It's hard to start writing again. Phrases and clauses of what I wrote and lost in the robbery keep floating in and out of my head, and chasing them into coherent thoughts is frustrating. I've got to stop delaying before even the broad details start to get lost.
The first thing that I remember about this visit to Croatia is getting there from Montenegro. We had spoken of how the hard part of this journey is behind us now, how the roads were going to be good from tomorrow on, and how easy getting around would be. Enter a ferry crossing and a border crossing, and all that changed. The coast of Montenegro includes a large cut inland that takes hours to circumvent, or you can take a ferry across a ½ mile strip of water and save a lot of driving. It took us an hour to get on the ferry and there were four of them running. It’s a great place to build a bridge, but it seems that too much has been invested in the ferry business to do that. Paul refers to it as the ferry mafia; he probably isn’t wrong. There’s an ice cream seller that does a smashing business by the ticket office.
the section of water the ferry crosses
The border crossing took even longer. The most frustrating part is watching cars jump the queue. Actually, it’s more frustrating to watch cars allow enough of a gap so that someone can jump the queue. On the narrow road, a Serbian car cut in a few cars in front of us. Paul nicknamed him Milosevic (My past experience with Serbians has been negative, so I enjoyed this.). As we got to the spot where one lane turned into three, we moved into a lane different from him. It was very satisfying to get through the barricades before him. At the Montenegrin check point, the guard gave us a smile and wished us a good day.
our first view of dubrovnik from the road above
It took us so long to get to Dubrovnik that all we did was set up camp in an overcrowded and huge campsite and head for the beach for some soothing time in the water. Tim seems to love the water more each time. He doesn’t care about the temperature at all anymore. As soon as we get close, he barks an “Ah!” and starts wiggling. He splashed and kicked happily.
tim enjoying the croatian beach (across from split - no photos of him at the dubrovnik beach
Like Montenegro , Croatia has wonderful beaches. Neither Paul nor I are big beach holiday people. I like the sea and I like to get in the water, but sitting on the beach bores me. Also, I don’t like sand. The final strike for me against beach holidays is that the only beach holidays I had as a kid were in Hawaii. (Don’t you feel sorry for me?) I’m beach spoiled. When I first came to the Adriatic in Croatia in 2004, I felt I had found my kind of beach, even better than Hawaii. The water is comfortably warm. It’s so clear that swimming around on top of a float face down is almost as good as snorkeling, and there is no messy sand. I think Paul is becoming as big an eastern Adriatic fan as I am. It’s hot here, and the Adriatic is unlike any other, so we’ve become beach people.
My colleague at ACS Egham described Dubrovnik as a sea of red when you see it from the road above and a city of white marble from the streets below. She didn't lie. The old town is walled, and inside everything is done in the same white rock that seems to be Croatia 's trademark. The highlight of seeing the old city was walking the wall. It takes a while but the view of the sea on one side straight down and the land on the other is well worth it. Just don't leave your sunglasses when you stop to feed your son. I was holding Paul's and set them down. He found them again, but didn't enjoy the climb back up the stairs and the slope up. Of course, I left them on one of the highest parts of the wall.
our walk along the walls around the city
the city within the walls
From Dubrovnik we continued up the coast. We camped across a bay from Split and did a day trip in. The center boasts Diocletian’s Palace. Again, lots of white rock and the Roman stuff is impressive. Our campsite had a small private beach and we spent one whole day enjoying it. The rocks were smooth and just big enough that Tim could put them in his mouth without worry of choking. He liked the salt. The moonrise over Split and across the water was good enough to sit and watch both nights. Tim was good enough to go to bed just as it appeared, so we got to enjoy the romantic atmosphere as much as you can in a campsite.
a view of the moonrise over split from our campsite across the bay
Away from the coast, Croatia has great roads, so we hightailed it for Slovenia and the cool Julian Mountains.
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