Croatia was supposed to be our slice of heaven with endless beaches and plenty of relaxation. As it turns out it was the start of many painful travel hiccups and ended with us chucking in the towel and heading for Italy.
We had a few night just across the border in Gorizia, Italy, where we had high hopes of checking out the Prosecco region. That didn’t end up happening due to there not being any real winery tours to be taken so we spent the day in Trieste with expectations that it would be cool due to it’s mix of Slavic, Latin and German cultures. Turns out it was just another city with a few nice buildings and large amounts of cruise ship tourists.
We said goodbye to Tash’s parents and then caught the train down to transfer to the bus and onwards to Opatija. We hadn’t printed the tickets which turned into a saga and ended with us having to re-buy the tickets with only seconds to spare. It was a short journey so not too bad.
Tash found this beautiful boutique hotel right near the beach and we spent a few days relaxing by the coast, walking the Lungomare, swimming in the Adriatic and sucking back some cheap Croatian beer.
Next stop was Zagreb and what should have been an easy journey turned into a right shit one. We booked our bus tickets and showed up at the stop (admittedly I didn’t exactly check the correct place the bus might be picking us up) and saw it pull up in the distance at the last minute, running over only to have the driver pretty much give us the finger and shut the door in our face before driving off. We then had to get another bus to Rijeka and buy our tickets again (is there a theme building here?). We arrived late and in Zagreb’s stifling humidity had to trek to our airbnb which was in an old Soviet looking building that looked like it may have actually been bombed. The plusses were: stopping for a beer to use the internet and realising they were only A$1 and the hosts being really cool and hanging out with us for a couple of hours when we arrived. Although, they were massive Croatia haters who were heading to Ireland the following week as that’s the only place that would take them (their words).
We spent the next few days taking the bus out of Zagreb to Velika Goricia to hang with more of Tash’s family, the Slavs this time. The hospitality of Anna, Mario, Ivan & Luka was above and beyond and they treated us to a wonderful meal at a local restaurant where Mario and I got stuck into some Croatian whiskey. Feeling a bit dusty the next day we were back at their place for lunch and Mario was cracking open the homemade whiskey from the coke bottle at 11.30am, oh dear. More meat for lunch, it’s the Croatian way! We then went and visited Tash’s great aunt Bara to catch up on the local family gossip.
During our time in Zagreb we did a brief walk around the city but the 38 degree heat was rather oppressive so we spent what little spare time we had in our Soviet bunker in front of the air-con which unfortunately didn’t reach into the bedroom.
We thought it would be nice to catch the train down to Split but upon arriving at the train station in the morning we were advised that the train wasn’t running and we would be taking a replacement bus, not really problem but yet another slight travel annoyance.
We arrived in Split and it was HOT. And we had a 30min walk to get to our next airbnb pad. After getting lost, we arrived at our next soviet styled shitty apartment block that was conveniently not represented in the photos. The apartment was nice but the a/c didn’t reach the bedroom (again!) so it was beyond uncomfortable at night which had me sleeping on the couch with a towel for a sheet. That was kind of the last straw and we decided that that was enough for Croatia and we would be back when we had planned it ahead of time and it wasn’t peak season. Split itself was beautiful and a joy for eating and indulging in bargain priced ice cream. We did a day trip down to the stunning Brela beach and finished up with some amazing burgers and beers by the beach before jumping on the overnight ferry to Ancona in Italy.
J & T
don't give away the end 