Staying Overnight at Studenica Monastery

Staying Overnight at Studenica Monastery guest house is one of the best things to do in southwest Serbia. 

About Studenica Monastery

Studenica Monastery (aka Studenica Manastir) is an UNESCO world heritage site first established in the late 1100’s.  There are several chapels in this Serb Orthodox monastery.  Now it is one of the best monasteries in Serbia.   The artwork is divine – with the special blue paint from Afghanistan that was once more valuable than gold.   

Studenica Monastery Guest Rooms

The Studenica Guesthouse was only added after the UNESCO designation, but the style makes it seem much older.  The rooms are quite basic, but comfortable, with several single beds.  The rooms have a bathroom with western style toilet and shower with hot water.  Our room had a balcony looking away from the monastery, with a view of the surrounding hills and forest.

Studenica Monastery Guest House Meals

Staying at Studenica Monastery, comes with half board, so you get dinner and breakfast with your stay.  Breakfast was a choice of “meat” or “no meat”.   After seeing the choices, I would go with the “no meat” option.  Meat included several sausages with soup, fried potatoes, and salad.  “No meat” was the same but with fish.  Breakfast included lots of bread, spreads, tuna, pastries, and coffee or tea.

Studenica Monastery Wine

Many of the monasteries in Europe make their own wine, and you can get some homemade wine at Studenica to have with your dinner.  A bottle costs $7 euros and the red wine was quite good. 

Studenica Monastery Guest House Cost

It cost $20 Euros per person for room and half board at Studenica.  Half board included a full dinner (I recommend ordering the fish rather than the meat option) and an ample breakfast. 

Advantage of Staying Overnight at Studenica Monastery

The advantage of staying overnight is you can access the monastery after the tourist groups have left for the day. One of the joys of staying was getting up early, sitting outside the chapel, and listening to the monks chanting their morning prayers.

Getting to Studenica Monastery

Getting to Studenica Monastery by public transportation is hit or miss.  The biggest trick to this feat is to get to the village of Usce.  Once you are there, there are buses up to Studenica.  Ask locally for times.

When leaving Studenica Monastery, we wanted to get to Novi Pasar on a stopover on our way to Kosovo which didn’t seem too difficult – it was a short ride to Usce, which was on the main highway E-761, which was only 54 km away from Novi Pasar along a main highway. 

The ride to Usce was easy.  The front desk at the monastery stay told us the times for several buses and we decided to catch the 10:30 to Usce which left exactly on time.  Usce to Novi Pasar was a different story.  Some locals told us where the stand along the main highway.  Several other people were waiting and after a few minutes, boarded a bus to Raska.  In hindsight, we should have gotten on this bus, which would have gotten us half way to Novi Pasar and would have taken us to a city where it would have been easier to get a taxi cab.  Instead we waited and waited… we waited over 2 hours.  A couple buses going towards Novi Pasar went buy… some didn’t stop.  One that did stop told us they were completely full.  No one could tell us exactly when a Novi Pasar bus would stop.  Eventually we got on a bus to Raska which proceeded to drive 1 km out of Usce and then stop for 20 minutes for a bathroom stop and lunch.  Luckily, we were standing outside and saw a Novi Pasar bound minibus drive by.  We flagged it down and switched buses, arriving in Novi Pasar about an hour later. 

If you like staying in monasteries, check out the overnight stay in Rila Monastery in Bulgaria

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