The Final Countdown. Day 51: Pompeii - Sorrento

Getting to Sorrento proved to be a little bit...shit. Frankly. Breakfast and checking out of the accommodation was easy enough, nothing to complain about there. We had two options for walking to the train station - we chose what we thought would be the easier option but turned out to be us fighting for space on the footpath - we just ended up on the road for most of it - with a group of Asian tourists. The train station was right next to Pompeii, so we expected a little bit of traffic.

With all our luggage and in the hot sun, we make it to the train station and we grabbed a couple of tickets to wait for the next train in about 25 minutes. We found a little place to sit outside, and then suddenly the tour group joins us on the platform. Huh? The tour is getting on the train?

As we sat there, another three groups of Asian tourists join us on the platform, making a total of 4 groups with about 20 or more people in each. This train is gonna be packed. It was of course running on ish time, so it was quite late, and when it did arrive there was a serious amount of pushing and shoving to try to get on. Dan and I finally made and found a corner to stand uncomfortably in - we put most of our bags on the floor as there was no room to keep them on, and it wasn't going to be an overly short journey.

I've had worse, but it definitely wasn't a great train ride. At one point, a bunch of buskers with saxophones got on, and all the tour groups got very excited by this (although less excited when they were asked to pay). Finally though, we popped out in Sorrento.

Our next accommodation was going to be quite different. The cheapest option we could find was a camp site a little way out of the city. This was ok, because it was near the port - we actually really wanted to do a boat cruise of the Amalfi coast and Sorrento was a great place to do this from. Sorrento itself we didn't need to explore all that much. I found last minute that the camp site offered free shuttles from Sorrento to the grounds, except the pick up point wasn't at the train station. It was, an Italian "5 minute walk" from the station. Probably closer to 15 with our heavy bags, and I was pretty unimpressed when we got there.

I didn't want to have done that hike when we could have paid about €1 for a bus that would take us to the camp site door, but come 12pm a mini bus did in fact show up with the camp site name on it, and so we saved ourselves €2 and gained all that extra walking time (although to be fair we got a seat on the shuttle, which may not have been the case on the bus).

The shuttle deposited us right at reception, and so we joined the small queue, waiting our turn to check in. We paid the remainder, was given a couple of maps and excursion options, and then not so long after we hopped in a shuttle and we were driven down to our room. Another couple was dropped off first - a lot higher up. I got a little concerned how low we were going as it meant we would have to go up again...

We stopped and hopped out, shouldering our luggage. We were taken to a small cabin and shown inside - this'll do nicely! It was much nicer than some of the accommodation we have had, that's for sure! We opted for a cabin with our own bathroom instead of cheaping out, and I'm so glad we did. I would have probably broken all my bones trying to get too and from the cubicles in the middle of the night! Our cabin had a bunk bed with a double on the bottom (which was actually just another single pushed up against it with a double mattress on top, but it worked fine). We had a little toilet and shower too, and outside we had a nice balcony with a bench table where we would end up sitting a lot.

The place was totally devoid of air and stuffy and hot, so we opened the door and the window to let some air through. We read all of the timing instructions for each of the services on the camp grounds - the restaurant was open 24/7, the mini market had divided morning and afternoon times, the swimming pool closed at 7.30 and the beach area at 7pm.

I was naturally starving so lunch was a top priority. Before then though, we went all the way back up to reception to book into one of the excursions they had on offer. It was a boat tour along the Amalfi coast, stopping at Amalfi and the pretty Positano on the way, as well as a few other highlights. I had seen similar tours advertised on Viator when I had been researching for a higher price, and this one would pick us up and drop us off at the camp grounds, so I wanted to book it in.

When we got to reception, first I asked what the ferry prices were between the different areas, and it would be more cost effective for us to book the tour. "For tomorrow please."
"No, Monday," the man replied.
"We aren't here on Monday. Is it full tomorrow? That's very disappointing."
"Not running tomorrow," he continued. This was in direct contrast to what the lady had told us when we checked in - she just said come up one day before you're interested in a tour. Turns out, until the 15th of May the tours didn't run every day, and this was a few days after so the rule no longer applied. He must not have realised the date, so he said something to the lady and then went ahead with our booking. I'm glad I kept pressing the issue and didn't just accept his first answer!

Lunch time now. The restaurant was up on this level too, just a short distance away, with the mini market next to it. It wouldn't reopen again until 4.30pm. At the restaurant, we made our way inside and through onto the balcony which had a really lovely view over one of the Sorrento bays. The man acknowledged us but didn't bring any menus, so Dan grabbed a couple from a pile and we had a look through.

Food and especially drink was not extortionate, surprisingly - a little higher but not the kind you'd expect on a camp site. It was quite a posh looking restaurant too, not like the others I have been privvy to in the past, so we were quietly optimistic. He didn't come to our table to serve us so I jumped up to go to him, but then he wandered over with a big smile. He was very friendly - just my starvingness was making me a bit hasty!

We ordered a margerhita - as we are now doing every time, and Dan chose the other pizza this time - corn, sausage and - french fries! It was actually really tasty - sometimes I ate the fries on the pizza, sometimes I ate the fries off the pizza. The wine was stupidly cheap too for a quarter carafe, and I thought I ordered rose but I ended up getting a red. Dan ordered a really large local 660ml beer. After we finished, we weren't quite ready to go back down so we ordered another round of beverages, this time I got a white wine so I could have a slightly cool drink!

By now we were feeling pretty hot so - swim time! Back down to our cabin, we wiggled into our togs, grabbed our towels, I grabbed the ouzo and our sippy cups, and we started the LONG DESCENT to the waterfront. I mention that it was a LONG descent because we realised...we would have to come back up this at some point. Countless stairs later, it levelled out at a flattish rock where people were sunbathing on sun beds and others were sitting on their towels. We found a flat little spot in the sun, and made our way over to the waters edge.

I oped to go in first this time - probably because I was overheating pretty bad - and started climbing down the ladder. Because I didn't know what the rock situation was like, I wasn't willing to jump straight into the water. It was pretty cold, but after the waterfall at Kravice - I can get into anything! Dan followed suit, although without his glasses he lost me, I didn't realise I had swum so far away.

We paddled in the water for about half an hour. I had the waterproof camera and he had the gopro, so we took as many photos as we could while trying to stay afloat. I tried to hang onto the rocks at one point, but the waters from some passing boats were smashing me against them too roughly which wasn't pleasant, and I scraped my foot a bit. All good though! Soon we got a bit cold and tired so we paddled slowly back to the ladder and climbed back out. It was rather a beautiful setting - Mt Vesuvius was in the background on the other side of the curve.

We dried in the sun sitting on our towels, and I whipped up our ouzo, watching as it went milky when the water was added. It smelt worse than it tasted, and we had definitely had worse drinks in the last few weeks! The sun was creeping further and further across the rock, and as chairs delved into shade, the staff members were packing them up for the night. Finally our little position succumbed to shade, and it was time for us to go back up.

The ascent wasn't actually as bad as I expected, and when we popped out near our cabin we continued allllll the way back to the top, as the mini market would now be open. We already had crackers from Venice (and yes I'd been carrying them around since), so we thought cheese would be a good idea. A quick dash around the market - prices were a bit overboard but again not too painful. We got a squishy cheese and a small hard cheese, some ham, cherry tomatoes, a couple of those enormous beers and we found a bottle of cleanskin wine for €2.50, so that was thrown in too.

We set ourselves up on our bench and table, and munched our way through dinner. We kept the beers for tomorrow - we definitely didn't need those! The wine was fizzy and pretty tasty, especially for the price! We didn't finish all of the cherry tomatoes so we kept some for the next day.

By now it was getting pretty late, and we had an early start in the morning for the boat tour, so we called it a night.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 50: Pompeii

Guess what? An early start! Because the day was going to be warm, and we had read there could be quite big queues to get into Pompeii ruins, we decided to get there for opening at 9am. The night before, the lady who owned our accommodation asked about breakfast. You see, our original hotel was supposed to have a breakfast buffet, so now she had to provide us with something. We opted to have breakfast delivered at 8am so we could then eat and go to the site.

About 8.25am the breakfast finally rocked up. It was delivered by a man on a scooter, and he hand delivered a few cups and a bag. It was all quite confusing. We took the food outside and sorted out what we had been given. The coffee appeared to be in one cup, with two tiny cups on top, so I believe it was supposed to be the amount for 2 espressos. We also received juice, instead of fruit as we expected. In the end it was all ok - the espresso was delicious - I don't know what they put in it but it was equal parts bitter coffee and very sweet, and the croissants were quite massive. Not exactly a healthy way to load up for the day, but it was our only choice!

We set out for the ruins at about 9am. Some of the roads around the area had little to no footpath, so we had to dodge traffic a few times. We eventually fell into line with other people travelling in the same direction, so knew we must be going the right way! As we got closer, there were more and more vendors trying to sell skip the queue tickets - we decided we would see what the queue was like first and then come back if need be.

At the entrance, we simply walked in, sidestepping some enormous tour groups. To the left was a queue which Dan and I joined, but it didn't seem right - I heard someone say behind me "Are we all in the ladies toilet queue?"
Yes, yes we were.

There were two signed lines - one for online tickets, and one for group tickets. There was no by-now ticket signed line, so this had confused everyone. The ladies in the ticket booths were frantically trying to get people's attention and eventually the line moved over. I noticed another lady waving her hands around, and caught her eye. I motioned whether I could come forward, and she motioned that I could. Therefore, I skipped the entire queue because no one else was paying attention.

We purchased our two tickets - slightly cheaper than I realised they were, and picked up a map and an explanation booklet. Dan was in charge of the map, I was in charge of the explanations. He did a far better job than I!

We spent the next 4ish hours walking all over the ruins. It was incredible. As morbid as it may sound, the bit that fascinated me the most was the casts of the bodies of the people who had perished when Vesuvius erupted. It erupted in 79AD, blanketing the town in up to 6m of volcanic ash, as well as rising temperatures of up to 400C, killing everyone in the town, up to 20,000 people, within minutes. The casts are interesting because while this eruption happened almost 2000 years ago, their body shapes were preserved. Not their bodies, they had decomposed, but due to the dust settling around their bodies and turning to rock, the gap that was left showed their forms perfectly. Their facial expressions, the folds of what they were wearing.

Some were found embracing each other. Mothers protecting children. Shop owners sitting in a seat, clasping their bags of gold. The original casts weren't an exact science - but some of the later ones are truly amazing and often difficult to look at as you can see the fear on their faces and in their pose.

Near the entrance was a museum which had a recreation of Pompeii, and normally I don't go for these kind of things but this was very useful. It was a video pointing out everything, so that when we got there we could imagine it a little better. We obviously did Pompeii by ourselves however the place was overrun with tour groups of varying sizes. Sometimes we were able to eavesdrop what the guides were telling their groups.

The whole city, and it's actually quite huge, was rather well preserved - the ash had just blanketed it and it was only found in the 1800's. Roofs had collapsed, but many walls and paintings still remained, the baths were still standing, the cobbled streets and footpaths, speed bumps and carriage grooves were all still there. It was like walking down a normal street, except the houses had been reclaimed by nature, and the only other people there were tourists gawking like we were. In the background, Vesuvius loomed with a funny little white cloud over the top which looked like a tuft of smoke.

At one point we sat and had a bit of a snack to keep up the energy levels. It was a big area, and there was little shade. We essentially walked from one end to the other - one interesting thing we noticed was that many areas had signs that said "9.30am - 1.30pm", while others said "1.30pm - 7.30pm" - it seems they opened and closed different areas perhaps to stop too much footfall ruining the same places. However, all the good ones were only open in the morning! So we were very glad we were there early.

We popped out the other side and into the modern day town of Pompeii. We needed food desperately, and after grabbing some horribly overpriced postcards and magnets, we settled for a cheap panini place. The food was delicious and fresh, thankfully, and not very expensive. For pre-nibbles, our server gave us a giant bucket of unpeeled peanuts - I had never cracked peanuts before, so that was interesting. I don't even really like nuts, but I couldn't stop cracking and eating these, even though I really wasn't enjoying eating them. I was very hungry.

So, now we had to figure out what to do with the rest of our day. It was about 2pm by this stage, and we had been talking about our next step. There were 2 other things we were interested in doing around this area, 1) Climbing Mt Vesuvius and 2) Visiting Herculaneum, another ruin site. Even though we really wanted to climb the volcano, we decided to opt out of this. Reasons being we were already completely stuffed from walking around Pompeii, and the buses/trains were irregular, and it was just going to be plain difficult.

Dan and I had both read that Herculaneum is just like Pompeii but even better preserved, and well worth a visit. It was hit by the lava flow after the mountain erupted, and apparently excavations found human remains all along the beach as the inhabitants had tried to run to the water to get away from it. You can't see any of that today though, not like at Pompeii.

The trains were of course running on "ish" time, but we finally caught a train and we were on there for almost half an hour before it was our stop. I fell asleep on Dan's shoulder. On arrival, we followed the signs towards the ruins, passing the Museum on the way which has a virtual tour of the ruins. At the entrance of the ruins, we went to buy tickets at €11 each, but we were directed down a long walkway saying the ticket office is at the end.

We started marching down the walkway when we realised - we were walking directly over the top of Herculaneum - we could see practically everything from up here. We slowed down, and started taking pictures. Upon arrival at the other end, we had walked almost the full length of the ruins, and we stopped to deliberate. €22 for walking around the ruins, after we had just spent all morning walking around ruins? €22 for looking at more paintings on the walls and ceramic tiling? In the end, we decided not to buy the ticket, and just walk back slowly, seeing what we could from up there. Pompeii was what we had come there to see, and we had seen it very well. We sat on a bench and soaked up the sun for a little while, watching other people walk down the board walk and then back up again.

Time to catch the train back to Pompeii. Thankfully again, Dan knew the rough train times because basically none of them said the direction on the front! We ended up sitting in the sun for about another half an hour, I think we got a little bit burnt but nothing that lasted. It wasn't long before we were back at the train station, and then walked to our accommodation.

Eventually we got a bit hungry, and I had been researching places to eat nearby. We were still very much on the outskirts of the city, and almost everything was a half hour walk away (if I could figure out their address at all!). I finally found a pizza joint 5 minutes away that sounded great so we headed there.

This pizza joint was an experience! Proper local, virtually no English spoken (although the menu had English). We got there and tentatively walked inside. A grumpy looking man who looked like John C Reilly stared at me while he was sitting in front of the TV. I waved my hands around in a "can we sit anywhere?" fashion, to which he smiled a bit and nodded gruffly. I think he looked grumpier than he actually was! I sat down, then jumped up again to return to him, brandishing my credit card as if to say "can we pay with this?" Another gruff nod, and so I sat down again.

A younger man then gave us some menus, and started setting the table for us. We chose 2 pizzas (we keep choosing one margarita, and then we choose one fancy one, this time it was an odd Dan choice with corn, sour cream and I think pancetta). Wine was a bit confusing - it simply said "WINE: €5" in the menu. We didn't know if this meant by the glass or by the bottle, so we just ordered 2 glasses of wine. In broken English, he replied "Bottle?" so we just went with that.

It was all very confusing but we got there in the end, and I'm so glad we did! The pizza was delicious, and the house red wine, when it was delivered, turned out to be a kind of sparkling red which was definitely unexpected. The meal was so tasty, and it was punctuated by us trying to work out what the hell was on the TV in the corner. It was some kind of weird Dancing with the Stars kind of mash, where someone seemed to get a crash course in dancing and then were blindfolded and had to dance, and then they were given a partner to dance with. Some were spectacular, some were horrible (closer to my dancing style). We still have no idea what the purpose was.

Also while we were here, we heard from the lady in our apartment about how to check out. Actually, we had tried to message her - her number was written on the fridge list, but neither of us could get the number to work. It started with 39 but when I tried to call, it said there wasn't enough digits. The country code for Italy is 39. I half jokingly said to Dan "Maybe it needs the +39 as well as the number starting with 39?" This was the case, and Dan's message got through. While at dinner, she replied that we just return the key to her in the morning, and breakfast would be delivered again.

At the conclusion of our meal, the waiter gave us a shot of Limoncello each, and I was stupidly excited. I love that stuff. Over the next few days there would be a little bit more of it - the Amalfi coast is the home of Limoncello!

And at that, we called it a night.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 49: Venice - Pompeii

It was already time to leave Venice - but we still had a morning to potter around the city. Our train to Pompei(i) (Pompei is the Italian spelling, Pompeii is the English spelling, it seems) wasn't leaving until 2pm, so we had time to find lunch and go for one last walk around the place.

We packed and left our luggage at the accommodation - which was totally full but they put our bags somewhere... Out on the street, we just started walking. We had a few little bits and pieces we still needed to get - namely a magnet for me and I wanted to see if there was any way I could buy a venetian mask and carry it without it getting damaged. Basically, no. There was no point buying a mask here, despite desperately wanting.

Oh! I should explain why I wanted the mask. As you may know, 24 June - 1 July Dan and I will be sailing on the Queen Mary 2 from Southampton UK to New York. One night aboard the ship is fancy dress, and for us it is masquerade. I almost cried with joy when I read this - it's always been my dream to go to a masquerade party and I'll get to do it in a ball gown! Hence why I was looking at the masks.

We meandered our way into an area we hadn't seen before, and found a little cheapish place for lunch. I ordered the tagliatelle ragu and it was everything I was hoping it to be. The presentation was about an F but the flavour was amazing.

On the way back to our accommodation, we stopped into the supermarket to pick up some supplies. Our train journey from Venice to Naples would take about 5 hours, and then we needed to catch another train from Naples - Pompeii, which would take about half an hour (plus messing around time).

We left Venice at about 2pm, and arrived in Naples a bit after 7pm. The journey was quite good - we got 1st class tickets because they weren't much more and that way we could choose the direction of travel so I didn't run the risk of sitting backwards for 5 hours. Every short while on the journey, we were offered drinks and snacks, which in the end I was just taking so I could pack them away and have as snacks on the following days...I spent the time doing a lot of writing on my laptop, and periodically Dan and I switched chairs as the train changed direction. At one point, Dan's phone rang, and it was our next accommodation asking if we were still coming...yes...we would be there...? This would unfold a little later...

Dan had it all sorted what we needed to do next once we got off the train - we needed to catch the Circumvesuviana train to Pompeii, not the main station but the one before it. The train signage at this portion of the station was utter shit, and we stood there with all of our luggage trying to figure out what was going on. Thankfully Dan had looked up a timetable so we knew roughly what time the train should be approaching as the signage was not helping us in the slightest.

On the train, I managed to push our way onto a four seat where one other man was sitting. He looked a little bewildered by all of our luggage, and then he pulled out a book and started reading in English. Our stop arrived, and we jumped off. It was about a 15 minute walk from the stop to our accommodation, which we struggled to find at first but eventually made it. It looked really fancy with a garden in front, and Dan and I were both so preoccupied looking at the frontage that we both slid and stepped in a large pile of dog poo which was sitting in the entrance.

Fantastic. Thankfully my shoes have no grip and therefore no tread for it to get stuck in, so I could wipe it off easily, but Dan's got itself nicely wedged right up in there. I was just thinking to myself, well, stepping in dog poo is good luck, right?

We went inside and started the check in process. The man behind the counter said "I will organise a car to pick you up." Excuse me? We aren't staying here? "Another hotel for you. Car will pick you up in a few minutes." He couldn't tell me what had happened, where we were going, whether we were going far away, and I started to get annoyed. I kept telling myself that usually when this happens, it's for the better, but all he needed to say was that they were overbooked and had found us a better place. Easy.

About 5-10 minutes later, a car rocked up and a very vivacious lady approached us, trying to take our luggage. It was all too heavy of course, but we managed to pile in the car. I was very confused as we seemed to be driving a long way, and through a lot of back streets. We had chosen our hotel based on the location and that it was walking distance to the ruins, and now I was completely lost. On the way, she asked us (Dan mostly, because I wasn't concentrating) what we wanted for breakfast, and we apparently settled on a chocolate croissant each, coffee and juice, ananas and orange.I didn't realise this was juice and thought it was actual fruit, and I thought it was banana, not pineapple.

After some windy driving we approach some apartments, and the lady shows us inside. We walk up to the first floor (quite acutely aware of the smell coming from our shoes) and we are let into a rather beautiful apartment. We definitely got a room upgrade. There was a giant bed in the middle and also some bunkbeds on the side, huge amount of space, fridge and a lovely bathroom - and a big balcony stretching the length of the apartment. There was even a small stove top and some implements. The lady took great delight in showing us everything about the room, including the automatic shutters on the windows and the hair dryer. The one thing she did forget to mention to us was how to check out...

Finally, we were able to collapse, and we figured the dog poo had brought some good luck after all. The location was even closer to the ruins entrance, and we were closer to the town, so in the end it had turned out for the best.

All day I had been carrying some food that we were supposed to eat on the long train, but with all the snacks we kept being given we hadn't been hungry. So now was time to have a bit of a nibble - we had a delicious brie with crackers and some strawberries, and soon it was time for bed.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 48: Venice

After researching Murano and Burano, we were absolutely sure we wanted to visit Burano but not so sure of the other. We also desperately wanted to beat the crowds, so today's plan was to take an early ferry (8.40am) to Burano, explore there, and if we felt like it maybe we would head over to Murano afterwards. Our ferry passes were like a golden ticket to the city - we could choose where and when we'd like to go!

So our alarms went off pretty early, as the Nova ferry port was a good 20 minute walk from our accom. We also thought we'd pick up some sandwiches for lunch to try to save some money. We arrived at the De Spar (a very fancy Spar - in an old theatre! No photos allowed, and you had to purchase something to be able to leave!) and grabbed a couple of pre-made sandwiches and an energy drink... I was feeling pretty shattered this morning!

We continued the walk to the ferry terminal, getting there with plenty of time. The ferry arrived only a few minutes before we were set to leave, and we opted to sit inside this time as there wouldn't be too much of a view. On the way, Dan and I looked up the abandoned insane asylums - of which there are 2 - around Venice. One you can visit, the other is haunted and not open for visitors. The ferry raced across the water in what looked like a lane - the whole sea around the islands is filled with wooden pyres marking the way - I assume as a kind of traffic control. We passed a couple of tiny islands with crumbling buildings on them, and we passed a low boggy island which made me wonder if that's what Venice looked like when it was first inhabited around 400AD. Did you know that all of Venice is built on wooden stakes? No wonder it's sinking.

We made a few stops at some islands on the way, including Murano. A lot of people got off here, as to be expected, but almost all of them were wearing a badge saying GAS. We later discovered there was a Glass Artists Society conference happening on Munaro happening at this exact time.

Our first destination was Bunaro. This island town is known for 2 (maybe 3) main things:

1. Colourful houses lining the canals, very unlike the rest of Venice
2. Lace
3. Wine. Wine is actually associated with the neighbouring island, but they are connected by a walking bridge so I am including it under Burano.

We arrived a little after 9am and alighted with the few remaining people on board. The first thing I noticed was grass - Venice has little green grass, and it's in designated park areas. After a short walk, we burst out onto our first canal - and saw the beautiful, colourful houses. I am so happy we came here! I squealed, as Dan and I took a hundred pictures. The day was a bit overcast, but the clouds were a little dramatic and some blue was trying to peek through.

We took a lot of photos with barely anyone else in the background, and the continued on. I don't even want to know how many photos I took...the colourful houses, the reflections, the water, the people starting to come out of their houses and begin their days. A man loading up his boat while his two dogs stood on the canal side and barked at him. Old men walking slowly along the edge of the canal, stopping for a chat. Ladies opening up the windows to their houses. People putting their rubbish out. Shops slowly starting to open.

We walked the full length around the island, and through many of the inside streets too. All of the houses were painted terrific colours and we couldn't get enough. Hot pink. Peacock green. Mustard yellow. Every shade of blue. Hot purple. Even grey, which was quite a nice contrast, especially when the house had bright pink flowers in the window. The sun peeked through a little more, and the day was warm and beautiful.

Eventually we reached the main stretch and saw it was overrun with people. The next boatload must have arrived, and the people continued to flow in. Time to make our exit. I had a quick look in a lace shop and decided the lace was definitely out of my price range...a dress I was slightly in love with was over €200. Sadly that's a no!

We walked back to the ferry terminal, and I insisted we eat one of our sandwiches. To the left was the bridge over to the neighbouring island, officially called Mazzorbo. Marisela had mentioned the island next door had a winery, and suddenly we popped out into it. It was strange, seeing so much life when the last day and a bit was mostly surrounded by marble and brick.

Rows and rows of grape vines, cherry trees, rose bushes, artichokes and all sorts of other plants were in abundance here, and we were free to just walk through at our leisure. Along the way were little sign posts explaining the Vernissa area and the incredible wine they make there. This made Dan and I pretty keen to try this rare wine, but we were quite sure it would be out of our price range. There was a Michelin starred restaurant, and another restaurant on site. The Michelin one didn't have prices, so one can guess that if you have to ask, you can't afford it.

We continued on and found the other restaurant, with tables outside. The tables had little bundles of twigs where cutlery should be. This should have been a giveaway. I led the way inside - I was curious about this wine, although it was only about 11.30am. It was deserted inside and I found a menu, and had a quick leaf through. €25 for a glass, and bottles starting at definitely too much. Unfortunately my leaf through wasn't quite quick enough and a well dressed waited spotted me, coming over.

Either the waiter was reserving judgement, or Dan and I looked posh enough that we might have been able to afford to eat and drink there. He told us in great detail about the history of and the method for producing the rare wine, of which they only make up to 4000 bottles per year from a grape that was thought to be extinct, and which it was so unlikely it would grow in the salty soil - but it ended up thriving. He continued to explain about the golf leaf stuck to each 500ml bottle and how it was sourced by the last known family who can do such a thing in the region.

Dan and I smiled and nodded and oohed and ahhed at appropriate points, and when he gestured we should take a table, I said that it is a little early for wine (Me? Never...) but that we will go for a short walk and come back closer to lunch time. This perplexed him a little, and he insisted on giving me a business card so I could ring and make a reservation when I was ready to return...which Dan and I had no intention of.

As delicious as it sounded, and as much as I like wine (dunno if you've noticed that?) €25 for 70ml of wine is ever-so-slightly out of our current price range. That's 5 not-even-bottom-shelf bottles of wine. That's closer to 13 bottles of our usual price range bottle of wine....

Turns out though that when we made our speedy exit, we popped out right next to a ferry terminal. We only had a short wait before a ferry came past, headed to MURANO - VENIZIA, so we jumped on. We decided we would visit Murano after all, eating our final sandwich on the journey.

I had read to expect to be hassled the moment you jumped off the ferry, but this wasn't the case for us. I think it was because everyone on the island was so distracted by the GAS conference - the shops already had willing participants! We jumped off and just followed the crowd. This island is no where near as beautiful as the others, although it is filled with canals. The buildings are more plain brick or factories.

As we walked down the main street, we stopped to watch a man in an open door creating a glass product, however this was all the glass blowing/making that we saw this day. Continuing on, we found the main stretch, and just walked along, peeking in some shop windows, occasionally going inside. There were some massive sculptures that were quite impressive, but most of it was the same store to store. Some stores were obviously hand made by the artist inside, which was quite lovely.

We found a shop that also had an attached gallery, so we spent some time wandering through this. The store itself seemed a bit nicer than the others, and we ended up buying a few little glass trinkets. We were both getting pretty weary of looking in shop windows, and we didn't want to buy anything else. I spotted an icecream store down a side street which sold homemade gelato - we got a couple of scoops each and returned to the canal front, sitting with our legs over the side. It was delicious!

Now we were both quite ready to return to Venice, and so caught the next ferry back to our accommodation. After a short rest, it was time to jump out onto the street and - find ourselves a gondola!

We had researched which area we would like - specifically we did not want to take the gondola near the main sites because while it was great to take photos of - there were just too many. For your money, you'd probably only get a short way down the canal! What we wanted was to see the little back alleys which are only accessible by gondola - the ones that had no foot path access, and to see a little slice of life.

We had read that Accademia can be a good spot for this, so we returned to where we had had our lunch the day before. 2 gondoliers pulled up here, but we were a bit unsure so kept walking. We about turned, and the gondoliers had gone. Ok...so we kept walking. We couldn't find another - it seemed like yesterday they were everywhere, but we couldn't find any today! We returned a third time to the original spot and one of the drivers was back.

It was all very simple - he helped us step into the boat, through another one, and we settled down. He immediately set off and the first thing that I noticed was how quiet it was down here. So peaceful and serene. A far cry from the rest of Venice! Dan and I took about a million photos, including of our gondolier who posed for us. At one point, we rounded into a tiny canal to hear someone practicing the violin (quite well!) and that serenaded us, and many people had different flower pots hanging out their windows.

We only passed one other boat, so we did get to experience that and at one point we even popped out on the Grand Canal! We did not expect that, and the water got quite choppy. We are going to be the subjects of a lot of people's photos - our gondolier wanted a particular canal and the main ferry was blocking the way, and so we just sat there waiting while everyone on the ferry took our photo and our video!

It was over far too soon, and we were off and paid. Before we jumped off, another gondolier took our photo - pretending to throw my phone in the water, of course! The question always is - is it worth it? It's very expensive. I really enjoyed it, it was beautiful, I do still think the price is too high and the fact it is now 30 minutes instead of 40 makes it a bit harder to justify. Still, when in Rome..I mean, when in Venice... Besides, Dan and I were able to snuggle up to each other, and giggle, and it really was beautiful.

Naturally, I was hungry by now. Venice is full of little wine bars called Osteria's that serve small bread tapas called cichetti. There was one that I had wanted to try that had a nice looking outdoorsy bit, and it wasn't too far from us. When we arrived, we realised there wasn't so much an outdoor bit as instead people could just stand on the sidewalk. The weather now was getting a bit chilly too. We went inside and looked at the wine list - prosecco was €2.50 so that was an obvious choice for me! Dan got the same, and then we each chose 3 cichetti; salmon, truffle and brie, and a seafoody salad for me. We took our food and drink outside, but it wasn't so good out there so when we spotted a table coming free inside - we nabbed it just before anyone else did.

We sat here nibbling and drinking our drink, and eavesdropping the people next to us. I couldn't help but finally butt into the conversation - apparently the elderly gentleman next to us had bought an insanely cheap bottle of liquor and he was very proud of it. What ensued was a hilarious hour chatting with Stirling from Northern Ireland (Although now living somewhere near Liverpool). He was an utter character and exceptionally good fun to chat to.

While chatting, we purchased ourselves an Aperol Spritz as that's something you have to try in Venice! The one here was also only €2.50, and it looked (and tasted) amazing. It came with an enormous olive and the salty nicely offset the sweet. We also grabbed another prosecco because at that price...

By now we had our  drink on, and there was another of these Osteria that I had found - with 60c wine. Yes, in Venice.  We had tried going earlier in the day but they shut just before we got there (maybe to restock?) so now was our chance to go back. We got there about 7pm and it was closing at 8pm. The place was the size of a table and absolutely overrun. There were people trying to come in both entrances, and I was so impressed by how calm the man behind the counter was. After a short wait, we managed to make our way to the front, and because the queue had been a bit long, decided to order 2 wines each and a little place of ham and cheese.

This was delivered immediately and we were able to turn around and head outside. The shop was literally only a front, so we found a corner on the stairs and hoed into our wine and the cheese, which paired beautifully.  We really put these way quite quickly, so before we were finished, and the shop was still open, I ran inside and ordered us another wine each. In front of me was a tourist that made me laugh. The conversation went like this:
Tourist: Which is your best wine?
Server: It is all the best. Red or white?
Tourist: Red.
Server: Sweet or dry?
Tourist: Dry
Server: Cabernet.

The best bit? The cabernet was the 60c and what we had been drinking (heavily). I immediately ordered another two and took them back outside to Dan. We continued sipping our wine and watching the gondolas go past on the small canal. One lot of tourists were taking a lot of photos, so Dan and I posed, clinking our glasses. The shop was about to shut, so for some reason Dan ran inside and bought another...3. I should point out here that the glasses were quite small, not normal size, so it's not like we drank an entire bottle each!

This little shop shut, but we realised there was one next door! We wondered if it was run by the same people, but it's prices were (a little bit) more expensive, but they had a small amount of indoor seating and - most importantly - a toilet. We bought a prosecco here for €1 while I got the chance to wine escape....

We were pretty tiddly by now, and it was time to make our way back to the accommodation. When we arrived, I realised we hadn't eaten any proper dinner, so Dan kindly went back out into the world and brought back a pizza which we scoffed from the comfort of our room.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 47: Venice

Today we let ourselves have a bit of a sleep in - and also took it slowly in the morning because we were (I was) a little nervous about jumping out on the street. Last night had been so lovely, and I just knew it would be hectic with all the tourists out there. Over the course of the morning, I received a few messages from my old colleague in Berlin Marisela asking if we were going to visit any of the other islands, like Murano and Burano. This was a question that kept popping up all day:
- do we go to Murano and/or Burano at all or spend all our time in Venice main?
- if we do go to Murano and/or Burano, do we do the tour that the hotel offered and take away any hassle (it would be for 4ish hours), or do we do our own thing?

It literally took us all day to come to a decision on this, which I'll get to later.

We finally jumped out mid-morning and of course, Venice was buzzing. There were people everywhere, although it wasn't shoulder to shoulder and we never felt particularly over crowded. We retraced much of our steps from the night before, and now the streets were also filled with vendors, making the streets and alley ways tighter. The plan was to walk all the way to San Marco Square, which would take, on paper, about half an hour.

We were really located in a perfect place - while San Marco square was beautiful, the walk to it was much better. We passed many shops and walked over many canals and bridges, stopping all the while for photos. At first all of my photos were pretty damn shit - I couldn't work out what I was doing wrong. I eventually realised that my framing was right off - I was getting too close to the canal walls and this wasn't working for the skinny landscape in front of me.

The canals were filled, as to be expected, with boats of varying shapes and sizes. There were many motorboats - as no on has cars, here, of course! And - as you would expect - there were plenty of gondolas too. Now, we had talked long and hard about this and decided not to get a gondola. They are expensive (€80 for 30 minutes. Yes. Just let that sink in for a minute - and that's just before 7pm, it gets more expensive after that). We had plenty of enjoyment watching them navigate the canals and traffic jams that we didn't need to be in one.

When we popped out in San Marco Square, the throngs of people were immense. The Basilica looked beautiful, and you could climb the tower, which had been on my list as a potential "view" spot. It was €8 though, and that's a bit pricy for a view for us at the moment! We also didn't go in the basilica because of the queues. We have seen a lot of churches and religious places, and will be heading to the Vatican soon, so we were quite ok with leaving that off the list.

By now, we realised that we were on the edge of Venice, where there were a tonne of vendors and gondolas amassed. One bridge we could see in the distance looked like it was crawling shoulder to shoulder with ants. Thankfully it eased up by the time we got there. We passed by the Bridge of Sighs, and it was gondola city. Overrun. In fact, we thought you would never really get much of a journey for your money here because the traffic jams were pretty consistent!

Venice isn't renown for it's good food - or cheap food, so I had googled some places that were in the price range. There was a place apparently not far from where we were which did pasta in a box which got great reviews. After a false start getting there - Dan's offline maps sent us on a bit of a goose chase - we eventually found it. The line was pretty massive but it moved so quickly that I hadn't made up my mind by the time we got to the front.

In the end I went with a super cheese one and Dan the bolognese topped with cheese, and we grabbed little wines each. There was no where to sit here, so I asked the man behind the counter where the best place to go was. He looked so happy that I asked! "You go left, then right, then you'll get to a lovely square!" We followed his instructions and we did indeed land upon a little square.

It was quite lovely sitting here - we found a little ledge to perch on to eat our pasta and drink our wine, watching the gondolas and boats go past. It seemed that he directed every one here - so many pasta boxes walked into the square! There wasn't a lot of space to sit, I think we got the last one.

Next up, we wanted to see the Academia Bridge. After getting a bit lost in all the backstreets, we found it. Covered, in it's entirety, in scaffolding and wooden boards. Nothing to see here, folks!

By now, the heat of the day, my need to sit down, and just being slightly overwhelmed got to me and so when we found a shady spot, we took the opportunity to pause and figure out our next move. We were so close to the Ponte dei Pugni, or the "fighting" bridge as we had nicknamed it, so the plan was to check it out, and then back to the accommodation to regroup.

The Ponte dei Pugni, or Bridge of Fists - back in the 1600's, every year rival factions used to hold fist fights on the bridge until it was eventually outlawed, which took about 100 years...

Back at the accommodation, I fell instantly asleep and had a decent nap. Woo! Napping is great!

When I woke up, Dan had a suggestion for me. Turns out, he won a voucher for petrol back in New Zealand and his mum had exchanged the voucher for cash for us. The amount was almost the same as a gondola ride. At first, I was very much no. We had decided we were not going to do a gondola, as much as I would like to! That's a few dinners out. But then, when I was looking up whether it really is worth the money, I started to change my tune, and thought it might be a lovely thing to do after all in Venice while we're here and....

So the gondola was now on the cards. Not for tonight, as it would be getting into expensive zone soon, but for the morrow, or maybe the morning of the day after as we had given ourselves extra time here in Venice. While we were sitting here, we also tried to figure out these damn islands that had been plaguing us all day. More researching about whether it was worth visiting them, and it also seemed like a good idea.

One other thing that we really wanted to do was catch the ferry from the beginning of the Grand Canal to the end, or to the end of the line in Lido. So a plan was hatched: we would buy ourselves the €20 ferry 24 hour pass tonight, and take the ferry at sunset. This ticket would also be valid for Murano and Burano, which we could visit the next day - we had 24 hour to use up the ticket. These trips alone paid back the cost of the pass, at €7.50 a normal trip, so we hop skipped it out of our accommodation to head to the ferry terminal.

The idea was to start at the beginning of the line, not least to try to get the best seats for the view. We were about 2 stops walking distance from the beginning, and considered getting on - but the ferries we saw were smash packed so continued with the plan. This was a good plan. When we got to the first ferry terminal, we had pole position - and after a short 10ish minute wait, I ran for the front of the ship, thwarting some other people who had the same idea.

Dan and I positioned ourselves at the very front and we had an excellent view for the journey. I'll note here that the ferry is actually a lot slower than just walking - it took almost an hour to get to San Marco when it takes about half an hour on foot. We did it simply for the view, but it's also good for resting to your feet.

The ferry very quickly filled up. The stop we were going to get on at - it was standing room only, by that point. We were very glad we had waited the extra few minutes and walked the extra distance! The journey took us all along the Grand Canal, which was beautiful lit up in the last few rays of the sun. The gondolas were out in force. Soon the sun was below the horizon, and there was a little bit of pink in the sky. We decided not to get out at San Marco as was the original idea - but stuff it, let's go to the end of the line at Lido!

Lido is another island altogether, and is the "beach" island. We figured why not! The journey to there took a little over an hour. We stepped off at Lido, although I considered that we could just stay on and go back the way we came, like some other people were doing. But we had come this far, we might as well look.

The sky was getting quite dark by now, and we walked a short distance. After consulting the map, we realised that it would only take us a few minutes - about 10 - to literally cross the island to the beach. What does a Venice beach look like, we wondered?

On the way, we of course discovered a kitty. This cat was SO FLUFFY and turned out to be quite hilarious. It meowed as we approached and let us pat it. It then started following us, tangling itself up in my legs. Then it would stop and look at me like, "Wait, you're still here?" Then I'd try to pat it, and it wouldn't know what to do. Then it would let me pat it. Then it would look at me like, "I'll protect you!" and would walk with us for a while. It was really a confused cat.

Really soon we hit the waterfront, which was blocked off by a big row of hedges. We turned right and kept walking until we saw a way down to the beach. Or so we thought. Venice beaches (or at least this stretch), was only open until 5pm, and was paid entry... This concept is so foreign to an Australian who has access to any beach at any time, really!

We contemplated this odd beachness to the sound of electro music pumping. Opposite where we were standing, was an old London bus (or Italian equivalent). It was a panini-cum-bar bus, and we figured we'd come all this way, why not have a beer. Wine was too expensive, beer was definitely not cheap but we each ordered a local beer and climbed up the stair case to the second level of the bus.

There were two guys sitting up here already playing cards, and we excused ourselves as we squished past them. The bus was laid out with very low floor benches made out of what looked like pallet crates, with cushions thrown over the top. The roof of the downstairs area had been raised to fit the kitchen, and the roof up here had been sawed off and raised up on sticks so that people could generally stand up to move around.

It was covered in a funky red glow, and Dan and I giggled our way through our beer, sitting like naughty kids up the back of the bus. At one point the other guys left, leaving Dan and I the only people up the top. At about this time, the DJ downstairs started to play - if you can guess it - That's amore by Dean Martin, and we definitely got our karaoke on! It was a lot of fun. The DJ then returned to happy electro, we finished our beers, and climbed down from the bus.

We walked back to the ferry port, and checked the bus times. There was one going where we needed in a few minutes, and oddly enough another one after that. We jumped on the earlier ferry, when Dan suddenly said, which direction does this ferry go in? Turns out that we hopped on the ferry which ended up where we needed to go, but went the complete opposite direction around the islands than we needed. Oh well, we were already on our way.

To be honest, both of us were pretty glad when we got off at the Nova port - our ferry driver seemed to want to sink the boat. When we left Lido, I think the rope was still attached, and so we went back and forth about 3 times before we actually set off... And every port we went into, the boat launched into the docking station with a painful scrape. I was sure we were letting in water!

By getting off at the Nova port instead of the train station, we could practice for tomorrow. This is where we would need to catch the ferry to Burano and Murano. By now it was after 10pm, and we made our way through the backstreets until we finally hit the main street we recognised. Although we got mildly lost in these back streets, it was amazing still to turn a corner and suddenly see a pumping little bar with a crowd of locals outside, as we squeezed past them trying not to be burnt by their cigarettes or spill their wines. The back streets are oh so quiet, and so narrow, and people have their washing hung up, or little flower beds out of their windows, or religious relics painted onto the side of the buildings.

Back on the main stretch, we made our way back to our accommodation. I was so glad we still had another full day and a half in Venice - our original plan to have only one day would never have been enough!

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 46: Bled, Slovenia - Venice, Italy

I can't believe we are already on the Italy portion of the trip! That brings part one almost to a close - how quickly has time been going!

Check out was uneventful, as was making breakfast and the salads for lunch. We had bought tickets the day before for the 3pm bus from Ljubljana to Venice so we were going to catch the 11.30am bus from Bled to Ljubljana. However we were packed and ready early, so we hopped on the 10.30 bus instead. A few buses came past while we waited there although none were going to Ljubljana.

Just before 10.30 our bus pulled up and we waited patiently for him to serve everyone else and open the baggage compartment. We found ourselves a seat in the middle and settled in for the journey. Unfortunately this driver was a bit jerky on the transitions and it was about 10 minutes in that I had to reach for my chewing gum. The scenery outside was rather dramatic - low hanging clouds over the houses and lake - but with how unwell I was feeling I kept my eyes closed for most of the journey.

Thankfully we got into Ljubljana a full half an hour early, which was a reprieve for me but left Dan and I at a bit of a loss for what to do with the additional time. The last thing I felt like eating for lunch now was a salad - so Maccas it was! I had spotted a Guacamole burger there the other day so was keen to try it.

When it was literally hand delivered to our table (wut?) it came with a little flag in it, all gourmet like. Our receipt was priceless too, stating we had ordered two "No thanks", whatever they are, but at least they were free! We wiled away the time in Maccas downstairs where we were out of eyeshot.

After a while, we also grabbed an ice-cream, which was almost as much of a performance as previously, but we got there in the end and without any arguments! We also returned to the €1 wine bar while I wrote a little bit, while it rained - which thankfully stopped before we had to leave.

Soon enough it was time for our bus to Venice. We got around to the stop about half an hour early and set up camp. And waited. And waited. I went to the toilet about 8 times as Dan had an app on his phone which showed where the bus was - and it wasn’t going anywhere fast. It ended up being half an hour late, and jumping on was a bit of confusion, but we got there in the end. The drive made me feel really rather sick - I have misplaced the motion sickness wristbands that Nat kindly gave me (they’re in my luggage somewhere!). I was never sure whether they worked or they “worked” because I was wearing them - well, I think they do work now as that whole day without them was pretty sucky!

As we are travelling now within Schengen we were surprised when our bus pulled over for passport control at the Slovenia Italy border. I think they pull over cars randomly, but perhaps all buses. 2 gentlemen with large guns jumped on board, and started with a South Korean woman just in front of us. They interrogated her quite significantly, flipping back and forth through her passport. As a result, Dan and I prepared ourselves for an onslaught of questions, as our entry and exit stamps from various places are missing.

The biggest of the two gentlemen took both our passports, looked briefly at our photos, and our faces, passed our passports back and then moved on. Dan and I looked sideways at each other…really? Obviously the Aussie and Kiwi passports don’t elicit any interest at all! They ended up kicking two people off the bus - one eventually was able to rejoin but we never saw the other one again. Guess he has to go back to Ljubljana!

Now across the border, the drive continued to be slow, and strangely filled with trucks. Trucks everywhere! Sometimes we passed whole lines of trucks just stopped as the traffic in that lane was moving so slowly that right back here the trucks couldn’t move. It was a very industrial route, and when the train hit 6:55pm, the time we were SUPPOSED to be in Venice, we were very much not in Venice, although I do remember seeing a solitary seagull at one point.

Soon we arrived to the Venice mainland train station, and almost everyone got off the bus. I found this a bit confusing, especially as some of the people then were intending to get the train across now to the other side…? We stayed on the bus and soon we were on the concord over the water, Venice proper looming ahead of us. When we had chosen the bus in the end, I had thought the bus station was close to the train station, but this wasn’t entirely the case. Our accommodation was near the train station, so that’s where we wanted to end up.

The bus drove across and rounded into a giant parking and bus area. We were quite a walk now, but we realised we had been dropped off at something called a “people mover”. This was a weird monorail type thing that connected the bus station, the cruise terminal and the train station. It was only €1.50 for a ticket and if it was going to save us walking a long way, then it was a definite. It was kind of fun, too - it had strange compartments - think the shuttles in an airport, and we managed to get one to ourselves. The view was nothing spectacular, but then we were really just skirting the outskirts of the city at this stage.

We were deposited near the train station, and started to get a small understanding of the city. In our path stood a large, staired bridge over the waiter, which would take us to the train station and our accommodation beyond. With our backpacks, it was all relatively easy. I did not envy anyone who had a wheeled suitcase, although some of the staired bridges had a sort of ramp-y section which would have helped.

The sun was gently lighting up the buildings as we  walked, and I thought it looked a little bit pretty. But we really had to get to our accommodation, so no time to stop for pictures now. We arrived at Hotel Adua, and checked in. The man behind the counter threw us a curveball, asking if we would like to do a tour to Murano and Burano. He briefly explained these are the glass blowing and lace islands, and we said we would think about it (as we had to do some research as we had no idea what these were!).

Probably because I had had a nap on the bus, I had a fair bit of energy when we arrived to our room. We collapsed for a short while, then decided we would jump out and do a bit of night exploring. Oh am I so glad we did this! As we left, we got a bit confused by the man at the hotel and left our key with him as it was on an enormous key ring and we thought we had to. Turns out we didn’t, and he would be closing the front door at midnight, so this gave us a bit of a time schedule. Either way, the chances of making it to midnight were pretty slim! We were still pretty stuffed.

Our hotel was at the very end of the main road that, if followed, takes you right around and deposits you in San Marco Square. The full walk would take about half an hour without any stops. Out in the night, the restaurants were still buzzing, and a few of the touristy stores were still open. Many shops had lights in their windows, and we saw thousands of glass figurines, necklaces and glass balloons light up by the gentle night-time shop light. We saw thousands of Venetian masks of all shapes and sizes behind the shop window glass. It was beautiful. And as we walked, we passed over channel after channel, little staired bridge after bridge. At night, there were few people walking and it wasn’t cold. We had the streets to ourselves.

We made it as far as the Rialto Bridge, which was beautifully lit up at night time. We stood here for a while, taking photos. At one point, as I geared up to take a photo, a couple stepped right in front of me for a selfie. I lowered my camera, and just stared at them. I heard one say to the other “Maybe we could ask…” And I turned and walked away. “Ah no, she’s just left.” No, I wasn’t going to take a photo of you after you blocked mine.

We crossed the bridge and started meandering through all the backstreets. We got wonderfully lost, although I think Dan had a decent bearing on where we were and which direction we generally needed to take. If we saw something pretty, we would walk down that street. I found it incredible that there were practically no walkways on the water front - occasionally we would pop out at the end of a little street with a small opening to the water, and then back into the maze of streets again.

We really ended up in the residential area. At one point I got a little bit jumpy as I realised the streets are quite dark, and there was literally no one else around. A guy was following us with something in his hands, but when I stepped back to let him pass, I realised it was a dog leash and a doggie was tailing him. Phew. Every now and then we would burst out next to a bar busy and overflowing with locals, standing outside smoking and drinking a glass of wine.

Eventually, we popped back out next to the Grand Canal, with the train station just ahead of us. Amazing! We had done quite a loop in that time, about 1 and a half hours, stopping periodically for photos. On the bridge, we also stayed for some photos too, and soon it was time to go back to our accommodation and head to bed.

I fell in love with Venice in the night time - what would the day bring?

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 45: Bled

Today was a seriously lazy day. You know the sort of weekends where you basically don’t leave the house? That was today, and it was SO necessary.

The weather today was meant to be gross, and gross it was. We had such a good time around the lake yesterday that there wasn’t any need to try to replicate it. We had gotten so lucky with the window of great weather in the early morning, got our amazing photos and had a lovely time - why do it again in the rain?

We slept in as late as possible, breakfasted and showered. We had been looking at doing a wine tasting evening but it came in at €35 per person. I contacted them to see if they had the "orange" wine which Slovenia is known for, which is a strange white and red wine mix. The tasting did include it, but in the end I couldn't justify €70 for the sake of trying one wine. We decided we'd try the place for lunch instead and maybe try to get a glass then.

Meanwhile, Dan spent the morning working on fixing his laptop, commandeering my laptop for a while too.

Eventually I got hungry and wanted lunch. We went to the wine tasting place - I had read online they had lunch deals but couldn't see anything like that on the menu. In the end, we just decided to go to the pizza place from yesterday.

Today I found an odd looking wine on there - I don't know if it's specifically orange wine but it's certainly regional! It’s called Cviček. I quickly looked it up and it's a weird blend of white and red wine - sounds pretty much like this orange wine, and if it's not, it's still going to be different! And different it was. Sour, salty - left me feeling thirsty, but still a bit tangy. I liked it. It was weird, so I ordered another of the bright pink wine.


After this, we wanted to try the famous Bled cream cake. I say we, I should say I. I found a place that's supposed to do the best in Bled and it was only around the corner from the pizza place, and it was self service. It seems self service in this country is simply pay and take from the counter, not actually serving yourself!


We walk in,  and I forget instantly what the cake is called in English or in Slovenian. Of course my phone stops working too, so we take a seat while I figure this out. It came back to life, and what I had assumed was the cream cake was, and so we settled on the cream cake and another regional cake, just for a bit of variety of flavour.


I ordered one cream cake and one other cake off the menu, which they didn’t have any of. I pointed to something else on the menu, and when she gestured towards the cake in the display, I misunderstood what it was. She piled the Bled cream cake, and custardy and wobbly onto a plate, and then collected a scoop and scooped out something from a container and plonked it unceremoniously onto another plate, before covering it in cream and chocolate sauce. It was enormous. It was also a mess, a chocolatey, creamy, saucy mess. Both cakes were enormous. I also got two of the crazy wines from here again too.

All of this was quite a mistake. Not because it wasn't tasty but it was enormous. Did I mention already it was enormous? We struggled through, although Dan’s resolve was much better than mine. I went to the toilet at one stage just so I could drink some water out of the tap! We started with the delicious cream cake - I don’t normally like custard but this was really, really tasty, before tackling the chocolate mess. Somehow we got through it all.

When we got back to the hostel, I couldn’t cope with life, and had to have a nap. That’s the second time so far on this journey that I’ve eaten myself into a food coma! I lay down and groaned for about 2 hours while Dan continued using my laptop to fix his laptop. Which he managed! I don’t think it’s working 100% but it’s definitely usable, and he can do blogging and photo editing, which is great. Eventually I was able to sit up and started blogging!

We went to the store a bit before it shut to get some more of that crazy salty wine and some chips - there was simply no room for dinner tonight, but a little bit of wine to go with writing is nice! And that’s the end of this day.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 44: Bled

Up at 7am, we wandered down to prepare our muesli breakfast, which we were supplementing with bananas (for me) and orange juice. We add these things when we’re able to - bananas give me at least a piece of fruit and also helps keep me full for longer, and the juice is a nice vitamin addition too. We do this when we have access to a fridge, mainly.

We made sure our cameras were all primed and charged, donned our walking shoes and headed for the lake. We were told the day before that “THE” viewpoint will be about half an hour around, at the camp ground, and then it would take us 10 minutes to walk up to the viewing platform.

Not quite.

From ground level lake is fairly ordinary, especially on the side of the lake we started on. There wasn’t a lot to note, except we could see dots all on the lake for rowing lanes. As we were walking, we passed more and more people who were out for a stroll or a jog on a Sunday morning. Bells started to toll.

The view got prettier as we grew closer to the little church on the island. About halfway around, we found a toilet, which was a good thing it turns out as the walk up was a lot longer than the 10 min advertised…Our instructions had been that there was a path in the camping ground, and then it would take 10 minutes to go up. We simply could not find a path IN the camp grounds, or any path we did find ended in fences, and people in bathrobes outside their tents looking at us strangely. 


So we doubled back and found a proper sign for viewpoint Ojstrica. We started up and I regretted it.  It was very muddy and very slippery. I had to take it very very slowly. It eventually evened out a little bit and I could walk a bit faster, or I stuck to the very edges of the path to stop from slipping. We reached a sign which pointed to Ojstrica - straight up, and over rocks! No proper path anymore. This has already taken us about 20 minutes, and then probably another 10 minutes up over the rocks. So much for a 10 min ascent! Halfway up, we met a girl coming down, and waited for her. She was shortly followed by another two which we had to wait for too. All good though - these were the only people we’d seen on the path all morning! At least we were in the right place.

When we popped out at the top, the view was incredible. All I could think of though was, How did they get the bench up here? Dan and I took a lot of photos here, including going out on the rock ledge. It was magnificent. Just when we were almost done, but were going to take a couple of self timer shots, two people showed up. They waited patiently for us, but it meant that we were rushing. Dan set up the pics as it was a little intrepid for me, and he hurt his hip a bit on the landing one time. No lasting damage though, thankfully.

Now it was time to descent the rocks - this was much better than I anticipated and I took it a lot faster than I thought I Could too. Still, it was slow work and somehow I didn’t fall over! We continued on to the next viewpoint, called Mala Osojnica. More mud and sludge, although it petered out because more of this path had been in the sun and had dried. 


This viewpoint was behind a fence so not as good for shots of each other, but an astounding viewsof the entire lake. The scene was also now front lit, and it was truly beautiful. There were 3 benches here and we managed to get one. We would sit for a few minutes then one of us would jump up for a photo, sit again, jump up. I was trying to take a video for Instagram and my phone kept dying - I had to have it plugged into the charger to stop it from randomly turning off.


We stayed here for some time - it had been a bit of effort getting there, we needed to appreciate it! While here we had our snacks as it was about 11am by now. So much for 10 minutes up! I was also pausing because I was dreading the walk down.


But eventually we had to and it involved a fair bit of clambering. On the way down, we found another little viewpoint but the sun had gone behind a big cloud now, and it wasn’t as good as the views we had already seen. There was a big group of men here, and it turns out they were waiting on one of their party who was a bit slow. Once he finally arrived, they asked if Dan could take a photo of them with the lake and the island in the background.

“I’ll just sit here and read my book,” the slow one said to his friends. “No,” they insisted, “you have to keep going.” He turns to us and sighs, saying “I just want to sit by the side of the lake and read my book. I’ve been hiking around here for 4 days! These guys are slave drivers.” And he hauled himself off the bench and trailed after them.

Turns out there was a reason he was so slow coming up to meet his friends. To our right, and the path we had to take, was an EXTREMELY steep and long set of stairs. It was so steep it was almost like a ladder. I had to hold on with both hands and make sure I didn’t look around too much otherwise my legs would have turned to jelly with my fear of heights.

At the bottom, a lady was waiting for me so she could ascend. There was no way I could go any faster, so she just had to wait! The path continued and it was very, very twisty and windy. Some places even had rope for a handhold because there was only rock to clamber over.

We eventually made it to the bottom - it really did feel like it took forever and my knees were pretty unhappy. They’re not too bad going up, but I really feel them going down! Both of us had super shaky legs, and we were feeling really weary by now. And we still had halfway to get around the lake!

Because we were pretty tired, we took it pretty slowly. I was hungry, Dan was just tired - I think he was a bit low on blood sugar. We continued on, stopping for photos at lots of different angles as this is the side of the lake closest to the island with the church. We saw a lot of boats going over - both row boats and the “traditional” boats, both of which were expensive to hire.

On our route, we kept looking out for the apparently elusive €12 row boat per hour - we couldn’t find it. Every boat spot we saw was €20 and this was a bit steep! We were trying to decide if we would do the row boat today or tomorrow (too tired for today, by now, so it would have to be tomorrow if we did it at all), but the price was simply too expensive.

On the way around, we also found some ducks and ducklings, very cute! There were only 2 little ducklings, which seemed a small number for the two mumma ducks who were there.

We finally make it close to the town. We were so weary, and struggled to decide if we went back to accom to eat our salad (boring) or go for lunch and have the salad for tea. We ended up going back to accom via the shop and got a soft drink and wine for dinner that night. Then we collapsed for a bit, then went to lunch at the Pizza place, Pizzeria Rusticana.


Because of our accommodation and the wrist band we’d been given on arrival, we were entitled to 10% off at this place. It was delicious! We got 2 pizzas to share, and a beer each. Then I noticed a price list for some Kommjunism beers, and Dan ordered a TITO beer which was totally tasty! It rained while we were here, and we were happy with our timing.

We had perked up a bit more by now, so we wanted to get another beer at the Red and Black bar, which was also included on our wristband. First to the ATM in the main part of town, where we also grabbed magnets and postcards. On the walk back, we struggled to find the Red and Black bar - we went up to a bar that was in the right place and apparently this is the replacement. They no longer honoured the wrist bands so we left and went back to the accommodation. We weren’t that desperate for drinks!

I lay down because I was rooted, and while I did that, Dan was a superstar and ran our dirty clothes across the road to the laundry! He even came back with cheap beer. We took it super easy for the rest of the arvo, napping and blogging and so forth. In the evening we made a salad, grabbed our L of wine that we had purchased earlier in the day, and walked the 5 minutes back to the lake side to watch the sun set. It was quite cold by now, and all of the bench seats were wet from the earlier rain. We dried it mostly, and the rest from sitting on it! We had our cameras set up, although the sunset wasn’t particularly great. It was lovely though to sit here, drinking our wine and giggling, listening to a pretty bad busker across the lake (as Dan pointed out, if we could hear him singing, he could hear me complaining about how badly out of tune he was…this probably forced him to stop! Oops).

And with that - we called it a day. A beautiful day all around the Lake!

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 43: Ljubljana - Bled

We had been warned that there wasn’t a lot do to in Ljubljana and, for us, that turned out to be quite true. I said at the end of the day “It might be a nice place to live, if you want to just go out and have a beverage or breakfast on the water front - it's quite pretty - but for a tourist, there's practically nothing to do here."

To check out we had to go back down the street, but at least we were able to leave our luggage there for the day. The accommodation was right next to the iconic “dragon bridge”, so we took some mandatory photos of that.

Our main port of call for now was to climb up to the castle which sticks out like a pimple in the middle of Ljubljana. At the base, we found a bustling local market, selling a lot of produce and food products, as well as plants and fruits and vegetables. It was pretty cool looking! In the distance, we could hear live music too which was playing something quite electro. It was a cool vibe. We found our way to the bottom of the hill to start the climb to the castle. We opted not to pay the €10 return for the cable car - that’s €20 we can spend on something else (probably wine…!). On the way, we overtook 3 ladies pulling trundler suitcases and I couldn’t quite understand why they perhaps didn’t buy the cable car ticket.

The walk up was steep but fine, and didn’t take very long. Every now and then we took photos of the city peeking through the trees. At the top, around the base of the castle, the ladies with the trundlers had overtaken us by taking another path and asked Dan to take a photo of them. Circumnavigating the castle, there wasn’t a lot to see, and the castle itself wasn’t anything much to write home about. We have definitely seen more impressive castles. As we walked around, we discussed how much we would consider paying to go in because there was a view point up the tower that might be a nice look over the city. At the front, it turned out the cheapest ticket package was €7.50 per person, and this was above what we had been willing to pay. We finished another half lap and started making our way down - we had wanted to go down the opposite way but ended up finding ourselves on the same path back to the market. No matter! 

We stopped and listened to some guys busking for a while, they were playing electro music on sax and guitar and it sounded really, really cool. The music had resonated all the way up to the castle, too. Continuing on, we were looking for the square we could see up on the castle. Found it. Took some pictures.

By now, it wasn't even midday so too early for lunch, so we sat on a bench seat and ate some snacks. Dan had initially mentioned a train museum not far away, but after researching it had said it was a bit crap so didn’t want to go. Now we had so much time to kill that we decided to go to the train museum anyway, so after a bit of a sit down this was our next destination.

On the way was the “cyanometer” which I had wanted to see. It was slightly cooler than I expected - it was a beautiful brilliant blue - and I didn’t expect it to be so reflective. What is it? Apparently there’s been one on this spot for a long time, although the original wasn’t nearly so high tech! It reflects the colour of the sky, and this high tech one also gives pollution and other interesting air readings.

That was a photo and on we went to the museum, it was a 20 minute walk so not too long, but the sun was quite warm by now. There were road works at one stage which meant we had to back track a little way.

It was only €3.5 entry so that was nice and cheap. Dan had read there were only 8 trains on display but there were at least 12 inside and then probably about 8 or so outside. I had a little bit of a sit down in here while Dan inspected the trains.

Outside, there were a few more trains, some of which had started to be reclaimed by nature. By now it was time to go back - and for lunch. The place I wanted to go - Dan looked it up too and turns out it wasn't open on weekends. Damn! I lost track of days.

We found a place, it was alright...not too expensive but not crazy good either. I had the calamari which came with spinach and potato, it was a bit plan but alright. Dan had a lasagna and burnt his arm on the bowl. While here, we watched a crazy lady summoning evil forces or something - it looked like some possessed Tai Chi - she even whipped off her scarf and got that involved with the ceremony. No idea what she was doing!

The final thing I had wanted to do in Ljubljana was to visit the artist commune Metalkava. It was kinda disappointing, to be honest. I had expected more like Uzipius in Vilnius or Teufelsberg in Berlin. Instead it was just some graffitied buildings which are apparently bars at night time. Some people glared at us with our cameras, so we quickly left.

Dan realised we were right near our accom so we grabbed our stuff and just went straight to the bus station. Good thing! It started POURING as we entered the bus station. The sky opened up. We couldn't get tix for the 4pm bus (turns out, as I learnt later, you have to buy tickets 2 hours in advance), so we had to get tix for the 5pm bus instead.

This meant a 2 hour wait, and we didn’t know what to do with this time. Dan had spotted some seats at the train station next door, so while the rain paused for 30 seconds we ran across the road and set ourselves up on seats which we thought were for Maccas. I wandered off to the toilet, and popped into Maccas on my return to see what their ice-cream offerings were (more than usual, by the way!) and when I got back to the table I saw Dan being served. Turns out these tables were for a tiny station bar and so we had to order something. The drinks were super cheap, €1 for a glass of wine, so we ended up sitting here and ordering a few drinks over the next 2 hours!

And oh, did it RAIN. The sky was alight with lightening, and some of the thunderclaps were right on top of us. I think one hit the castle hill! It was truly amazing to watch. The tracks were flooding. Some of the platforms were flooding - all while we just sat back and enjoyed the view - it wasn’t even cold!

The original intention was to buy a Maccas ice-cream, so I went inside to order this. What ensued was a bit of an argument - I ordered the “jagoda” and the “chocolate” supreme McSundae, pointing to the pictures. The Jagoda had pink soft serve and the chocolate and had chocolate soft serve. When she returned, both had vanilla soft serve. I was like “It doesn’t look like the pictures?” And she said, well, you didn’t say that you wanted different soft serve. And I said, you didn’t ask me. So she got all huffy and made them again, this time like the pictures.

When I returned, we ordered another €1 wine from the bar lady, and when she saw our ice creams, she exclaimed, "Oh icecream and wine! That'll send you to the toilet!”

The rain miraculously stopped by the time we had to walk out to catch our bus to Bled. We grabbed ourselves some seats near the front, and in 1 and a half hours we were at Lake Bled. The sky looked very, very angry and there was more lightening on the way. It was drizzling in Bled when we got there, and we tried looking for an ATM to pay for our accommodation but failed, so just went straight to check in, hoping they’d point us in the right direction.

Thankfully at check in they allowed us to pay later! Our accommodation was in another building and we had the main kitchen below us. A lovely lady showed us the map and all around the area, as well as letting us know prices of things (such as the row boats) and estimated walking times around the lake. I mention all this, because I think her information may have been a little out, as we were to find out later!

The shop next to accom would close at 9pm, so we went in there to get dinner for the night and snacks for the morrow. Took us FOREVER as we couldn’t decide what we wanted to eat for dinner. We figured salads for lunch again and settled on cheap tinned soup and fluffy bread for dinner - we weren’t overly hungry.


Back at accom we didn't make dinner straight away as there were too many people in the kitchen. We went down a little while later, and prepared our gourmet tinned soup! It was actually ok, with rice and vegetables, and we ate it with some buttered some soft bread. While we were preparing our dinner, we chatted with and got to know 2 Aussie ladies who were also staying here - they were reasonably elderly, far older than the normal hostel clientele (probably 50+?)! One was sick so she had decided to just up and travel around the world (she didn't go into details) and the other has been living in Hungary for the last 7 years doing up a world heritage home, and travelling in between times. It was fun and interesting to talk to them, very different! The older lady who lived in Hungary couldn’t quite grasp the fact that we had been living in London and Berlin statically, and worked career progressing jobs. She seemed to still think we would be wanting to work on bars or farms, and working as we travelled because she herself employed young people to help with her house.

We excused ourselves and had an early night. Originally, we were looking forward to a sleep in but when we looked up the weather for the next day - storms were supposed to roll in from midday, so an early start around Lake Bled it was!

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 42: Split, Croatia - Ljubljana, Slovenia

Today was a long travel day. It began with the 8.25am train from Split to Zagreb, the capital of Split. The lady had given us a table seat which mean we sat opposite each other, and when we got on there was practically no one else around. There was nothing to say whether a seat was reserved or not, so when people got on with reserved tickets they had to bump people out of their seats. Just before take off,  5 girls ended up sitting at our table and the one opposite, even though the train was empty, but thanks to the reserved seating business they weren’t able to spread out further. They were loud and really annoying. I wasn't happy. Oh well. 6 hours this train journey took and it was very, very windy (as in, not in a straight line). Dan and I chatted, and then did a bit of blogging once the path became less windy. We even climbed up into the clouds which was quite beautiful, and the moment it hit 12pm we ate our salads.

We arrived into Zagreb late at about 3pm and piled off the train after the 5 loud girls. In the station we found some huge lockers for very cheap, which made our exploration of Zagreb far more enjoyable! It was around about here that I discovered Dan, in my definition of the term, has not actually been to Zagreb. “Which way do we go, and what should we see?” I asked him. He didn’t know, which confused me, as I thought he had been here. “But haven’t you been here before?” I continued. By “been here”, he had stayed near the airport, and popped into the city - saw a single building opposite the train station and wander to the pharmacy just next to the station. That rendered him slightly useless for Zagreb recommendations!

Across the road from the station was quite a lovely square with a small market selling mostly flowers, off-the-back-of-a-truck clothing, and strawberries. There was a lovely building here with some pretty flowers which we spent some time taking photos of from every conceivable angle. We continued to follow our noses towards the centre, on the way passing what from a distance we thought was another market, but turned out to be a student fair, like an O Day kind of deal.

After being in this for a short way, we felt really old so decided to skirt it, and in doing so found the main square. Oddly enough, here was another market, but this one looked pretty local and seemed to be selling lots of nice things. Rounding the corner, we found another market - I think we found another 2, both of these were packing up for the day (or maybe hadn’t opened), except for one lady selling jewellery in the middle. We ended up passing her about 4 times in our journey around Zagreb.

We continued up the street, and saw a few bars that had reasonably cheap beverages. We did a bit of a loop, found the cathedral, took a photo of it, and then returned to one of the bars. Basically we had seen most of what there is to see in Zagreb, I reckon. There was a wine on the menu that was really cheap and large, so we ordered one each. When we tasted it, it was like it had been watered down. I actually googled it and we had, in fact, ordered watered down wine. Apparently it’s a thing! So we ordered a full strength red and a white, just to be on the safe side…

And that was our time in Zagreb. At 6.30pm we had another train to catch - this time to Ljubljana in Slovenia so we returned to the station. As we wouldn’t get into Ljubljana until about 9pm, we decided to have dinner on board. A quick stop around the supermarket at the station, where we bought a giant 1L bottle of beer and some local brand softies and a quick trip to the bakery for some baked goods, and we were set for dinner.

When the train arrived it had lots of different names on each of the carriages, which makes one think that the train would split up at various times. After Dan went and asked, I pushed my way onto the Ljubljana carriage and found an empty compartment. We don't like compartments but there was no choice. Dan and I purposely spread our stuff out so no one was tempted to join us!

We poured our beer into our sippy cups and scoffed our baked goods, feeling nice and full. Not too long after setting off we arrived at the border crossing. The Croatian side asked a few questions, gave us a stamp. So many bloody Croatian stamps! Why do the Croatians love stamping, but other countries don’t? Soon after the Slovenian border lady came past, and threw us quite a lot of questions (complicated, after our 1L of beer), but I think she might have just been doing it while she was scrolling through our passports. There’s so many stamps that I can imagine it’s pretty hard to figure out, and then all of our visas for the UK and Germany also make things confusing!

She finally left us alone (with no damn stamp) and we settled back again. I thought as we were riding along - I could do this forever. It was beautiful, and just sitting back watching the world go by is so peaceful. The scenery was lovely with the sun setting outside, and at about 9pm we arrived in Ljubljana.

The walk to our accommodation was a bit arduous. When we got to it, there was a sign on door saying Check in at Hostel o2 down the road. So we had to keep walking just as I was wanted to throw my luggage all on the floor. However, check in was easy enough, and then we had to go back to the apartment and up a few flights of stairs. Oh well! It’s just one night.

Before crashing out hard, we did a bit of research of what we actually wanted to see in Ljubljana on the morrow - the map was very helpful as it had little explanations of things to do so we chose the ones we liked the sound of, consulted our “bible” for a few other suggestions and then it was time to sleep.

Til next time,
xx

The Final Countdown. Day 41: Split

We had two choices for buses to Krka, one at 8am and one at 10.15am. In the end, we chose the later one because we really needed a sleep in - I for one was getting sick of being woken by alarms! I packed our salads (and sneakily put the rakija in too), Dan grabbed the wine in our sippy cups, we donned our bathers and made our way to the bus station. The town we needed for Krka was Skradin, but this wasn’t listed on any of the signs for Platform 1. Eventually a bus pulled in and we sat in our assigned seats near the front. I wanted to jump off so I could use the ATM, but found myself unable to get off the bus. There was an argument breaking out over the front seat of the bus. Two French women had apparently especially chosen the front two seats so they had a view. A lady was sitting there already. The lady was saying there’s no assigned seats. The driver said there were no assigned seats. The argument continued until the French ladies won.

I managed to quickly jump off for the ATM now but it wouldn’t give me what I wanted, so back on the bus I went. The journey was uneventful after the arguing - it was pretty windy so I had to chew gum to make sure I wasn’t motion sick. About 1.5 hours later, we arrived at Skradin and I asked the driver how to get tickets for the way back. He said either from the river or from the little office - but that’ll probably be closed.

We followed the signs until the ticket office, where we were pushed in front of, then bought our tickets. They weren’t cheap but they were cheaper than if we had come at the peak time of the year! The park is huge, and we didn’t have the means by which to explore the whole thing (namely, a car), and the bit we wanted to see specifically was the waterfall that you can swim in. Therefore, we knew there was a boat to the waterfall at 12pm so when we found the queue, we joined it. Ended up being the last people to be let on, which was a relief as we thought we would have to wait a whole hour for the next boat. Turns out at peak times they just keep the boats rolling, so we wouldn’t have had to wait long, but still - much better to be on our way!

We had to sit inside as all outside chairs were taken, and put on some sunscreen in anticipation of our swim. The waterfall was hidden from view, and once we were off the boat we had to follow a little path. At first we struggled to find a place to set up - everyone just seemed to be leaving their things at the base of the tree roots but I had wanted somewhere were we could also picnic later too. In the end, we just put our things under a tree a small distance from the water and decided to figure out the picnic later.

And so we stripped down to our bathers and made our way to the water’s edge! It was cold but not like Kravice Waterfall in Mostar, but I was also forced to enter the water quickly as there was a queue behind me! It was not deep here, there were lots of rocks but with sandy bits in between. The water was so clear, we could see everything. Dan kept his glasses on this time and I had my contacts in, so neither of us put our heads under the water this time. 


We waded out to the "photo" spot, and took a few ourselves. It isn’t quite as beautiful as Plitvice Lakes, or as large, but it was still damn beautiful! Especially able to be in it was spectacular. There was a rope stopping people from being able to get into the waterfall (it was pretty hard flowing) so I was happy I had climbed all over the waterfall at Kravice.


As we were hogging the photo spot, a lady offered to take our photo on our GoPro. I went to offer to take hers but her phone wasn't waterproof and I didn't feel comfortable doing that…I think she was a little disappointed but I’d rather her disappointment at not having a photo than me dropping it in the water.

We found a rock in the water to sit on. From here, we witnessed some dragonflies mating and watched the sky change as the sun popped in and out from behind the clouds - it wasn't really that cold now, either.  We paddled over to the edge of the waterfall - you could get close to the corner of it, and took some more photos I loved putting my hands in the water flowing down the rocks - it was gushing very strongly and made a lot of bubbles.

By now we were hungry and it was time for lunch. A flat spot with a lovely view and a tree stump for a chair came available so we nabbed it for our picnic. Ever industrious, we drank the glass of wine we had packed in our sippy cups and ate our salad which was actually quite tasty in the end! We also shuddered our way through the rather terrible rakija I had sneakily packed.


We wanted one more dip in the water, and to explore the right hand side this time. We nicknamed it the “mangrove swamp” as there were more trees and tree roots in the water over that side, as well as being a fraction shallower. We found another rock to perch ourselves on which covered us up to about our shoulders, and watched the world go by. When we started to get a little cold, it was time to jump out. In all, it was beautiful sitting here in the waterfall. It’s what we had come to do - basically the only reason we had come to Croatia at all. It was probably a far greater expense than necessary but whatever - I enjoyed it and I think Dan did too.

There’s a path around the outside and up around the waterfall which takes about an hour. It was beautiful seeing all the different trainees and pools, all different colours depending on the light, the depth and whatever was growing in the water. There was some wildlife too - we saw some baby duckies and some froggies sitting on lilypads. I sad myself down in the middle of the path to take piccies of some of the beautiful deep blue dragonflies that inhabit this area. As we started to make our descent, I saw some people crowded around a corner and realised there were some super teeny weeny kitties there! When we walked down the path, we found a third kitten, who got a little frightened and joined the other two who were playfighting.

We took some photos and they let us pat them - even their little paws! I love kitten paws. They were all playing rough with each other, and maybe only a few weeks old.

At this point, it got a little less pleasant.  When I stepped back from the kitties, something landed on my arm. As I went to brush it away, I felt an intense stinging pain in my forearm, which spread down to my hand and up my elbow. "FUCK something sting me!” I shouted loudly, and in front of children. It really, really hurt. I think what bit me was yellow and green, and may have been a horsefly. My initial reaction was that it was a bee or a wasp as I’ve never been stung by either of these, and is something I’m pretty phobic about.


Within minutes a lump had appeared and there was a stabbing, tingly pain every time I moved my arm. I wasn't particularly happy about this. Over the remainder of the walk, the pain began to dissipate a bit, which was a relief.

By now it was time to go back to Split, so we went back to the boat ramp. There was a big queue here - we thought the boats would be going constantly like they were that morning, but found out that the next boat wasn’t until 4.30pm. We managed to position ourselves close to the front, my arm still bothering me a bit, so that when the boat finally let us on (they were all standing there just watching us all for half an hour), we got ourselves some seats with a nice view out the front. Unfortunately the seats were possibly the most uncomfortable flip seats I’ve ever had the misfortune of experiencing, but at least we had leg room - the people behind us could barely even lower the flip seats! Rather hilarious, really.

The boat landed at 4.50pm and we legged it back to the bus station - the bus we wanted left at 5pm. We got there to be greeting by quite a crowd. And we waited. One bus came, we all surged forward, but it wasn’t going to Split. Some people got on, minimising the crowd. Another bus came, we all surged forward, but it wasn’t going to Split. Again, this thinned the crowd a bit. A third bus came - also not for Split. This was getting ridiculous, as the next bus was meant to be there at 6.10pm. The crowd had thinned but was now expanding again - for those who intended to get the 6.10 bus. Finally a bus to Split arrived, almost completely full.

Dan and I were pretty close to the front of the surge, and it seemed to take forever but we finally managed to buy 2 tickets and hop on board. We took the last 2 seats next to each other. We sat here til 6pm as the bus kept letting people on - although there wasn’t enough seating space for everyone, because each bus is run by a different company so they probably wanted to try to take the business of the 6.10pm bus.

We finally made it back into Split at about 7.30pm. We went to dinner on the foreshore at a place that was supposed to be a cheap eat but turned out to be pretty expensive. I had a seafood risotto which meant I had to shell the prawns (not a fan of this) and some nice beers. Even though it wasn’t quite what we expected, it was still lovely sitting out on the terrace in the lovely Mediterranean night air. No partying for us - back to the accommodation as we had - you guessed it - an early train to catch in the morning.

Back at the accommodation, I cooked the salad (as Dan calls it!), we packed and called it a night.

Til next time,
xx