TravelStream™ news feed for member jmabro on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/jmabro en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sat, 27 Jun 2009 16:10:20 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869964/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869964/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869964/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 16:10:20 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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London, England, United Kingdom

Back in the flat we were again greeted by our hostess, this time with Turkish coffee and cake. Her mother-in-law (89 year old Granny) joined us again and this time we had translation. What an amazing lady this is. She was in Port Said in World War 2, had Italians pointing machine guns at her on more than one occasion where she thought she would die, lost her sister in that war and lost one of her children in the Yugoslavian war in the 1990's! We did also talk of happier things like the beauty of Dubrovnik and Lokrum Island and the world out there to travel. We also met our hostesses older daughter, the younger one is away at University, so now know almost all the family and had to email that we had arrived home safely! :-) As you can imagine, I would HIGHLY recommend this as a place to stay when visiting Dubrovnik, I very much doubt that a hotel experience would have been better.The bus ride back to the airport was along the coastal cliffs so afforded us one last amazing view before we headed home.We flew on EasyJet and unfortunately were delayed a bit and got home quite late but, I had an experience on board the plane that I have never had before. When they see my cane they usually are more helpful but in this case I was allowed on the plane first, given a seat in the front row (EasyJet does not reserve seats), shown where the service button was to call them, had the location of the toilets described and told to call if I needed help finding them. All throughout the flight Rob was checking that I was OK and, when we got to London, he made sure I got off the plane first. What amazing service from an airline that you only usually hear bad things about!I must say, even though the weather gave us a bit of a flooding at times and the public transport is not as easy as we would liked it to be, we thoroughly enjoyed the trip, the people, the glorious water, the beautiful islands, the medieval cities, the Croatian wines and, let’s not forget, the delicious ice creams! :-) It is a wonderfully friendly country and they love children there so an ideal family holiday too. Will we go back? Possibly but, as always, there are so many other places to see that the list just keeps on growing. We may go for a long weekend in winter to see the frozen waterfalls in Plitvic as that does sound fascinating but who knows, the world continues to beckon and we attempt to heed the call.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869944/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869944/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245869944/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 16:07:30 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Dubrovnik, Croatia

A short, 15 minute, twice hourly ferry allows you to leave Dubrovnik and wander around an amazing island. From the ferry landing it is straight into the forest where you can visit the most amazing Botanical Gardens. At first glance it seems like it will just be a continuation of the forest and wild plants but, on walking in it is like walking into a whole new world filled with plants from all over the world growing in this wild wonderland. Not being any sort of a green thumb type I cannot begin to pretend to know what the plants are called but the varieties of palms, aloes, cactus, "naartjie" (clementine) trees and all sorts of other exotic plants and flowers. We spent quite a while enjoying this plant paradise but then the call of the ocean was too strong.We headed off to the rocky outcrops, the island has neither sandy nor pebble beaches but what they have done is brilliant, they have put lots of ladders down the sides of rocks to allow easy swimming in the sparkling waters. Annie found the route that would be easiest to guide me down and we went and claimed our rocks to lie on before taking the plunge. Were it not for the fact that we had a plane to catch in the evening I think we would still be on our rocks!We had another forest walk back to the café where we enjoyed a local beer for me and tea for Annie and then back to the mainland on the ferry.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245790536/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245790536/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245790536/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 16:03:03 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Dubrovnik, Croatia

We dumped our bags and headed for the Old City walls. We found we could climb up and walk around the top of the walls which we did and got magnificent views across the Old City, the new city, the walls, churches and turrets of the Old City, the ocean, islands and world beyond. We spent the next couple of hours walking with continuous stops to admire, photograph and admire some more.Down from the walls we wandered around the Old City a bit, saw a procession of locals in traditional garb, and then found the Synagogue but it was too late to go in and look. We left the Old City and went to the restaurant at the bottom of our steps for another amazingly delicious sea bass fish meal.When we got back into the flat, not only were we greeted by our hostess, but told that we would be served pancakes in the kitchen! She cooked them and then came to call us and we sat and ate pancakes and chatted with her at around midnight! We declined seconds and went off to bed with, "breakfast will be waiting for you in the morning".
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245783506/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245783506/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245783506/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:59:34 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Dubrovnik, Croatia

As our last journey we are going on an open ferry, the rest have been fast, closed catamarans. This ferry only sails twice a week so you have to plan carefully to get on it.We were having a rain on, rain off day so spent our last hour on the island at a café, first drinking coffee and then, as the guide books really raved about the Korcula ice cream, checking and confirming that they had their facts correct, they did.Happily, we left Korcula in the dry and could sit out on deck for a while before it started getting a bit wet and blustery. We spent a while indoors reading about Dubrovnik, checking out the accommodation options, and drinking coffee. Then, about half an our before we got into port, the skies cleared up and we rushed out onto the deck to sit in the sun and take in some of the beautiful scenery.Off the boat we went into the local info office which was more of a homestay booking agency so we decided to see what they had near or in the Old City. What they offered sounded attractive so we decided to take this option for our last night and what a great decision it was. The lady who owned the home was, just by chance, in the area so we arranged to meet in half an hour and, on meeting, found that we were to be driven to the home by her husband who is a taxi driver, bonus!Their home was a lovely flat right across the road and up about 100 stairs from the Old City gates which was perfect. The only downside was that the husband had forgotten his keys so he had to go and fetch them which was a bit of a wait while he went to find his 89 year old mother, an amazing lady who is always busy, always fussing, always trying to feed and water us, and continuously chatting to us in Croatian even though she does not understand English and is VERY hard of hearing :-)
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245697077/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245697077/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245697077/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:52:59 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Korcula Town, Korcula, Croatia

It has become a bit of a tradition for us to spend our birthday's somewhere new, different, exotic, but NOT wet!!! Thankfully we have found a place to buy a brolly and wandered around the harbour area and old town before the rain returned again. We took cover and are still sitting in a restaurant / coffeeshop reading about Croatia, watching the changing weather and doing the Croatian coffee-sip.We have learnt some fascinating facts which we would never have guessed:- the Cravat, or necktie, was invented here as part of military uniform and later adopted by the French;- the first working parachute was made here;- the ballpoint and fountain pens along with the hot water bottle and, of all things, a laundry bluing agent was invented by a Croate;- the father of radio and alternating electric current was born in Croatia;- fingerprint identification was invented by a man born on the Croatian island of Hvar;- but no-one is sure whether or not Dalmatian dogs started in the Croatian area of Dalmatian :-)Time for lunch and then, hopefully a walk in the dry. More later...Well, we have eaten, sat and watched the world go by, walked back to the hotel in more pouring rain, had an afternoon snooze and then, HOORAY, the skies cleared up! We rushed out to explore and see what things looked like in the dry and found a pretty local beach to walk onto. Then, one of the turrets of the Old City walls has been turned into a cocktail bar so we climbed to the top to look at the view. To get up the last bit you have to climb a stepladder, I had a very nervous waitress watching me go back down :-) Then it was off to a waterside café for a beer before finding a restaurant for supper.We chose a restaurant that looked nice and found that we were seated at a table with two other couples, both turned out to be English so we had a fun evening chatting and eating THE most delicious fresh fish, sea bass, meal we have had in a very long time.
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Korcula Town, Korcula, Croatia

WOW, the storm was bright with lightening, loud with thunder and pouring like a monsoon in the Far East or Caribbean, neither expected nor usual in Croatia! Thanks!We literally swam our way to Hotel Korcula which thankfully had a room with a view(!) and place to dry off. Can you believe that we had neither umbrellas nor rain jackets with us?! This weather is not expected here.... :-) Not daring to venture out again we ate supper in the hotel diningroom which reminded me of the Melmoth Inn, the country inn my parents owned when I was a young child! It was an excellent example of "what was", right down to the trolley used to deliver the food to the table!Since returning home we also learnt that Korcula is known by my Mother for a very positive reason, it is where a Jewish couple who now live in Durban (South Africa) hid and survived the Second World War. What a nice thing to find out!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245610613/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245610613/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245610613/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:47:57 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Split, Croatia

Our plan was, rain permitting, to repeat our night tour by day so I could see the detail Annie had been describing to me. The weather performed for us and allowed the sun to shine for most of the day; we wandered the Old City, found the ferry ticket office to secure our passage to Korcula and then to Dubrovnik; walked along the promenade and sat on a sunny bench; returned to the Old City and back to our favourite find, a fountain with water from the original Roman aqueducts. We drank our fill and filled our bottle with this cool, refreshingly delicious water before continuing our explorations which included a local bakery which provided us with lunch al fresco and a fruit market where we bought sliced watermelon and returned to our sunny promenade bench to eat it.Later we retrieved our luggage from our hotel and, in true Croatian style, relaxed at a local coffeeshop for a while before heading off to the ferry. Sadly the dark clouds were returning with a vengeance and making our arrival seem like drizzle!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245524181/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245524181/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245524181/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:32:16 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Split, Croatia

How sad, here we are, going by bus along the Dalmatian Coast which is reputed to be really magnificent and all we can see is RAIN! :-( Might as well sleep :-)When we got to Split Annie had planned where we would stay. We walked in the pelting rain and dark but, what Annie had not planned was that there were no rooms at the inn. Thankfully the innkeeper sent us around the corner to a delightful hotel right in the Old City Palace area and they had a room.Later, to our delight, the rain stopped so we went wandering around the marbled palace of the Old City and ended the evening with a lovely meal in the area we discovered to be the Jewish Ghetto at one point and next door to the Synagogue which was already closed for the rest of the weekend.While we were wandering around the Old City we came across a shop window with a display of nautical blue striped clothing, bags and shoes. It has been most amusing that, ever since we were offered a homestay on the island of Rab by a local sailor (appropriately) wearing a blue stripes shirt, we have seen so many people wearing their nautical blue stripes. There have been shirts, t-shirts, dresses, flip flops, and, best of all, one evening there was a couple both wearing their identical "his" and “hers”, I wanted to take a photo of them but it would have been just a bit too obvious!
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Novalja, Island of Pag, Croatia

A short catamaran ferry ride and we landed in the town of Novalja on the nearby island of Pag but it is a world away from the quiet medieval Rab! Here the promenade was filled with tourist stalls one after the other; bars and restaurants blaring out their music, and all filled with people doing their best to consume the island's supply of alcohol. It is not surprising that Pag has earned the title "Ibiza of Croatia".We found another room with a view, watched the sunset over the harbour and then went to our room. It was quite a hilarious room with two single beds secured to the wall head to toe. Definitely a town to pass through.The receptionist was a lovely lady who directed us to her favourite restaurant away from the crowds, with a really pleasant atmosphere and a meal to redeem the island.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245437721/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245437721/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/jmabro/52/1245437721/tpod.html Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:20:30 -0400 Croatia Unplanned

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Rab, Kvarner Bay Islands, Croatia

What a wonderful way to spend a day on an island. We walked for miles along and in the water, stopping often to admire the view and marvel at the colour of the water; found a local man to talk to about his little bit of paradise and a local ice cream parlour with thatched coverings and amazing views to enjoy our ice cream just out of the midday sun; the local park for a lunch picnic; and later an obligatory espresso at one of the many cafes around town.At around 7pm the ferry arrived to take us off to our next island, Pag, which was really just going to be an overnight stop to get us to the bus to Split.Rab is just two hours from Rijeka so, for people working in the city, an ideal island weekend hideaway. We saw one lady get off the ferry and climb onto her waiting boat right at the side of the ferry, definitely the right way to do this.
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