Splitting up my travel time
Trip Start
Sep 23, 2008
1
9
10
Trip End
Dec 11, 2008
Split,
Croatia
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Zadar was a really beautiful city that's located right on the coast of the Adriatic. It's a small city, and it hasn't had as much of a Western influence as Italy and Switzerland has. Although it definitely has some. It's the off-season there now, so there were almost no tourists.
One thing that was slightly bothersome about Zadar is that the locals all seemed very unfriendly. I don't know if it was because they had just finished a tourist season and were sick of tourists or what. I had loads of problems at the bus station. I was staying with Sime, who is staying at his brother's house while his own house is being built in a small town outside of Zadar called Zemunik-Gornji. Now there are two parts to Zemunik, Zemunik-Donji and Zemunik-Gornji. Gornji is the smaller of the two, it's literally just one street. Anyway, the town was about 10 miles from Zadar, and you had to take a bus to get there. When I first got to the bus station at 7:30 am (after getting very little sleep on the ferry), I had to wait until 1 pm for the first bus to Gornji. The next night, I spent the day in Zadar and then at 5 pm I went to the station to catch the bus (the information lady the day before had told me that during the week buses ran all day to Zemunik-Gornji) and found out the next bus to Gornji was at 8 pm because I had missed the 5 o'clock bus. So I sat around and waited for that bus, and when I finally got on the bus the driver didn't even stop at Gornji! He went straight on to the next stop! So I started the three mile walk back to Gornji, but then after about a mile Sime came and picked me up.
Then the next day, determined to catch the 5 o'clock bus to Gornji, I arrived at the station at 4:30. Oops! No 5 o'clock bus today, there's only a 3 o'clock bus, so instead I took the 5:45 bus to Donji and got another ride from Sime.
The next day, determined to win, I went to the bus station at 11 and asked for all the bus times for that day to Zemunik-Gornji. They told me there was one at 2:20 and one at 8:05. So I bought a ticket for the 2:20 bus, spent a half day in Zadar, and then caught that bus to Gonji. Later that day I was walking around with Sime and we saw a bus roll up at around 3:30 and stop at the Gornji bus station.
So, aside from a busing system that I don't understand, Zadar is a really beautiful city. It's very clean and safe, and the waters surrounding it are crystal clear. Zemunik-Gornji is also relaxing place. It's very small and mostly made up of farmland (figs, olives, cherries, and watermelon). All throughout the Croatian countryside there are bombed out houses remniscent of the war that ravaged the country just 15 years ago. The house that I stayed at was only recently re-built, and you can still see the ruined remains of the previous house in the yard.
Anyway, I'm in Split now, the 2nd largest Croatian city, and also located on the Dalmatian coast. Split, so far, has been an incredibly beautiful city. I've only been here for half a day and I can already say it's one of the coolest cities I've traveled to (if not the coolest). The hostel is located in the city center, so I don't have to worry about any buses. There are ancient ruins throughout the entire city, and all the modern buildings seem to incorporate the ancient walls into their building designs. There is also an ancient palace right in the center of the city, built by a Roman emperor, that you can walk through and there are modern shops located in. Tourism is a huge industry here, but so far it seems that the city has been able to retain a good sense of its Croatian identity, more so than other cities I've visited.
So I have about two weeks left before I come back home, and I'm having trouble deciding where to go. I have a few options. I plan on going to Dubrovnik after Split, and after that Albania. But after that, I can't decide whether I should go to Bosnia, Kosovo, Montenegro, Macedonia, or Thessalonika in Greece. All I know is that I have to be in Athens by the 12th so I can fly home at 5 am on the 13th. yay.
