Climbing the Kotor City Walls to St John's Fortress

Kotor's city walls are part of one continuous fortification system that climbs from the old town, on the water's edge, up the flank of St John's hill to the fortress of San Giovanni — the local name most visitors use is simply "the fortress" or "San Giovanni." The whole system runs roughly 4.5 km and the fortress itself sits about 260 m above the Bay of Kotor. It's the walls and old town together that make up the UNESCO-listed Natural and Culturo-Historical Region of Kotor, inscribed in 1979. Walking it is less a single staircase than a route that changes character three or four times on the way up, and knowing what's coming makes the climb far more enjoyable than just putting your head down and counting steps.

Where the climb begins

There are two signposted entrances into the wall system. The first is near the North Gate, also called the River Gate, on the edge of the old town where the Škurda river meets the walls. The second is behind the old town, on its eastern side, and is the route most guided hikes use. Both paths converge fairly quickly onto the same stone stairway, so it doesn't much matter which one you pick — pick whichever is closer to where you're staying, or start at the North Gate if you want the classic view back over the Sea Gate and the Lion of St Mark carved above it, a leftover from nearly four centuries of Venetian rule between 1420 and 1797.

Stage one: the lower switchbacks

The first stretch out of the old town is the steepest in perceived effort, mostly because you're starting cold. The steps here are narrow, uneven, and cut directly into the hillside, zig-zagging back and forth across the slope rather than climbing straight up. This is also where, in peak season, you'll pass the ticket booth — worth knowing about before you set off (there's a full breakdown of how that works in our tickets and entrance fee guide). Take this section slowly. Most people who find the climb tougher than expected go too hard in the first ten minutes and pay for it later.

Stage two: the halfway church

Roughly halfway up — in effort more than exact elevation — you reach the Church of Our Lady of Remedy (Gospa od Zdravlja), a small chapel built in the early 16th century, around 1518, as a votive offering during a plague outbreak. It's the single best-known photo stop on the climb: from the terrace beside it, the old town's terracotta roofs sit directly below you and the bay begins to reveal its full, fjord-like shape (technically Kotor's bay is a ria, a submerged river canyon, but it's very commonly described as Europe's southernmost fjord). Most people pause here for ten to fifteen minutes, and it's a sensible spot to reassess how you're doing — the second half of the climb is shorter than the first but the exposure increases.

Stage three: to the ramparts

Above the church, the path narrows and the drops on either side become more noticeable, particularly on the final approach to the fortress walls. This upper section is where sturdy footwear actually matters — see our difficulty and safety guide for specifics. The reward is the fortress itself: a rough, roofless enclosure of ramparts at around 260 m, with the Bay of Kotor laid out in full beneath you, framed by the mountains that give the bay its enclosed, almost lake-like feel.

Getting back down

Independent climbers usually retrace their steps — it's the simplest option and lets you take the descent slowly, which is often easier on the knees than it sounds. Guided hikes, by contrast, frequently do the route in reverse or continue over the back of the hill, descending through the hamlet of Špiljari, a small hillside hamlet with a ruined church, before looping back into Kotor on quieter paths. If you'd rather not retrace 1,350 steps, that's the main reason to book the guided version rather than go it alone.

Distances and numbers at a glance

• Total fortification length: roughly 4.5 km of walls
• Elevation of the fortress: about 260 m above the bay
• Steps: commonly counted at around 1,350 (sources vary slightly)
• Round trip time: roughly 1.5–2 hours unguided; guided hikes with a downhill Krstać–Špiljari route run closer to four hours including transfers
• Best light: sunrise or the last hour before sunset — see our timing guide

A few things nobody tells you

The path is entirely sun-exposed with almost no shade for the whole climb, which matters more than the step count on a hot day. The stone underfoot is original medieval paving in long stretches — beautiful, but uneven and slippery when wet. There's no running water anywhere on the route, so what you carry up is what you have. And because the fortress ramparts have no barriers in most places, this isn't a climb to do in flip-flops or with small children who wander — more on who should think twice in our difficulty guide.