Blogs from Dalmatia, Croatia, Europe - page 86

Saturday 11th July 2009 Woke up during night due to the VERY loud thunder and rain but turned over and went back to sleep fortunately!! Awake at 7am to be packed and at breakfast by 7.30am and we head off from Dubrovnik around 8am. We drive along the Croatian coast till about midday, nowhere to stop for a break but Damo manages to find somewhere around 11.30 for about 45 minutes and from this point we turn away from the coast and head inland along a brand new highway to Split. Most the view today is of rock and scrub hills, you couldn’t really grow a thing along this part of the Croatia it is ALL weathered rock with scrub on it. Our stop in Split is for lunch and we have 2 hours to walk ... read more

I am sitting on our balcony at the Villa Anton in Sukosan as I write this. It is a beautiful sunny morning and at 6 am the air actually feels cool! We arrived here yesterday afternoon once we finally got our rental car. For some reason, the agency wasn’t able to get our credit cards to accept a pre-authorization for damages. After an hour or more we were told that we couldn’t have the car if there was no deposit - even though the rental was pre-paid! We eventually got things worked out thankfully! The major highway from Zagreb to Zadar on the coast is new and very impressive. We went through several tunnels cut through the mountains. I clocked one to be 5 kilometers but there was another that was even longer than that. The ... read more

Time is not on my hands these days. I would love to be able to blog as much as I did when we were travelling for a year, but it is just not possible! Therefore, our recent few days in Dubrovnik, followed by a week in Montenegro will exist in these two short (but sweet?!) blogs... Some of the highlights of our couple of days in Dubrovnik included: * the weather! I loved the blue skies and sunshine. We had perfect weather for our entire trip. If anything, it was too hot, hitting around 35 degrees on most days. This meant that culture was mostly out of the question, so instead we found other sun-friendly ways to amuse ourselves. * walking the city walls at sunset. The perfect time to capture the light on the red ... read more

Croatia: 11th - 18th July 2009 “Umm...now?” I wasn't sure if I'd heard Skipper Ben correctly. I thought he said to stand on the pier, and as the boat motored out of the parking spot (slip?), I was supposed to push a little on the hull so it wouldn't bump or scrape against the pier, and then just as the stern was passing by, I was supposed to climb on. But, Skipper Ben failed to take into account that I'm scatter-brained and uncoordinated, which meant that there were even odds that I'd forget or fail to board at the precise moment. Fortunately, some modicum of survival instinct kicked in at the appropriate time, and I made it aboard as we motored out of the marina at Primosten, Croatia, on the Dalmatian Coast. And thus, our long ... read more

written and contributed by Liz and Ali Warr “Right guys, this next bit is going to be a bit tricky so I just need to explain to you all how it works cos I need you all to help”. In a touching display of faith and courage, Skipper Ben is going to trust his crew of merry buffoons to help him moor a quarter of a million pound yacht. It seems this involves going in backwards, into a small gap between two other people’s doubtless none too cheap yachts. Ah. “So, Raymes, Doug, you take short lines from the stern, Liz we need the fenders all off, Ali you need the boat hook and you take the line the guy passes you up to the bows quick as you can and get the tension on. I’ll ... read more