Woke up with a few fuzzy heads and went for brunch at Fifa. Eggs, pancakes (which are more like crepes and technically dessert) and tasty potatoes. Managed to get a hold of Anka and Rike and sat in a cafe for hours talking about everything but mostly politics. It’s interesting hearing the different perspectives coming from different experiences. We also spoke of silly stuff and teased. At 17:00 we realized we still had a palace to visit so we split up, with Homed coming with us and Anka and Rike going off to other plans. We wandered the ruins but a lot of the area was under construction and as it’s a living palace, much wasn’t accessible, but still amazing to see. We did wander underneath the palace which was pretty cool since that part hasn’t been modified much over the centuries. After some naps we decided to check out a restaurant Al recommended called Black Cat, a few blocks out of old-town and it was fantastic! Delicious salads, a nice change from pizza and pasta. Back to town where we stopped for a drink and then met up with Anka, Rike and Al back at the Ghetto. It’s a fantastic place, not as pretentious as some of the others and even has fun-fur on one of the couches and has candles in the stone walls and incense. No music tonight though because the neighbours complain and one is known to drop a bucket of water on the people below. Not as late a night this time as we’re all leaving in the morning but we had a chance for goodbye’s, a picture and address exchanges. Al walked us back and showed us some things in the palace we hadn’t seen yet, like the exact location the emperor stood when proclaiming freedom of religion after so
many years of feeding christians to the lions (like poor afore-mentioned St. Euphemia in Rovigne) Off to bed and tomorrow, the return to Frankfurt where we hope to see Ani again.

We arrived at about 17:00 on the bus and got to experience first-hand the hassling at the bustation we’d been warned about, except it happened up until we actually had our packs off. About 30 people offering accomodation every step we took, including a hoard that was blocking the door as we were trying to get off the bus. We kept saying thank you, we already have arrangements. Which we didn’t, but we knew where we wanted to try first. Al’s hostel. And he was there and there was room and it’s been hella fun since we walked in the door. Not because it’s a crazy party house, Al, the British ex-pat, makes sure it’s not, but because of the friends we’ve made already. It makes a big difference having like-minded people to hang out with and learn from. We met Homed from London in our dorm, and Anka and Rike from Cologne through Homed who had met them on the ferry on his way over. We settled in to our room after going for a bite to eat at an excellent local seafood restaurant, Fifa. Al took us to meet the girls and to a pub called Ghetto and we all enjoyed several hours of his stories and eachothers. After he went home, about 1:00, we wanted to see what else we could find and after following some rather shady seeming directions, the five of us found some packed nightclubs on the beach. We were the only tourists which was extremely obvious while waiting for the loo, ALL the women were done up with 3″ heels, mixed age but mostly quite young (a lot of crying drama queens for some reason) and we were all wearing hikers and most of us over the age of 30, with our hair loose and minimal makeup. I felt like a midget in a room full of Paul and Marie’s. What was really neat though was the music, not one English song unlike every other place we’d been near. They had a live singer at first, then afterwards, piles of Croatian songs that everyone knew the lyrics to, it was fun to be a part of authentic Croatian night life. Most of us staggered home at about 4:00, except me of course, I just walked along with my slightly tipsy mates :) Somehow the day felt like several in one, funnest night so far, sadly, only one more to go.

Somehow I lost day two so I’ll see what I can remember. We ‘moved’ into our new dwelling for the remainder of our stay, not the room we thought but a fairly decent one nonetheless. The furniture is more modern and it has a loft with a futon, kitchenette and bathroom above the main floor where we sleep. Right in the middle of old-town, not bad for €50 a night. It’s pretty loud but I think everywhere is with the continuous construction all over the place. We visited one of the oldest apothecaries in the world that is still functioning and toured the attached museum in the Franciscan monastery as well as the cloister which is just beautiful. We bought some more books to carry us through the rest of our trip. Can’t really remember what else I wrote so on to day four.
Today was beach day so we wandered to the pebbly beach and laid our towels down to read and nap for a few hours. Managed to get a touch of colour but we didn’t go swimming, still too cold for that. We came back to check on the clothing I washed in the morning and I think I’ll be packing wet clothes again, doi! Went to the rector’s palace and museum and wished I could take pictures but we weren’t allowed. The dungeons and iron-works were pretty cool along with all the renaissance paintings from all over. We also checked out a few of the places we had only seen from the fortress walls, so many churches in such a small area! After dinner and some walking we headed to club exit where they were playing some sweet house music and the Dj/part owner came up and bought us beers and hung out with us a while. He invited us to one of the rare parties that goes until 6:00am tomorrow night but alas, we won’t be here. After 1 too many pivo’s for Max, we came back and now it’s sleepy time before another long travel day to Split. Hopefully I’ll manage some wireless there, Dubrovnik’s been pretty awesome for it. I think I know every alley to reach it from now, though I think people probably look at us weird while we geek out on the steps every morning.

This post will be shorter than most since we’ve both been filling up on facebook and twitter quite a bit today. We went for breakfast and wandered a bit, we were going to do the day by the book but our timing was off on some stuff so we went to the museum at the Franciscan monastery which was pretty cool. The cloister inside was just beautiful and reminiscent of my visit to Spain when I was 14. We also did the walk along the fortress walls which was 2km and lots and lots of stairs. Kinda scary since I’m afraid of heights so I was hanging on to both sides where I could and probably looked quite moronic. A lot of the railing were freshly painted which made it difficult. Funny thing though was that most of the other tourists in front and behind us were Spanish so I got to practise some today. I even got made fun of when I slipped (I didn’t totally bail though fortunately) at one point and a group noticed my Birkenstocks and were teasing me and asking if they were from roman times. We went down for some freshly made gelato, a little more worn out than we thought we’d be and we went back and finished our books. Went back out for dinner and interwebs, started new books, and then went out again to a nearby pub. I tried to drink a beer again but failed and switched to Orangina. We didn’t hear one Croatian song though, all English from the 80’s to mid 90’s. Tomorrow we aim to find a beach and get our travel to Split sorted out, we’re hoping to take a ferry but have had no luck so far finding a clear schedule so we may be bussing it. G’nite mamma since you’re probably my only regular reader :)

A much better sleep at this hostel, warm and the pillows are 3x as thick as the ones in Pula. Had breakfast, grabbed some internets, then came back to read while the rain had some fun. The challenge of getting the car returned started, thankfully it was SO much better to drive the roads when I knew what was coming as opposed to getting caught off guard. It was pretty fun and now Max thinks I’m almost as crazy as the Croatians, either that or he’s just being nice, afraid to wake up the beast again :) We caught a bus from the airport back to town and wandered in awe of the fortress. We walked in the former moat to the beach and watched the waves crash against the rocks while we had gelato. We also found an amazing room in the old-town that we move in to tommorrow, right near the center of everything, up a narrow alley, in a home filled with interesting artwork everywhere and each room is completely different than the next, all for less than half what we paid for the hotel in Sibenek. We had dinner with our french roomates and chatted about movies and politics and now we’re all in our bunks and ready to split off tomorrow while we go to old-town and they head to Pula. I will miss them but not the ladder up to my bunk!
P.S. An update on Carolien and Bert, they made it to Instanbul for pita and are now in Athens for Carolien’s 20th birthday.

This morning started at 7:00. We had slept so well we thought we had slept in! Packed up all my finally dry things, including the things I had washed the previous night and I even blow dried my shiny locks. We started driving to Krka national park and stopped for something to eat, I had crepes and Max had roasted suckling pig, it joined the dinner in Rovigne in our top 3 best meals. The drive through the countryside was really beautiful yet a little sad as we passed many bombed out houses, on what happens to be the anniversary of the start of the war responsible for the destruction. We got to the park after getting a bit turned around, absolutely stunning, we hiked all the paths and took lots of pictures. Unfortunately we didn’t get to see the remains of the camp of the 9th legion who had been there for two centuries, BC and AD. We continued on the freeway until it ended, about 160km from Dubrovnik. Enter some of the most stressful driving in my life. Hairpin turns, no shoulder, steep drops, crazy drivers. At speed limit it was ok but the tailgating and ‘pointers’ from my dear, lovely husband, brought the stress level up. Absolutely no-one drives the speed limit here and they’ll fill your rear view mirror with thier angry faces riding your bumper until they get a chance to pass you. I’ve driven through mountains before in pretty rough conditions but this had it’s own magical pain that I would hope to never have to do again. When we finally got to Dubrovnik, I had my little freak-out fit until I could just park the thing and walk away from it so I could start breathing again and decrease my tension level enough to be civil. Max got us set up at the youth hostel and we went to the recommended eatery where we both had lasagne and the smiles came back as we added the third greatest meal to our top 3. We’re back now in our bunks, listening to the night noises of the clubs down the street and the crazy motorcyclists wizzing by. We’ve met two new peeps, a brother(Bruno) and sister(Christine) duo from the south of France and thankfully they’re nothing like the rowdies from Zagreb, if anything, we’re the ones keeping them up with Max reading below and me on my iPod. Tomorrow we take the car back and see if we can get lodging a bit closer to old-town, hopefully get some wireless since the hotel passwords last night didn’t work.

Hello from a lush hotel room in Sibenek! How did that happen? I’ll start with our night in the hostel in Pula. It was freezing and damp and even with 3 thick blankets, I still ended up squishing in with Max in the less than 3′ wide bunk where his sleeping bag was working warm magic. There was a heater but it was broken. There was a weak shower that was also broken and the shower head kept falling off. We then had the included breakfast which was a slice of bread and some rather tasty tea. We decided we were going to get out of Dodge and never sleep there again and headed to town, hiking back out, uphill, with our packs. The book mentioned a Garderobe (luggage storage) at the train station. It was pretty much abandoned so we hiked, uphill, with our packs, to the bus station where we had better luck. We asked about a car rental but they only had luxury cars left so we decided we’d take the bus. We then headed to town to wander the ruins and enjoy the day. It was pretty incredible to wander about the colliseum that Emporer Augustus starting building in 31BC (remember the guy after Caesar?) I think it might even be where the afore-mentioned Saint Euphemia was eaten by lions. We loosely followed the map but mostly just explored and wandered about. The historical museum was kinda lame in it’s display but awesome in that we could wander about the old castle unhindered. There were even some kids smoking weed in the former moat. After about 4 hours, around 3:00, everything started closing up so we went back to the bus station to get our tickets, it goes overnight every day at 8:00pm. Except today and tomorrow. Same with the planes. We weren’t quite sure what to do at that point so we had beer. We started calling all the car rental agencies even though the hostel and travel agent had already tried. We were soooo lucky it’s ridiculous, the guy was just leaving for the day and came and got us from the bus station and took us to our little Fiat. It was only about $50 more than the bus would have been. So we got in and I drove (don’t worry, didn’t even drink half of the afore-mentioned beer). I haven’t driven stick in about 3 years but I only stalled it a couple times. The cities are a bit chaotic to drive but the highways are much better than home. We were just going to go until the end of daylight but I wasn’t tired yet so I kept going until we got near Split. We were going to sleep in the car but it’s too small so we decided to splurge, the only rooms available were in a resort area. We’d had some chilly sleeps, our clothes were still wet, and few options. So now we find ourselves on a bed that fits both of us for the first time since we left home and wireless. And a TV which Max is enjoying as I write this. For anyone wondering about my run-on sentences and sporadic writing habits, it’s because I do my blog posts on my iPod when I’m tired and grammatically lazy and can only send when I get wireless which is spotty from one city to the next. We do go to the cafe’s where I’ve been updating my twitter feeds. Going to have a good sleep and see what tomorrow brings! We’re aiming for a national park and Dubrovnik by evening.

Today’s been a bit of an adventure. In the morning, we packed up our still wet things and couldn’t find the girl to pay for our stay so we went to breakfast in the hopes of running into her playing again (she’s about 7, her mom left her in charge) We didn’t see her so we took turns going back to the hostel to see if she had returned and we were successful on the second try. We hopped on the bus to Pula and arrived around 2:00 and after figuring out the local bus, missing a stop and hiking along the Adriatic coastline, we arrived at the hostel. So far Zagreb has been the easiest to get around with it’s much missed trams. This place is far from the center as it’s also a campground and we’re in a little trailer with bunkbeds so it feels a bit like camp Kannawin in Sylvan Lake. Most of the others here are young Italians who are doing their own thing so we’ve only really chatted with the staff. The site has it’s own little cove and is quite beautiful if a little out of the way. We did wander in for some food and that turned into a bit of a disaster. We asked at the beginning if they took Visa before ordering so we would know what we could afford since we only had 100kuna on us (hadn’t hit a bank yet foolishly) she took the Visa for about half an hour only to come back and say no. We asked about a bank pointing to the translation just to be sure and she gave a vague point in the direction so Max went to go find it. It ended up taking him 45 minutes of walking to the center of town as it turns out there was nothing nearby and through some pretty sketchy areas. If we had known, the hostel was much closer and we had backup euro’s there. I asked for the phone to figure out what was up with Visa (I had done my due diligence before leaving and called to let them know we were going to be in Croatia) but apparently there was no phone either. Maybe she just didn’t like us, who knows but it really sucked. Back at the hostel we hiked down the cove and hung out on some rocks to catch the sunset and then made a little blanket sleeping bag cave to sleep in. It’s been pretty chilly in Istria and Max seems to have the sniffles pretty bad, we’re hoping it’s just allergies. We’re going to bed quite early so we can wake up early and get to town to see the Roman ruins and see if we can rent a car to get to Dubrovnik as apparently one bus ticket is about the cost of renting anyway and I think we’ll get a lot more out of it than sitting on a bus for 15 hours. The other way is by ferry but we’ve missed the boat on that one. Pun intended, insert groan.

We’ve discovered this beautiful town is quite sleepy, especially when it’s overcast. We went to get breakfast this morning but nothing really seemed alive yet except the market so we picked up a kilo of strawberries to snack on until we found something open at 11:00 where we had some tasty omelettes. This town feels much different than Zagreb with a population of less than 20,000 and seems more Italian than what we’ve seen and heard in Croatia so far. We wandered to the cathedral of Saint Euphemia who was martyred by Emporer Diocletian in 290AD. I lit a candle for my grandmother and we checked out the sarcophagus and the history before heading back to wash clothes and have a siesta (they’re becoming a pleasant daily occurance). We woke up and the sun had come to greet us this time and we grabbed some pasta and pizza to fuel the rest of the day. We walked to the cemetary where there were rumours of a 3,500 year old burial ground, the only example of a Myacenaean tomb outside of Greece. Wrong cemetary. We couldn’t find it on any of our references so I’ll just have to go to Greece to see one then. We briefly entertained the idea of going to Venice for the day tomorrow but we decided to remain in Croatia since that’s what we came here for and to keep near budget. Things have been a bit more expensive than was expected with hostel accomodations running around €40-€50 when we had planned for around €30. Good budgeting practise for the big trips coming up, still room for more gelato though! We’re back in now as everything seems to shut down at 9:00, but we managed to pick up a Kras chocolate bar that we’ve been wanting to try since our stay near the factory. Tomorrow, we head to Pula a day early to try to get to Dubrovnik for Easter. Hopefully our clothes have dried by morning so we’re not packing wet things! Our stay has been a bit shorter than we intended but it’s been very sweet!

Back in bed after having showered, washed some clothes, and almost finished packing again. Finally figured out the wireless, on our last day here of course! It doesn’t travel building to building like at home because everything is made of stone and cement instead of wood. We went back to town and did 5 more hours of walking around upper and lower town following the guide from the hostel. Considering we wandered the area about 4 times already there was a lot we hadn’t seen yet. More than once we turned a corner and let out an audible “wow!”. At one point Max was insisting there couldn’t possibly be a road there and there it was, just because there wouldn’t be a road there in Canada, doesn’t mean there won’t be one in Croatia. Amazing little hidey-holes and alleys and roads in every direction. We decided it was a good idea we hadn’t rented a car. We also went to eat at a restaurant down an alley which was listed in good old Lonely Planet. At first the service seemed a little brusque until I started trying to speak Croatian and then the waiter brightened up noticably. We came back to the hostel and tried to upload some pictures (like the lego human sized storm trooper!) but it was a big FAIL. You’ll have to wait until we get back it seems. Now I turn out the lights and go to sleep smelling the chocolate air from the neighbouring chocolate factory.
Update: the French elephants showed up waking the whole building, stomping up the stairs, banging on doors, etc. It started about 1:30 and lasted an hour. Karma came back on them though, the morning started with the pitter-patter, giggling and shrieking of pre-schoolers that arrived earlier yesterday. Max and I were giggling in our beds at the justice of it.