The Development Goals of FitCamp Montenegro
Being a crazy ant is not an easy job. All of us crazy ants know it, but we usually wouldn’t do anything different even if we could turn back the time.
‘…most of the ants in the nest are creatures of habit (workers). They mark their routes with scent trails and only follow routes where another ant once walked. So they obediently finish their work list. They will mainly work harder and harder but do nothing structural about the problem.
Fortunately, there are always several crazy ants (scouts) in a nest. They deviate from the fixed routes and, therefore, find new places that the ant people need to survive. The crazy ant is the one who will find a new place. But how does he convince the other ants to help him move the entire nest?’
Read the full story about the crazy ant here.
Lagant.nl
As many in our surroundings characterised us as crazy when we left the coast and headed up to the Adriatic hinterland of Central Montenegro to develop FitCamp, we wished to write this blog and explain our reasons, or better say goals!
GOAL 1 – Local Community Involvement & Development
Seeing the potential and optimal growth in rural tourism development of Montenegro, one of the leading thoughts of our business idea was to include the local community in all that we do.
Offering only local products to our guests and visitors is what we crave, but taking in mind that our production is not that big to cover all the needs yet, we saw an opportunity for everyone in the village producing anything from fruits and vegetables to cheese, meat, marmalades, juices, rakija, wines and similar.
This goal includes long-term effects that are equally positive to our business development as to the city’s economic empowerment, a larger tourism inclusion and better rural product placement.
We frequently hear how the city of Niksic, where we are located, is not touristically developed, so we want to motivate people from this city to understand the potential of the area and plan their agricultural and other activities following all the possibilities that the modern market offers.
GOAL 2 – Sustainable Environment
The mal-influence of tourism on the environment has become very clear, taking in mind massive movements, cruising travels increase and similar. Some of the greatest minds in sustainable tourism development are now finding a way to regenerate the travel market and decrease the poor effects of the travelling crowds that used to happen from the 70s of the 20th century up to today.
From the very beginning, FitCamp Montenegro had a clear idea in mind – development in touch with nature! All our efforts to find a remote place and cultivate it further paid off when we landed to today-location of our well-being centre. We clicked with this area and saw all the small bits and pieces needed for the puzzle that we started to put together.
Firstly, we were enthusiastic that the village where we are now located doesn’t have a city water supply system. Most of the people we work with and our partners told us – oooh, but the water might be a problem there. We nodded and made it one step closer to our vision.
Most of the people living here are collecting the rainfall and snowfall in underground containers from which they distribute it further to their barns, houses and gardens. The same is with us. Our property has a 44 m3 water container built underground in the backyard, and it is connected to the house by an electric water pump. So, when you are inside our premises, you can’t feel the difference as it seems the same as in the urban areas. In reality, it is not the same, as we take as much as nature has given us and reuse it in our daily life. The best about it is the reaction of our guests and visitors and how fast they learn to collaborate in saving water and protecting natural resources.
Furthermore, we started planning a sustainable irrigation system for our gardens, orchard and future cattle. We dag a pool in the valley of 150 m3 size that will soon be our addition to recreation on the FitCamp estate, as well as a secure water supply for all the produce.
The system is planned with a SMART addition so that we can control the water flow even remotely.
A solar plant is something we keep for the near future, but it’s been on our list since the very beginning. The reason for postponing it is the investment that it requires. That piece of the puzzle will close the circle of self-sustainability and give us the title of the possibly only self-sustainable place in Montenegro, especially in the commercial market.
Thus, nature will give us:
– electricity from the power of sun and wind, and
– water from the rainfall and snowfall.
This will shape our small system as a perpetuum mobile.
GOAL 3 – Diversified Travel Product
As parts of our team have been working in tourism for years, we are aware of the clutter and fuzz that follows travelling. The effects of tourism on nature are not flattering, but luckily, the latest generations of travellers seem to see this problem and react to it.
Even before the pandemic, FitCamp Montenegro’s idea was shaped around the fact that nature has a healing effect and that we should let that fact into urban lives that are stale and dusty. We didn’t want seasonal work or to offer the same services as everybody else in the rural areas of Montenegro, so it took us time to shape the whole program and system with our partners and friends. From 2018 up to today, we didn’t stop working on this idea and sharp-shaping it for the market in the best way we possibly saw it could go.
All our programs are based around the benefits and inspiration that nature gives us, and we invest ourselves in the best combination of silent time within the forest, hiking, swimming, outdoor adventures, yoga, fitness, healthy food & nutrition, and mindful workshops. We immodestly consider that we crafted a unique travel product for the Montenegrin market, and we are fanatical about the reality that our demand is responding so positively to what we created for them! That gives us further inspiration and motivation to never stop and always introduce novelties to our products and the Montenegrin travel market in general.
Avoiding the short seasonal work, our doors are not open only to travellers and our programs are not crafted just for short-term rentals. We are happy to share that winter 2022/23 was more than successful at our estate, with numerous digital nomads who have chosen coliving stay, entrepreneurs and MSMEs who have chosen our team buildings and workshops and last but not least – our volunteers, who help us and at the same time live the life with us, by applying the same set of rules and goals we crave for FitCamp.
We do hope to welcome you here and spread our love for nature and all it gives us with you, introduce you to our elderly neighbours and their delicious products and heal you by being one with our Planet Earth.
Approaching Earth Day, we wish that this blog enlights you in your future travels and motivates you to only travel with purpose!
