Visit-Montenegro.com : Action in “007” Style and Survival Skills at Mount Orjen

Herceg Novi – Television manager and sailing instructor from the UK, Jack Delf, who became Herceg Novi’s citizen three years ago, has refreshed the tourist offer of Montenegro and this town with introduction of brand new ideas which he is bringing to life with his team.

Activists of the NGO “Adventure Race”, which had been gathered by this British national, are attracting attention of both tourists and locals by climbing up and down the rope hanging from Forta Mare fortress at Novi’s Skver.

This has been an invitation and introduction to the Adventure Race – a triathlon race through Montenegro, which will take place on 3 and 4 October in Mojkovac and Herceg Novi.

Organizers emphasize that revenues from this race, which will bring together professionals and amateurs, will be given to charity.

Action and active holidaying is the most interesting part of Jack Delf’s “Black Mountain” agency’s offer.

In cooperation with other agencies, kayaking and scuba-diving clubs, this business-oriented Brit is bringing foreign tourists to the Montenegrin coastline, but also to its’ mountains.

Groups of businessmen and interested tourists can pretend to be James Bonds at sea, they can do survival training at Mount Orjen, practice shooting in a village at this mountain’s bottom, kayak in the Bay, fly with a helicopter or ride horses across the border in Croatia. What seems to be most attractive for those who are on holidays is action and adventure.

“I have come here on a sailing boat, several years ago. I liked the coast and the sea here, while my wife, Hailey liked the mountains. We found that this place had both, so we moved over here. Some 20 months ago, our son was born here.

I have a team of 10 men who are contributing to the diversity of our offer with their ideas”, Delf says.

Except for him, no one can run corporative training, team-building and leadership programs which are organized in Boka Bay and at Mount Orjen.

Organized groups from Universities, companies and various institutions are coming in order to learn something about working in teams, mutual trust, roles of leaders… And, all that in games which have been developed by Jack and his team.

Training contains theory-part, while the other part is, most usually, staged in difficult conditions, but in realistic surrounding.

For instance, six groups from the US’ University of Denver went through a survival drill at Orjen Mountain, in a staged situation of the aftermath of a massive earthquake. They had to fulfill all sorts of tasks, including building a bridge, climbing rocks, rescuing of survivors, fixing cars. Americans found later was most difficult.

One of these trainings included representatives of Montenegro’s Tourist Organization. Their game demanded that they should give up their leadership positions. They hiked down Orjen’s rocks as well.

Evidence to the claim that requests by the interested clients were quite diverse is the program which has been prepared for businessmen who wished to play James Bond-game.

They have arrived to Cilipi-airport, where they were picked up by luxurious cars and taken to “Splendid” hotel. Jack Delf organized actions at sea with yachts, scuba-diving and all sorts of similar 007-style adventures.

Owner of this Herceg Novi’s agency, which is active across whole of Montenegro, says that their offer is not aimed, as some might think was the case, only for those who are ready to pay huge amounts of money.

What is important is that there is a variety of different offers, including trips, hiking, mount-biking at Orjen, clay-pigeon-shooting in Kameno village, scuba-diving and kayaking.

What is most certain is that arrangements like this one find growing number of interested tourists. Situation at the home market is quite different, as local tourists are still not interested in active vacations.

This Brit from Herceg Novi says that there are many companies doing different things in Montenegro and its’ tourist industry, and that it would be of utmost importance to create better connections between them.

“Discovery” and “National geographic” at Jack’s

These days, Jack Delf hosted crews of “Discovery” and “National Geographic” in Montenegro. During the first half of August, he took them to Sinjajevina to shoot the life in authentic shepherd-cottages.

With Jack’s assistance, shows have also been recorded in Boka Bay, with a special emphasis to Kotor. Millions of viewers will see Montenegro on these globally-famous television channels.

(25 August 2008)

By: S.R.