Kotor, Montenegro

Kotor sits at the deepest point of the Bay of Kotor, a fjord-like inlet carved into the Dinaric Alps in Montenegro. The town's UNESCO-listed Old Town walls climb 1,350 stone steps and 260 meters of altitude to the fortress of Saint John, with sections built during the Venetian era that lasted from 1420 to 1797. At the center, the 12th-century Cathedral of Saint Tryphon fronts the largest medieval square, where a Latin inscription records the 1166 blessing of its original bells. Roughly 22,000 people live in the municipality today. What waits at the top of those steps shapes the climb ahead.