Most time ashoreIslet and Perast, slowly
Speedboat from Kotor
- Length
- 3 hrs
- On the islet
- 30 min
- In Perast
- 1.5 hrs
- Price
- from $48
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Guide · Perast
Our Lady of the Rocks and Perast, by boat from Kotor
Off Perast a small church sits on an island that sailors made by hand. Here is how Our Lady of the Rocks grew out of the sea, what you see inside, and which boats stop there.
Check availabilityfrom $53 · cancel without a fee
Editorial team, blue-cave-montenegro.comUpdated October 25, 2026about 7 min to read35 sources
In a nutshell
An island that Perast built stone by stone
Our Lady of the Rocks is the rare island you can call man-made without exaggerating. Where it stands there was once only a bare reef, while its neighbour, the island of St George with its Benedictine abbey, is a natural rise of an undersea ridge.5 The fill was heaped around the original rock, and the main altar of the church rests on that rock today.6 When you step off the boat you are standing on centuries of deliberate work.
The tradition preserved in Perast takes 22 July 1452 as the islet's birthday.1 Over the centuries the people of Perast kept enlarging it by piling stones and sinking old, worn-out sailing ships, and by 1603 about a hundred ships had gone to the bottom around it.2 Each sunken hull gave a little more ground, and each gain allowed bolder building on top.
The custom never stopped. Every year on that date at dusk, the boats of Perast, loaded with stones and tied to one another, process along the shore singing old songs and then drop their stones around the islet.7 Locals know the procession as the Fašinada. If your trip falls on that evening, watching it from the waterfront of Perast tells you more about this place than any guidebook.
Five centuries
How the islet and its church grew
-
1452
The islet's birthday
-
1603
A hundred ships down
About a hundred old ships had been sunk to enlarge it.2
-
1624
Pirates raid
North African pirates plunder the church and damage the icon.9
-
1667
Earthquake and rebuild
Most of today's ensemble dates from after 1666.10
-
1720 to 1725
The presbytery
Built to designs by Ilija Katičić.11
-
1828
The embroidery done
Jacinta Kunić signs her votive picture.12
The church: a shrine of sailors
The first church here, like today's dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin, was built in the middle of the 15th century and was modest, as small as the rock under it.13 Most of what you see now dates from after 1666, because the great Dubrovnik earthquake of 1667 badly damaged the shrine.10 The presbytery followed between 1720 and 1725, to designs by the local builder Ilija Katičić.11
Everything about it speaks of the sea. Archival records show that from the 16th century to today more than 150 ships have carried the name of Our Lady of the Rocks.14 The museum keeps the teacher's chair of the Perast elementary school that the Franciscans opened in 1636, a school that also taught navigation.15
The icon at the heart of the shrine was painted around 1452 by the Kotor painter Lovro Marinov Dobričević, in tempera on a cedar board.8 In 1624 North African pirates plundered the church and left the icon riddled with damage.9 The main altar of white Carrara marble came later, commissioned by the town of Perast in 1796 from the Genoese workshop of Antonio Capellano.16
Three ways to visit
The islet by speedboat, at leisure or with the cable car
Most time ashore
ShortestIslet and Perast, short
Speedboat from Kotor
- Length
- 2 hrs
- On the islet
- 20 min
- In Perast
- 30 min
- Price
- from $43
Highest ratedIslet, Perast & cable car
By van from Kotor port
- Length
- 4 hrs
- On the islet
- 30 min
- Rating
- 4.91
- Price
- from $114
Decision helper
How much time does the islet deserve?
Match the visit to your day
The booked speedboat
A 20-minute islet stop and an optional 30-minute swim at the cave.
The relaxed 3-hour tour
1.5 hours in Perast after the islet.
The short speedboat
20 minutes on the islet and 30 in Perast.
The van tour with the cable car
A 45-minute cable car ride is part of it.
Stay in Perast that evening
It happens at dusk every year on the islet's birthday.7
By this old and simple ceremony, on that day every year at dusk, all the boats of Perast, filled with stones and tied one to another, set off in a solemn procession along the shore, singing traditional folk songs, toward Our Lady's island, to pile the stones around it.
Kokolja's paintings and the silver plates
Look up as soon as your eyes adjust to the dim light. The ceiling is divided into 45 geometric fields, each framed in gilded rope-shaped borders.19 The painted cycle runs to sixty-eight paintings, which make the shrine a European rarity of late 17th-century church art.3 Most are the work of Tripo Kokolja, born in Perast in 1661 and dead on Korčula in 1713, one of the most important Baroque painters of this coast.20
His Dormition of the Virgin on the south wall measures 9.5 by 3 m, big enough to make a small church feel crowded with figures.21 Around the paintings hang the silver votive plates, about 2,000 of them, made mostly by goldsmiths from seventeen different Kotor workshops between the 17th and 19th centuries.4
A large silver relief shows Perast, both islets and the Ottoman army attacking the town; it was a joint offering for the victory over the Turks on 15 May 1654, made by the Venetian goldsmith Francesco Costadoni between 1736 and 1738.22 Perast still marks 15 May every year as its votive day.23 Give these objects a few minutes. A 20-minute stop goes fast, and the silver is easy to walk past on your way to the view.
Checklist
For a visit to the islet
01
Wear
- Covered shoulders, shorts or skirt of modest length
- A hat for the open quay
- Shoes with grip for wet stone
02
Bring
- Cash for the islet admission
- An eye on the closing hour late in the day
- A few minutes for the silver plates
Cost calculator
The islet trip for your group
Starting totals for boats that stop at the islet.
People
Total from$95
each from $48
Check availabilityfree cancellationA total here is the lowest per-person starting price on GetYourGuide times the size of your group, converted with the European Central Bank's daily reference rate; the date and option you pick set the final amount.
Video
The Story of Our Lady of the Rocks
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The embroidery made with human hair
The most personal object in the museum is an embroidered votive picture of the icon by Jacinta Kunić of Perast. Tradition says she worked on it for a full 20 years, with silk, silver and gold thread, and used natural hair for the hairstyles of the figures.24 Her signature shows she finished it in 1828.12
Sources do not agree on the dates. The national tourism organisation says she worked on it from 1803 to 1828 and wove in strands of her own hair.25 Either way it is one woman's patience made visible, and it is worth asking the guide or the custodian to point it out, because it is small and easy to miss among the paintings.
Everything here was paid for by a seafaring town at the height of its wealth. Perast had its golden era under the Republic of Venice, from 1420 to 1797, and over the centuries it built 20 Baroque palaces, 17 Catholic churches and two Orthodox ones.2627 The islet is the town's public diary, written in stone, paint and silver.
St George, the island you cannot land on
The island next door looks like a painting in itself: a dark ring of cypresses around a church and a few walls. It holds the 12th-century Benedictine monastery of Saint George and the old graveyard of the noble families of Perast.28 Unlike its neighbour it was not built; it is the top of a natural ridge under the water.5
None of the tours compared on this site lands on St George, so enjoy it from the water and from the quay of Our Lady of the Rocks, where it lines up against the mountains of the inner bay. The islets together are part of what UNESCO protects here: the World Heritage site includes Kotor and its fortifications, Risan, Perast, St George and Our Lady of the Rocks.29
The whole region was inscribed in 1979, by an emergency procedure after a devastating earthquake that year.30 The shrine itself cracked again at its old weak point in that earthquake.10 When you see how close to the water everything here stands, it is easy to understand why a single earthquake changed how the world looked after this bay.
Perast: a town of captains
Perast had no defensive walls. Its only fortification above the town is Holy Cross Fort, built in 1570, and the town defended itself from towers raised beside almost every noble palace.31 Walk the waterfront and you notice those towers rising from the facades, a reminder that every family here guarded its own door.
This was a town that taught navigation. In 1698 Captain Marko Martinović founded the first maritime school in the Balkans here and trained Russian boyars in navigation.32 More than 2,000 people lived in Perast until the end of the 18th century, only about 400 remained by the start of the 20th, and the 2023 census counted 237.1718
The Perast Museum fills the Bujović Palace, built in the 17th century.33 It opens Tuesday to Sunday, from 8:00 to 20:00 between 15 April and 15 October and from 10:00 to 16:00 in the colder half of the year.34 Smekja Palace, built in 1764 for a family of sea captains, admirals and merchants, also faces the water.35 The booked speedboat only passes Perast, so choose a tour with a land stop if you want to walk here.
Opening hours, the dress rule and which boat to take
The church and museum keep seasonal hours. One listing gives them as typically until 17:00 in April, May, September and October, until 18:00 in June and until 19:00 in July and August, and notes that you can still walk the islet when they are closed. Hours can change, so an afternoon tour late in the season may find the doors already shut.
Dress for a church, not for the beach. Entry to the islet is not allowed in swimwear, and the booked tour asks for covered shoulders and modest shorts, skirt or dress; another listing confirms that swimwear is not permitted inside the church. On a tour that ends with a swim, keep a T-shirt and shorts on top of your swimsuit until the cave.
The relaxed way to visit is a 3-hour tour that stops 30 minutes on the islet and then gives you 1.5 hours in Perast. A shorter 2-hour version stops 20 minutes on the islet and 30 minutes in Perast. If you want the islet plus the cave, the booked speedboat stops for 20 minutes; one cheap Perast tour, by contrast, sees the islet only from the boat, so read the listing before you book.
Into the blue
Church, tunnel, fortress, then a swim
3 hours by speedboat from Kotor, with an optional 30-minute swim at the cave.
You ask,we answer.
Is Our Lady of the Rocks a man-made island?
Yes. It grew around a bare reef from piled stones and sunken ships; about a hundred ships were sunk by 1603.52
When was Our Lady of the Rocks built?
Tradition says 1452. Its birthday is kept on 22 July 1452; most of the church dates from after 1666.110
What is the Fašinada?
The yearly stone procession. At dusk on the islet's birthday, Perast boats tied together carry stones out and drop them around it.7
Can you visit St George island?
Not on the tours. It holds a 12th-century Benedictine monastery and the nobles' graveyard; see it from the water.28
What are the church opening hours?
Seasonal, roughly to 17:00 to 19:00. One listing gives 17:00 in spring and autumn, 18:00 in June and 19:00 in July and August.
Can I go in wearing swimwear?
No. Swimwear is not allowed on the islet church visit; bring something to cover your shoulders.
How do I get to Our Lady of the Rocks from Kotor?
By boat. A 3-hour tour stops 30 minutes on the islet and 1.5 hours in Perast.
Who painted the church?
Mostly Tripo Kokolja. The Perast-born Baroque painter lived from 1661 to 1713.20
Sources
Where the information comes from
- 1Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 2Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 3Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 4Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 5Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 6Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 7Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 8Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 9Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 10Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 11Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 12Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 13Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 14Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 15Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 16Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 17MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Perast Museum↩
- 18Wikipedia (last resort)Perast↩
- 19Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 20Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 21Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 22Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 23Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Zavjetni dan u Perastu↩
- 24Kotorska biskupija (Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor)Gospa od Škrpjela↩
- 25National Tourism Organisation of MontenegroBay of Kotor↩
- 26MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Perast Museum↩
- 27Wikipedia (last resort)Perast↩
- 28Wikipedia (last resort)Sveti Đorđe Island↩
- 29Wikipedia (last resort; whc.unesco.org returns 403)Natural and Culturo-Historical Region of Kotor↩
- 30Government of Montenegro - Ministry of Culture and MediaSavjetodavna misija UNESCO u Kotoru↩
- 31MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Perast Museum↩
- 32MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Perast Museum↩
- 33MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Perast Museum↩
- 34MPI Muzeji Kotor (municipal public institution)Admission fees and opening hours↩
- 35National Tourism Organisation of MontenegroStep Into History - Stay at Smekja Palace, the Heart of Perast↩
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