Croatia Oct 08

Traveling by train from Ljubijana, we were met at a quiet train station on a cliff top, by 2 police, 3 train staff and a rickety old train. ¨Passports please¨. Mandy very excited to be getting a stamp as it´s so rare these days. After a cursory glance we are pointed to the train... So now we are in Croatia...

The train hugs the cliff line for many miles, passing a number of little valley towns and an abundance of autumn trees, many of which are turning from their appealing green and gold to a more resigned late autumn burnt orange/red. It feels a little like we are arriving the day after a big party, as we appear to be the only backpackers making the journey at this time of year. Hoping that means we have more bargaining power, we look forward to our first night in Pula.

Pula

After a couple more changes, we arrive at Pula train station at 6pm and are disappointed to find no pack of little old ladies eager to offer us accommodation... In fact, the place is empty. This wasn't expected or considered. So we wander into town to see what sleeping options can be found. Having just passed on the option of sleeping in the squatter commune, our standards are minimal and we look twice at a couple of covered spaces near the roadside.

We find a couple of closed tourist info offices and struggle to understand why accommodation services are only open from 8am to 3pm... Surely people arriving later in the day need more help with their accommodation!!!

So, after wandering through town for 30 minutes, being tempted by the seafood on offer now that we´d finally reached a coastal town and having no further luck with private accommodation, we decided to stay at the hostel on the edge of town. Somewhat disappointed with the Croatian private accommodation system, we ride a bus out to the town fringe.

Arriving at the hostel we find reception has closed early with no staff about, despite having called in advance. A few other intending guests wander the grounds until we finally phone the staff again. After a difficult conversation being told we could ¨just check out tomorrow¨, ¨ah no, we would like to check in tonight¨... a Croatian-speaking barmaid appeared to provide a key. We´re beginning to notice a trend in Croatian hospitality service... Generally crap....!!

On the plus side, the hostel turns out to be a beach side 4-person room for just the 2 of us, so after a bit of re-organising of bunk beds, we convert the space into a seaside ´double with exclusive corner views´... Not bad for the cheapest accom in town!

Day two

We decided to head out of Pula on a day trip to Rovinj. So after a cost saving ¨40 minute walk to town¨, we arrive at the bus station some 2 hours later, with ticket stubs from the Amphitheater and dozens of photos. You see Pula´s greatest attraction is an ancient Roman amphitheatre dating from the 1st century AD and it was an impressive site to see.

Rovinj turns out to be a very cute little medieval old town crammed up into the corner of a coastal fort. Although it is almost empty of tourists at this time of year, we find the town still has a number of very appealing qualities. Naturally we find the local markets full of tempting local specialties. Planning to buy a tomato, we walk away with marinated olive oil and local prst (a preserved pork slice similar to prosciutto, only thicker and tastier). Lunch sure was delicious on the water´s edge!

We weave our way through the old town for the remainder of the afternoon, happily lost in the jumble of disorganised narrow streets and random alleys that appear to lead nowhere. With the weather a little grey though, we decide to find a nice little bar to hole up in and taste the Croatian wine. Pricing some of the nicer places, we settle on the closer-to-our-budget Croatian Volunteer Army bar and order a half litre of wine... Now, we won´t deny enjoying the $2 bottles of wine from Dan Murphy´s in Oz, but this stuff was nasty, quite easily the worst wine we´ve ever had.....but of course we struggled through it...

Finding our way back to the bus station we returned to Pula for an overpriced and average dinner in a pizza & seafood restaurant, with a couple more glasses of very average wine, before walking back to our exclusive seaside hostel.

Day 3

The next morning we head to Rijeka, with the plan to either hire a car or bus it down the coast. The weather forecast has accurately predicted a dull day with rain and cold winds.

Rijeka turns out to be a busy town, with little accommodation but a handful of car rental companies. Many have simply stopped trading, despite showing opening hours on their doors (not fun when you are carrying full backpacks in the rain), but we agree to hire a car for 3 days from Budget and happily load up our gear. We decide to head for Croatia´s most popular national park - Plitvice Lakes, over the mountains.

Now the drive along the coastal road was nothing short of breathtaking with sharp bends jutting out into endless ocean, with islands spotting the horizon. As for the road rules however, we were only confused. You see the speed limit varied between 50-80km an hour, but cars were roaring past us. We thought perhaps the speed limit signs were just recommended speeds for taking the corners, so we sped up. But even as we reached 20km over the posted limit, a line of cars were forming behind us, overtaking on dangerous corners and obviously annoyed that their Friday night was being cut into by this tourist trying to obey the rules!

Despite our excess speed, the darkness begins to fall as we leave the coast and head inland towards the national park, ascending into the mountains. Thinking to save a little money, we have been throwing around the option to sleep in our new rental car. Although the car is the smallest (cheapest) they had, our Tetris training convinces us of this possibility.

As we were driving through the Croatian Independence warzone of 1991-95, we drive past a number of destroyed and abandoned Serbian houses. Believing these may prove suitable overnight parks for our little rental car, we keenly continue in search of a quiet spot.

We eventually find a dark old church just off the road and swing in over the grass and around to the back..... in what appears to be a graveyard. Finding it quiet and deserted however, we prepare for our first night sleeping in our little car.

Now, maybe we were a little naive, or maybe there was some small punishment for staying in the car, but that night it dropped to 3 degrees Celsius...and having to sleep with the window ajar so we didn´t gas ourselves, this meant we felt it. I don´t think we calculated the difference in temperature after leaving the coast and travelling inland over the mountains!

We don´t recommend sleeping in a hatchback with 2 adults when the front seats don´t go down flush with the back ones. Mark was curled up in the front passenger seat, with Mandy partly on the back seat with legs into the raised front driver´s seat....

Nonetheless, we didn´t rise until 7am, with the morning temperature still only 3 degrees! Driving to the entrance gates, we ate our muesli and yoghurt in the car and then treated ourselves to a bought cappuccino at the entrance.

Plitvice Lakes

Now the Croatian customer service has continually been bad, but this experience topped it off. When purchasing our entrance tickets, we spoke in the few Croatian words we knew, as a sign of respect. ¨Dober dan, dvar prosim¨ (Good day, two please), to which she responds in croatian, which we didn´t understand. She then responds grumpily with ¨It´s better to speak your own language so I know what language to speak to you in!¨, which shocked us so much that we didn´t have a come back! Normally people appreciate you trying.....

But once inside, we were greeted with a spectacular site, a huge natural attraction of emerald green lakes and hundreds of waterfalls, all cascading downwards in an endless rush of water, changing direction along the way. Natural-looking wooden pathways spanned the park, ziggzagging in, out and over waterways. They also provided ferries and buses within the park to allow you to see the best parts! The sun even began to peak through the clouds just before we were leaving, finally warming things up and providing a scenic drive back out over the mountains.

Arriving back at the coast, we decided to head to one of the islands along the Kvarner Coast and caught the overpriced car ferry across to Rab.

Rab Island

Determined to get a good night´s sleep after the car experience, we parked the car near the bus terminal, put on a backpack and wandered along in hope of being stopped by a local with the offer of accommodation. Once again we were disappointed, but a kind old man pointed us in the direction of an agency. Finding the location on our guidebook map, we split up. Now I don´t know whether anyone´s been following the story of the Aussie girl who went missing in Croatia? Well, even though we weren´t too concerned about our safety, when we couldn´t find each other, thoughts were racing as to what the other was thinking. When we did eventually find each other, Mark had already secured a room with brekkie included, and great views over this medieval town.

Being mid-October, Rab´s high season is well and truly over, which can get extremely busy. Because of this, there is an abundance of accommodation in town....and yet most will not rent their rooms for less than 3 nights. Furthermore, many of the shops and restaurants just shut down as even those that remain open are struggling for business. We are back to enjoying blue skies and 20 degrees temperatures and all we can think is ¨Where are all the tourists???¨

Deciding to treat ourselves after our previous night of skipping dinner and sleeping in the car, we set out to find roast lamb. Mark had already checked out one venue that had literally only just skinned the lamb....so we checked on the restaurant in our hotel. Unfortunately, lamb was unavailable, but their seafood options sounded good and we accepted a seafood platter for two and a couple of glasses of house wine.....which turned out to be pretty darned good! The wine was tasty and the mountain of seafood was delicious, so we walked out feeling pretty happy about ourselves. Taking a stroll into town through the patchwork of quiet laneways, we found it hard to imagine this place in it´s tourist peak.

Waking to another stunning day, we enjoyed another excellent brekkie downstairs before setting out to spend the morning exploring the tiny town. We then went in search of a beach but as the clouds rolled over,we chose instead to make our way back to the ferry and continue our journey south.

For our final night with the car, we had decided to sleep in it one last time and but were considering paying for a campsite. Not really sure of our next destination, we ended up driving to Pag, another island famous for it´s goats cheese called Paski Sir. The cheese has a unique taste as the goats feed upon sage that grows wild in the island, in a very salty climate. If we thought Rab was deserted however, Pag was a ghost town, and we struggled to even find someone who sold the cheese. We ended up leaving the island, only to find a roadside cafe with ocean views. Deciding to stop for a snack (having missed lunch) we found that they sold the cheese, determining our snack of choice.

Nin

As the sun was close to setting, Mark navigated to a beachside town where we found a beautiful secluded spot by the water´s edge. Right next door was a camp ground with showers and toilets, so we stopped to check the price. The owner seemed surprised to find us there at that time of year and yet not surprised when we told her of our intention to sleep in the car. She was charging 10 euro (AU$20) for the night, which we decided wasn´t worth it when we could sleep 100m away for free.

So off we went to find (surely) the only supermarket open in Croatia (or Europe??) on a Sunday, bought some plonk to help us get to sleep, as well as some supplies for morning and drove down to the water´ś edge to pass some time. Sitting under a street lamp reading our books, we were approached by a Croatian man with limited English who explained that it was very hard to get work since communism had fallen. Makes you wonder about things.....

When it started to get a little cool, we drove back to our little camp spot and started to get organised. We went for a little wander and noticed how mild the night was, which made us decide to sleep outside! Since we have been carrying our roll mats since we left, it would be good to give them some use. Plus we finally got to use the stove Mark has been carrying, cooking ourselves a delicious mushroom and tomato pasta before slipping into a fairly good sleep. In the morning, after a cooked breakfast, a coffee and some juice at our little campsite, we hit the road, parking in Zadar shortly after.

Zadar

Spending only a couple of hours in this bustling medieval coastal town, losing ourselves in the labyrinth of cobbled laneways and visiting various the remains of roman ruins, we finished off with a coffee in one of the many cafes squeezed into the laneways.

Trogir

We continued on to Trogir, another quaint little medieval town on the Dalmation Coast, with the now familiar patchwork of narrow alleys so tyoical of this area.

Split

Finally we arrive in Split, where we need to return our car and we decide to try the same plan of approaching the stations again, with packs on. First stop was the train station, deserted of any hawkers, but around the corner was the bus station where we were finally swarmed. We were offered a room in the old town by an old lady and managed to bargain her down slightly. She quickly got her cousin - who spoke decent English – to try and finish of the sale. ¨Crazy Mary¨, offered to help us return our car and show us to our room, the whole time ranting on and on about how energetic she is at the age of 56 and how she would love to go to Australia and how she loves talking to people, etc etc.

We had our own little granny flat, a very old stone building with a bedroom and kitchenette with a retrofit small bathroom with terrible plumbing! It was only after she had gone that we found a piece of paper outlining the rules of stay, including a check-out time of 8am!!! We figured that they wouldn´t actually enforce this.....

We head down to the old Palace area. Climbing one of the old towers for views over the busy port city before sitting down to a sunset beer along the promenade. We then lost ourselves in the old streets, reading the history of the ancient town on plaques around the town. With several roman ruins, busy markets and plenty of restaurants, cafes and shops, we took an instant liking to this place.

We finished off the night at a very cheap seafood restaurant we´d been recommended, before the previous night´s outside sleep took it´s toll on us and dragged us to bed.

Waking fairly early at 7.30am, we showered and began to pack our things, when Crazy Mary appeared to tell us there was someone waiting for the room and we needed to be out. I expressed my concerns to Crazy Mary, telling her that 8am was unreasonable and that they shouldn´t make such a ridiculously early time to check out, but the poor thing ended up copping it from both me and her cousin who was telling her to shut up and let her run her business.

There really was a girl waiting for our room, but we were at least able to leave our bags there for the day. So we went down to the water for our muesli, where we watched an old guy feed fish to the many stray cats that roam the streets of Split.

Hvar

Arriving at Hvar on the catamaran from Split, we were greeted with a throng of hawkers offering us apartments. We were stoked to find that not only were the prices VERY cheap, but all the facilities were offered. We got our own little apartment high on a hill overlooking the ocean, with a separate bathroom and kitchen and a huge balcony with access to the internet whenever we wanted.

As soon as we´d dumped our bags, our first stop was a nearby quiet beach with crystal clear waters. We dived in and enjoyed a splash before relaxing with our books and a beer in the sinking sun. How´s the serenity!

Our next stop was the market to stock up on fresh food for our little kitchen. Dinner that night was a delicious lamb salad, with a yoghurt dressing and a decent(ish) bottle of red wine. We didn´t even make it into town, crashing early in our VERY comfortable bed.

After brekkie we hit the town, starting the day with a strong coffee in the main square. We then climbed up to the castle that overlooks the harbour, once protecting its shores. From here we had great views of the sparkling waters and the many islands just off Hvar´s shores, tempting us to hire a boat and explore them.

We decided to hire scooters that day though and went in search of the company that was offering a promotion of $15 a day. Not surprised to find the office unattended (we have learned to accept this as a common occurrence in the off-season of Croatia), we decided to wait until the following day when we could get the most of them. Instead, we grabbed some goodies for lunch before heading back to our little beach for the afternoon.

Deciding to eat out that night, we went to compare the prices of the many restaurants and eying off the fresh lobster. To work up our appetites, we firstly strolled along the water´s edge before returning to Bounty, based on a recommendation. Deciding that lobster was way out of budget, we shared a spaghetti marinara and some grilled scampi. This confirmed our original feeling that scampi (and crab for that matter) is way more effort than it´s worth!!

The next morning we went to find the scooter guy, only to be told that his prices had now more than doubled for daily hire. We explained that his posters were still advertising this promotion, but he was not concerned, claiming that it was for last month. Annoyed at this, Mark asks at tourist info if they care about false advertising in Croatia. Apparently they do, but everyone seems to engage in this misleading tactic.

Sitting down to decide what we would now do, we spotted Dino, one of the hawkers from the ferry port, who rented out spectacular looking rooms at only a slightly higher rate that what we were paying. Knowing that he had scooters, we asked if we could get two that day but changed our minds on the way when we heard he had a boat. With so many expensive yachts and catamarans pulling into these shores, we thought we could at least get a feel for the islands from the water and see it all as the rich and famous do!

So down to the harbour we went, got a quick lesson on navigating a boat, instructions on what to do if the cops pulled us up (ie, say that we borrowed it from a friend, not rented it) a quick dash to the nearby supermarket for snacks and we were away... Ducca, ducca, ducca, ducca... only a 5HP motor. So we had plenty of time to enjoy the view.

The islands are a jumble of star fish shaped rocky mounds that contain a number of little coves to pull up and relax in. As there was no one else about, it really felt quite exclusive and carefree. A very nice way to spend a day. The water is a very clear blue and a few fish are about the make you feel hungry.

After a few dips in the ocean and rides among the coves and inlets, we head back to Hvar to enjoy our last night in town. Picking up a few veggies we settled in with a roasted combo, with wild rosemary Mark plucked from his way back from the beach.

This next morning we caught a bus to Stari Grad (where the conductor gave us a discount when he pocketed the fare money) for a ferry to Split (where the ticket collector kept our unvalidated ticket and provided a dodgy stub so he could resell our ticket) and a bus to Mostar. All these transport options lined up very well and we were in Bosnia by nightfall.

So apart from the grumpy, dodgy and corrupt hospitality service, we had a great time in Croatia and highly recommend going after August.

Next stop Bosnia>>