman defter of the sanjak of Scutari, 1485 · National Parks of Montenegro
Hvor lang tid trenger du i Gusinje?
Noen timer
1The čaršija and its mosques — the Vizier’s of 1765, the Čekića of 1687, the Radončića of 1899
2Two kilometres south to the Ali Pasha springs, where the Vruja comes out of the ground
Half a morning covers the town. The valleys are the reason to come.
En hel dag
1Eight kilometres up the road to Grbaja, the glacial trough under the Karanfili
2Walk the valley floor to the foot of the wall — this is the region’s climbing ground, more than ten peaks above 2,000 m inside four kilometres
3Back through Gusinje to the Ali Pasha springs for the afternoon
One town, two valleys, and the highest ground in Montenegro ten kilometres off.
En helg
1Day one in Grbaja, under the Karanfili
2Day two to Vusanje — 594 people, the last village before the Albanian border — and the Grlja waterfall
3Up the Ropojana to Lake Ropojana: a macadam road, or about an hour on foot from just outside Vusanje
4Plav, thirteen kilometres east, for the lake and the road home
Gusinje is a base, not a stop. The Peaks of the Balkans trail — 192 km through Montenegro, Albania and Kosovo — passes between Lake Ropojana and Qafa e Pejës.
Hvor bo i Gusinje
Gusinje town
Best for the čaršija, the shops and the bus — with both valleys inside ten kilometres
Grbaja valley
Best for the valley floor eight kilometres up, for walkers who want the rock at the door
Vusanje
Best for the last village before the Albanian border, at the mouth of the Ropojana
Plav
Best for thirteen kilometres east on the lake — more rooms, and the road out to Podgorica
