Bigova Bay Wrecks

Tivat · Kotor Municipality · Montenegro

Bigova Bay sits on the outer shore of Montenegro's Lustica Peninsula, a short distance from the famous Bay of Kotor but facing the open Adriatic. This quiet fishing village with its handful of stone houses and single waterfront restaurant conceals one of the most interesting wreck diving sites on the eastern Adriatic coast. The bay's protected waters and moderate depth have preserved several vessels from different historical periods on a sandy seabed ringed by rocky reef. I descended through clear green water toward the main wreck at 28 metres, an Austro-Hungarian patrol vessel that went down in the early twentieth century. The hull section lay on its side, the steel ribs arching upward like the skeleton of a beached whale. Every surface was encrusted with orange and white sponges, and gorgonian fans had colonised the upper edges where current delivers nutrients. A massive conger eel, easily two metres long, occupied a cavity in the engine compartment, its mouth opening and closing as I hovered at a respectful distance. Swimming along the debris field, I passed scattered deck fittings, corroded machinery, and sections of hull plating now serving as artificial reef substrate for a thriving community of invertebrates. Scorpionfish lay camouflaged on the wreck's flat surfaces, and nudibranchs of startling colour crept along sponge-covered steel. A large octopus retreated into a porthole frame as my torch beam found it, its tentacles pulling inward in a fluid defensive coil. The shallower wreck at 16 metres is a smaller Yugoslav-era patrol boat, less dramatic in scale but fascinating for its intact wheelhouse section where blennies have established residence on the instrument panel. Between the two wrecks, the sandy seabed hosts burrowing starfish and hermit crabs, while the surrounding reef provides a transition zone of boulders and Posidonia grass where sea bream and lobsters patrol. The surface interval, spent floating in the bay with Montenegro's limestone mountains soaring above, is itself worth the trip. Bigova delivers wreck diving with historical depth in a setting of remarkable natural beauty.