Chapter 4 - DAY 9 - Plitvice to Split

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The Hotel is located very close to the Park entrance so we had our breakfast, met our guide outside the hotel and walked around to be in time for the Park opening at 8am. This was the ‘get in touch with nature’ part of our trip.

PLITVICE NATIONAL PARK
Plitvice National Park is Croatia’s most popular tourist attraction and it was granted UNESCO World Heritage status in 1979. The special feature of the Park is that it has 16 lakes interconnected by a series of waterfalls. Today we would spend 3 hours in the Park walking around two lakes and enjoying a short boat trip across two others.

The first thing that struck us was the stunning clarity of the water; we could watch the trout swimming around lazily –it was crystal clear. The lakes were also a bright cobalt blue. There were boardwalks at various stages on the journey which were uneven so people had to be careful with their walking. Because it was a walk in the the bush track also had roots and other obstacles. No problem for us but one of our group fell, fortunately she was OK. We also had a slight twisted ankle to add to the casualty ward.

At one stage there was some rubbish on the ground near a bin, someone said why didn’t they just put it in the bin. The guide said “actually it would have been a hungry brown bear looking for food” – not exactly what we wanted to here!

Overall the walk was an easy one and the views were spectacular. It was a great way to spend the morning and totally different from anything else we had done to date. We had a quick bite at the end of the walk and then jumped on the bus and headed for the Dalmatian Coast. On the way down we got a phone call from Terence to say the Warriors had pulled off a miracle win against the Tigers in the NRL playoffs to progress to the semi final – great stuff!

As the bus travels south there is a noticeable change in scenery from forests and green pasture to baron white rock and scrub, the temperature also gets hotter.

TROGIR ISLAND
We stopped for a break at Trogir an Island which is just a short bridge walk from the mainland. Trigor is a historic town and harbour on the Adriatic coast. The city which was founded in the 3rd century by the Greeks was listed as a World Heritage Site in 1997 and there are some of the finest examples of renaissance and Baroque Architecture in the world. For us it was great to be walking through the narrow streets/alleyways with so much character and so many interesting buildings (we’re less about the technical and more about the atmosphere)!

We ended up at the waterfront where we stopped for a quiet beer, watched the yachts coming and going and generally relaxed. On the way back to the coach we had a look around a very good outdoor market. We arrived in Split about 5ish and got settled into our rooms before heading out to a nearby village for a group dinner.

GROUP DINNER
The dinner consisted of a marinated seafood entre – delicious. The main was basically 2 fillets of fish with the skin on and bones in – obviously cooked the local way. Not so appetising for us but not too bad.

The thing that made the night sensational was the entertainment. There were 3 singers/musicians who wandered amongst the dinners playing traditional Croatian instruments but singing many favourite sing-along songs. At the beginning they dedicated a song to each nation represented – the song for New Zealand was Pokarekare Ana. It was a kind of cool, the Aussies joined in and all up we produced a half decent effort.

NOTE
There are a couple of extra photos at the bottom under advert att he base of the page

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Photos

Plitvice National Park
croatia's most visited place, its not hard to see why it was given UNESCO World Heritage satus.

Plitvice National Park
One of the 16 lakes in the Park

Trogir
Lots of narrow streets and alleyways to explore

Crystal Clear Water
Where's my fishing rod!

Walking Plitvice
a great way to spend 3 hours, track was a mixture of boardwalks and natural paths.

Ferry Boat
The boat that took us across two of the lakes

Road to Trogir
A dramatic change in scenery as we head to the Dalmatian Coast

Comments

[Melissa]

Love this photo!

[Melissa]

Trogir
Those little alleyways must have been so much fun to explore :) Looks like a beautiful place.

[GrantD]

Hi
Hi Melissa Yup it was a lot of fun exploring - the layout of the towns is so different to what we have at home. Hope all is well with you guys - say hi to Cam :)