Cruising in Croatia

Hello everybody! It's a very relaxed Ali, Cam and Bruce coming to you from today, after six relaxing days soaking up the Croatian sunshine.

Ali inside Diocletian's Palace

After departing Hungary, our first stop in Croatia was Zagreb - we thought we'd better check out the capital city, and spent the morning there checking it out. It was actually a lot nicer than I imagined it would be - we had yummy cappuccinos at one of the many cafes lining the bustling streets, before setting out on a brand spanking new and almost deserted highway to Split. It was kind of strange, nobody on the road, hardly any houses or settlements on the way, just huge rocky mountains with sparse vegetation...kind of Mediterranean-looking.

Arriving into Split was a little anti-climatic - we'd been hanging out to see the sea (haven't seen it since we were in France) and were envisaging a beautiful seaside city - but our first glimpse was of a rad dhe riy industrial area. We were also hot (definitely noticed the rise in temperature as we headed south and towards the coast), couldn't find a camping ground anywhere so had to drive out of the city, then found one that was expensive and had bad facilities...(but lots of sweet juicy grapes hanging off vines that we helped ourselves too, which raised our spirits somewhat), and all of these factors combined resulted in 3 grumpy kids. But never fear, the next day we became a lotnd dischvered th we strolled along the pretty harbour front, and discovered the delights of Diocletian's (Roman emperor of the 3rd century who retired in Split) palace - concealed behind a little alley way was a huge, beautifully preserved palace, complete with a church and lots of little marble-stoned streets with cute shops and cafes. Really cool. Split was in our good books by then.

Dubrovnik city wall

Headed along the pretty Adriatic coast admiring the imposing rocky mountains and brilliant blue water, and stopped for lunch and a swim at one of the pretty little coves on the way, before catching a car ferry over to Hvar Island, where we spent the next two days.

Like Split, Hvar at first sight wasn't too impressive either - we drove through the pine-forested, uninhabited hills but medieval Hvar town itself was really nice - a lovely little harbour, more cute marble streets and buildings like in Split, nice little rocky beaches with warm water (no sand, and an abundance of spiky sea eggs, but actually I've come to enjoy rocks - they don't mould to your body but you do avoid getting sand through your hair, teeth, ears and all belongings.) We climbed up a big hill to an old Venetian fortress and had gorgeous views over the town, sea and surrounding islands.

Ferrying to Hvar

Now we are in Dubrovnik, apparently known as 'the pearl of the Adriatic', and quite rightly so I think - it's another coastal city in the far south of Croatia, and has been the highlight of our time here. It's beautiful - the old city is perched on a rocky cliff and surrounded by a huge wall - and you can walk the entire way around the city, on top of the wall. It's quite amazing; spectacular views of the city itself, the surrounding coastline and islets. It was heavily bombed by the Yugoslavs in 1991, but they've done a fantastic job of restoring it - aside from a few tiles on some of the city's buildings, we couldn't even tell. We had to fight our way through hoards of cruise ship tourists, as there were a couple of cruise ships parked in the harbour, with little boats ferrying passengers to and fro.

The picturesque Dubrovnik

We've been enjoying the warm days and balmy evenings, and are hoping this is going to continue in Italy, where we are off to tonight! We're crossing on an 11pm ferry, which arrives at Bari at 8am, and we are roughing it on the deck (beds were going to cost something ridiculous like 800 euros, didn't quite fit in our budget) so hopefully it won't be too painful! Until next time...

The walled town