Dalmation Coast, Croatia

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This is a guest post by Peggy, Della’s mom, who joined us, along with Wayne, for 14 days in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia Herzegovina.

After finishing up at Plitvice Lakes National Park, we headed directly to the coast. Our first stop was Zadar. This was high on Della and Eric’s list because Zadar is home to Maraska, a maker of slivovitz. We didn’t find a brewery tour but we did find the equivalent of an outlet store. We bought several small bottles. Peg’s favorite was Orahovac, made of green walnut.

Zadar is famous for its sunsets and we were not disappointed. It’s really nice sitting on the sea wall listening to the eerie but somewhat repetitive sounds of the sea organ. Embedded pipes in the sea wall produce the sound. We were a little disappointed by the Salute to the Sun but maybe it wasn’t quite dark enough to fully appreciate its virtues. It reminded us of water fountains, like the one in front of Denver’s natural history museum. Instead of randomly shooting water it randomly produces lights in the pavement. (Editor’s Note: We tried to take videos of the Sea Organ and Salute to the Sun but neither came out great). In the morning, Della and Wayne took a quick swim on the more sheltered side of town.

Then we were off to Split. The main attraction here is Diocletian’s palace, built for the retirement of the emperor of the Roman empire around 300 AD. There are an interesting mix of original roman structures and other houses and shops built during the next several centuries after villagers moved inside the walls following the Slavic invasion in 700 AD.

In both Zadar and Split we had excellent airbnbs in fairly ugly high rise Tito era buildings, but with modern interiors. We think both cities warranted longer stays.

The view from our highrise during a rainstorm

The view from our highrise during a rainstorm

The next day we drove to Dubrovnik. We had a bit of a snafu when our airbnb canceled at the last minute due to a roof leak. Our host helped us find something else, though not quite as nice. We also had a snafu with the rental car. The office was closed so we left the car and hoped for the best. It all turned out OK.

Dubrovnik is a beautiful walled city which oozes charm.  But it was packed with tourists and felt a teeny bit like Disney world. Or perhaps the set for a film. Which indeed it was. We missed Game of Thrones filming by a couple of days!  We spent 2 days in Dubrovnik. We enjoyed walking the wall and also swimming in a cool lagoon.

While everywhere we went in Croatia had great natural beauty and grand historic sites, there is also ample evidence of the recent ugly past and the damage from the Yugoslav wars. The area around Plivice had been home to many Serbs, placed there by the Austrians to serve as a first line of defense against the Ottomons.  You could see many abandoned homes.  And of course Dubrovnik was subject to a siege, although the war stories in Croatia paled in comparison to those we heard later in Bosnia.

Plitvice Lakes, Croatia

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This is a guest post by Peggy, Della’s mom, who joined us, along with Wayne, for 14 days in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia Herzegovina.

We drove from Skocjan Caves in Slovenia to a town near Plitvice Lakes National Park back in Croatia. We stopped midway at Opatija, an old resort town from the Hapsburg Empire era.  We enjoyed strolling along the seaside path.

We stayed at an apartment rented through AirBnB in the small town of Rudanovac, about ten minutes from the park entrance. Our host worked at a local brewery and brought us several bottles of beer to enjoy. We ate one of our best meals at a nearby restaurant. It was all such a pleasure because everyone was wonderfully friendly, which came as a surprise since Rick Steves told us to expect otherwise.

Our day for visiting the park was very cloudy and misty. While it never really got sunny, it fortunately cleared enough that we could see the wondrous sights.  We were charged the winter admission charge of 55 kuna, about $10, half the normal summer rate. It turned out many paths along the lakes were underwater, so we missed some of the neat things in the park.  Nevertheless, it was quite something. Lake follows lake down a mountain slope, separated by travertine rock dams, and hence, waterfalls. Some of the waterfalls are high, others short and wide.  It is an incredible world of still and running water and mist. You walk along numerous paths, sometimes high above, sometimes just below the falls.  Many of the paths are boardwalks constructed of non milled timber (in other words – from logs and branches). There is a boat ride for one stretch and a shuttle bus that takes you from the upper lakes back down to the lower lakes.

We were there in shoulder season, on a not so nice day, in a relatively remote part of Croatia. Even so this park is CROWDED. We were ahead of the big tour groups, but even so there were lots of people. It was a bit hard to get unobstructed views but people were generally in good spirit about jockeying for position.

We were told that Krka Park (another in Croatia that is somewhat similar to Plitvice) has somewhat similar formations and allows swimming. At Plitvice you are not allowed in the water. Had it been hotter, that rule would have made us very unhappy because the water was clear and beautiful.

Fast Forward Friday: Pokhara, Nepal

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Fast Forward Friday is our series where we share our anticipation for our upcoming travel destinations! Check our itinerary for more details!

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Source: Wikipedia

We are super excited to visit Nepal for many reasons. The largest is probably because many of Della’s students come from there. Pokhara, specifically, is exciting because a good friend of ours from Delaware came from there and it looks like a beautiful city. It is the second largest city in the country and three of the world’s tallest 10 mountains are close by. It is an ideal location to set of on a trek.

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Monthly Recap: Month 3

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Here we are at Month 3. Hard to believe. We’re still going strong, though Della is going through her first bout of true homesickness. This was an emotional and eventful month. We dedicate our thoughts this month to two wonderful women who lived long, meaningful lives. We both lost our grandmothers this month. Lucille, Della’s grandma, was 101 years old. Marvis, Eric’s grandma, was 94. They were both kind, caring, and generous. They will be missed.

Here are our stats for this month.

Countries visited: 6 (Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Montenegro)

Beds Slept In: 16

UNESCO Heritage Sights Visited: 8 (Levoca Spišský Hrad and the Associated Cultural Monuments, Budapest including the Banks of the Danube the Buda Castle Quarter and Andrassy Avenue, Škocjan Caves, Plitvice Lakes National Park, Historical Complex of Split with the Palace of Diocletian, Old City of Dubrovnik, Old Bridge Area of the Old City of Mostar, Natural and Culturo-Historical Region of Kotor) Total on RTW: 23

We traveled by 0 planes this month!

We traveled by 4 trains (though one of them involved a train, a transfer to a bus, then a transfer back to a train!)

We traveled by 5 long distance buses.

We traveled by 2 different rental cars which took us from Zagreb to Dubrovnik, then Dubrovnik to Sarajevo and back!

Top Moments:

~ Our first top moment came at the very beginning of the month! We had long been looking forward to visiting Spis Castle. We had planned to do it as a day trip from Ždiar, but felt thwarted by it being a holiday weekend and therefore bad bus schedules. We switched our plan and it totally worked out for the best. We added one more UNESCO site of the old town of Levoča and were able to spend a wonderful day at the castle. The weather was glorious and the castle even exceeded our expectations!

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The amazing Spis Castle

 

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~ We had a top moment when, after a long day of traveling, we were able to successfully meet Della’s parents at the bus station in Zagreb. It involved both her parents making a train, bus, train connection as well as us doing the same. We converged on Zagreb one Saturday evening- Peggy and Wayne from Vienna and Della and Eric from Eger. Della and Eric arrived first, connected with our VRBO host, and then decided to head back to the train station to meet Peggy and Wayne’s train. It made for quite a happy reunion!

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~ During our two weeks with Della’s parents, we had the benefit of Peggy’s Rick Steves’ Guide Book. (Eric loved that book and might consider it a top moment by itself!) Rick had warned us not to expect too much from the people in the Plitvice Lakes region of Croatia, stating that often the service left something to be desired. We were so pleasantly surprised during another one of our top moments. We had a long day of driving to arrive in the Plitvice Lakes region. We met our Airbnb host, who was wonderfully friendly, making sure we had everything we needed in a great apartment. He even brought up some free beers from the local brewery where he works. We then headed to a restaurant that he recommended where we enjoyed the service of a wonderful man. He was friendly, funny, and competent. It was just a cherry on top when he gave us travarica (Eric’s new favorite liquor) shots on the house!

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The beer was actually quite tasty!

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Dessert with free shots!

~ Eric and Della returned to Dubrovnik after a few days in Bosnia-Herzegovina with Della’s parents. They said goodbye to Peggy and Wayne in Mostar before driving the rental car back into Croatia. We weren’t really looking forward to spending more time in Dubrovnik given that we had been slightly underwhelmed by our first experience (high prices and a LOT of tourists). We were also a little depressed after having to say goodbye to Della’s parents. However, we enjoyed another glorious, sunny day (after many of rain) upon our return. There was no drama with returning the car (which was unexpected) and we found our lodging quickly, despite having to hike up 421 stairs with our bags. But it was the next day that really brought the top moment- we found out that Game of Thrones was filming in the city at that moment. We slept in (which could have been a top moment also) and then headed into the city to hunt for the sites of filming. Turned out that it was easy to find. We were able to watch them setting up for a large scene this coming season. The excitement came when we, first, got to listen to what must have been the camera director explaining exactly how the scene was to be shot and getting some inside info about what was coming! Then we saw LITTLEFINGER walk right by us! Finally, when we weren’t even expecting it (sitting on the square, enjoying a Coke Zero and some snacks), we looked up and saw CERSEI walk right by. Della feels like she even got a smile. =) What fun!

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Eric is the King in the ever-continuing Game of Thrones

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We were right there with the official Baratheon/Lannister banner!

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It was quite fascinating to watch them set up for what is probably one scene. So many people and so much work involved.

Runners up for Top Moments:

~Della, especially, loved all of Hungary. She doesn’t have any really great reasons except that it was extremely enjoyable and she somehow identified with the place and people. She wishes that she could list the whole time in Hungary as a top moment, but we try to be a little more specific in these recaps. So, we picked a moment that was in Eger, Hungary. You probably read how we experienced some pretty depressing, rainy days in Eger. There was one day in particular where we were quite annoyed. We had a lot we wanted to do, but we just weren’t feeling like getting soaking wet while trying to do it. So, we headed back to our pension to relax and read. All of a sudden, after a few hours holed up in the room, we glanced to the window and saw the sun peeking from behind the clouds. We dropped what we were doing and ran out to visit the Eger Castle before it closed. What views!

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The clouds actually added to the effect

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We love castles and views…

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so happy the sun came out!!

~ The middle of our trip with Della’s parents was plagued with a bit of bad luck: we experienced days of gloomy rain, bouts of bad colds (all of us in succession), injuries (Della tweaked her back, Peggy’s toe continued to bother her, and Wayne sprained his ankle badly), unpleasant experiences (lodging being cancelled on us at the last minute and then having to pay more for less, car companies who didn’t do what they said and then literally yelled at us and hung up on us, threating to let the car be towed instead of allowing us to return it: Sixt Car Rental, by the way), some sad family news from back home, etc. I tell you all of this because it was the backdrop for one of our runners up for top moment. After all of this stuff to make us unhappy, we arrived in Sarajevo. Sarajevo is a difficult city to visit for a number of reasons, but we found it amazing. We also were able to finally find affordable, good food. This may sound like a small thing, but, somehow good dining options seem to be able to make or break a place for us. We found multiple pleasant restaurants with genuine servers, good prices, and tasty food. (Even the hardest person to please among us was happy!) Our last night with Della’s parents was amazingly pleasant. We dined in our second town in Bosnia Herzegovina, Mostar. The evening at a restaurant with all the above, plus a great ambiance, and amazing views of the wonderful Old Bridge of Mostar.

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Happy campers… er… eaters!

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Local food delicacy called Burek. Yum!

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Our meal, see the view in the background.

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This lovely bridge!

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Sunset in Mostar, adding to the wonderful ambiance of our final dinner

~ See above for the lead up to this second runner up as well. We had had many days of rain during our trip and expected many more. We arrived in the Plitvice Lakes region on a cloudy evening, had a wonderful dinner (see above top moment), and slept well (except for Della who was fighting the cold at that time). We woke up to more cloudy, gloomy weather, which was truly unfortunate for our trip to the amazing Plitvice Lakes. We had been looking forward to this for a long time, reading blog after blog about how wonderful these lakes were. This is what they are supposed to look like.

Image Credit: adventurouskate.com

This is what they actually looked like when we arrived.

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The rain had also caused many of the wooden paths to be closed due to flooding. We were quite distraught but hiked on anyway. The top moment arrived when, at around noon, the sun was able to peek through the clouds! It wasn’t perfect, but it gave us the light that we had been hoping for. The mist cleared and we were able to enjoy the second part of the lakes!

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The lovely upper lakes

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The sun is out!

~ We had a wonderful time with Della’s parents, however, because their trip was short and there was a lot they wanted to see, we moved very fast! We rented cars and zipped from city to city, mostly spending only one night in each location. This was great because we saw a lot, however, we were quite exhausted by the time Peggy and Wayne left. Traveling like that is OK when you get to go home after, but on this long trip, we can’t keep up that kind of pace. We knew we wanted to slow down and thought that maybe we had found the place to do it. We headed to the bayside town of Kotor in Montenegro. We had booked an apartment through booking.com and didn’t exactly know what to expect. We arrived to a great place! Spacious, homey, and with almost everything we could want. We had already decided to hunker down for a few days, but now we think we might even go for more!

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Stay tuned to the blog for more pictures of the actual town. It is lovely.

Items Missing, Broken, Discarded, or Added:

Discarded/Broken:

1. Eric’s computer. We were quite frustrated because we had bought a lightweight netbook for the purpose of this trip, but by the second month of the trip, it was starting to malfunction. It wouldn’t start up regularly and we began to worry that it was on its last legs. Luckily, we were able to buy a new one, ship it to Della’s parents and have them bring it to us.

2. Della’s cell phone battery. While in Budapest Della’s phone died. Luckily, it turned out to just be the battery. Unluckily, we were told that the specific battery she needed was not sold anywhere in Hungary. Cue a late night rush to the store in Denver by Wayne (Della’s dad) the day before they left to meet us.

Added:

1. See above: New computer and new cell phone battery, purchased at home and brought to us

2. New soap

3. New toothpaste and two new toothbrushes

Packing Update:

We’re still mostly happy with the contents of our bags. We probably have more than we really need. We still feel like we haven’t used some of our summer clothing. Shorts haven’t been worn virtually at all. We have finally used our swim suits (swimming in the Adriatic, next to the walls of Dubrovnik, and in Zadar) and we made use of our cold weather gear again during our time in Sarajevo. We also have been potentially carrying more books with us at a time then strictly needed.

Books Read: (Have you read any of these??)

Della has read Poland by James Michener, Everything is Going to be Great by Rachel Shukert, The Bridge at Andau by James Michener, Final Epidemic by Earl Merkel

Eric has read Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, Fire From Heaven by Mary Renault, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Eric and Della have BOTH read Stonehenge by Bernard Cornwell.

Make sure to catch up on all our monthly recaps: Monthly Recap 1, Monthly Recap 2

Slovenia (in a rush)

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This is a guest post by Peggy, Della’s mom, who joined us, along with Wayne, for 14 days in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia Herzegovina.

After picking up our rental car, we were off on our rather short drive to Slovenia. It was an easy border crossing, but you do have to stop to buy a sticker that allows you to drive on the Slovenian toll roads – good for a week.

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Entering Slovenia from Croatia. You stop right through the booths on the right and buy your sticker from a little van.

It took 1.5 hours to Ljubljana. After a quick stop at our AirBnB apartment, we quickly drove on to Lake Bled, another 45 minutes. This is Slovenia’s premier resort area. It reminded us a lot of Lake Tahoe. What distinguishes it is a small island near one end with a pretty church and a huge castle on top of a cliff at the other end. We walked fully around the lake (it isn’t as big as Tahoe) and climbed to the castle for grand views. We also stopped for a great cream cake pastry, a specialty of the area. We were grateful that morning rain gave way to partial sun in the afternoon and mad that we left our bathing suits with our luggage in Ljubljana.

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SO FRUSTRATED that one of the only pictures of all four of us was accidently taken with fish eye effect…. fail!!

We had an apartment with a big kitchen so we opted to cook our own meals both nights. We were happy to find a vinotoc, a place where you go to fill your own bottles from the wine barrel.

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Day 2 was spent in Ljubljana. We did a “free” walking tour. About 50 people showed up at Preseren square and they split us into 2 groups. Our guide Neja was quite good. The old town spans the river and there are multiple bridges each with its own character, the triple bridge, the dragon bridge, the cobblers bridge, and the new butchers bridge with cool glass walkways. One highlight was the new bronze door on the cathedral, commemorating a visit by Pope John Paul. Its depiction of Slovene history was interesting, as were the explanations of recent Yugoslav history provided by the guide. After the walking tour we went on our own to a different part of old town to see the Serbian orthodox church, passing the US embassy in a neat old building en route. Ljubljana is a pretty city, greatly influenced by an architect named Plecnik. We had really hoped to see his house/museum but this time our guidebook was unfortunately correct when it noted it was closed for renovation.

On day 3 we drove about 1.5 hours to the karst region to visit UNESCO world heritage site Skocjan caves. The area is mostly limestone which is soft and porous. There are two parts to the cave, a silent dry part with really large caverns. There are some interesting rock formations but nothing as interesting as say Carlsbad Caverns. The second part is an active cave with a huge river running through immense caverns. Definitely class 6 rapids. This part was interesting and pretty unique as you cross over the rushing river on a high bridge which affords stunning views of the cavern. When you exit the cave, you walk perhaps another mile through an area which used to be cave but where the Limestone roof grew thin and collapsed. So its now kind of like a lushly vegetated caldera with a river canyon.

After leaving Skocjan, we headed back to Croatia.

 

Zagreb, Croatia

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This is a guest post by Peggy, Della’s mom, who joined us, along with Wayne, for 14 days in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia Herzegovina.

On September 13, two trains converged on Zagreb, the capitol of Croatia. One, coming from Hungary, carried Della and Eric. The other came from Vienna and carried Peggy and Wayne. Both train rides ended up including one bus segment and a change of train due to washouts of the tracks.

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Transferring from the train to the bus, to go through town and then get back on the train!

Peg and Wayne were thrilled when they found Della and Eric waiting for them at the train station close to midnight. It was a happy reunion.

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Connecting at the train station!

The next day, we started our exploration of Zagreb in a park just south of Jelacic square. We stumbled onto some pan-Slavic festival with music and dance. Best of all there were booths representing regions /ethnic groups, each offering small plates of food or drink, all for free! We gathered this was a once a year event. The only bad thing was it poured rain much of the time.

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The rainy festival

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Wonderful festival with great food and drink from many different Slavic countries

From there, we embarked on a self guided walking tour, learning as we went from Rick Steves, well read by Eric. We started in Gradec, one of 2 medieval villages that combined to form Zagreb. The thing you see in all the guide books is St. Mark’s church with a great tile roof incorporating decorations including the Zagreb seal.

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We were happy to find the Mestrovic Atelier open. Our guide book said it would be closed for restoration. Mestrovic was a prolific sculptor whose works remind you of Rodin. He spent the end of his life in the US having fled Tito’s Yugoslavia. Peg especially loved his weird John the Baptist. His most famous work may be of Gregory of Nin, a bishop who was a hero to the Croatians. The huge statue is actually in Split, (which we saw later) it was mostly covered up undergoing extensive restoration.

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Peg’s favorite

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Study for Gregory of Nin. The real statue is in Split- though currently under renovation and covered by scaffolding

Della and Eric decided to climb the Lotrščak tower for some good views of the city and St. Mark’s. Peg and Wayne waited at the bottom with a small cup of coffee.

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Zagreb from on high

We also went to the Museum of Broken Relationships. Someone had a good idea: Ask people for a personal story and a memento from some relationship that has ended. The stories were mostly about romantic love, but some stories touched on parent-child relationships. Almost all had universal appeal, some funny, many very touching. Several stories came from Coloradans.

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It was a great idea!

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This was one of the smallest stories. Some were much longer and more meaningful!

We then went to the second medieval village called Kaptol. The main attraction was the Cathedral.

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We finished up with traditional Croatian food, including venison.

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Our big struggle the next day was figuring out how to get to our rental car. We had one reservation for the correct days, but it was 4 miles away and we couldn’t figure out any transit options. The other reservation was for wrong days but we could get to on the tram. We opted for the tram and luckily could change the days to match our needs.

One final note re transit. The old towns were pedestrian only. The main square had no cars but many, many trams running through.

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Moments of Misery: Rain, Rain, and More Rain

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There is almost nothing worse to dampen your spirits than rain when you are traveling. We have certainly had our fair share of rain during our time in Europe, but there is something especially miserable in knowing that it is going to rain the entire time that you are visiting a town. That is what happened to us in Eger, Hungary. The forecast was for rain for the entire time we were visiting. We had such high expectations for our time here! The first day wasn’t terrible. It rained lightly on and off all day, so we did most of the indoor things we had planned. We hoped to do the famous castle on our second day and return to the Valley of Beautiful Women (a 30 min walk from town). We woke up to steady rain. We had one more indoor activity we were interested in, so we headed out to do that hoping that the forecast of less rain in the afternoon would hold true. It did not.

Soaked and miserable, we headed back to our pension. Blargh.

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*Update: later in the evening, the rain did stop and we were able to rush and walk through the castle after all!! 😁

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Budget: Hungary

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This is one of our Budget series of posts to give you an idea of how much we spent traveling around the world. Here we will look at Hungary. Check our posts to see what kind of activities we did and where we stayed!

In Hungary we used forint. We converted to US dollars using the current conversion rates at the time of our visit. It was approximately 240 forint to one dollar.

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Total Spent (8 days): $767.77

We normally break down into the following categories:

Accommodation: $284.85

We stayed in two hostels in Budapest: one dorm and one private room host. We stayed in a pension in Eger.

Activities: $186.81

We did three free tours in Budapest and tipped for them all. We visited the Szechenyi baths in Budapest which was somewhat pricey. We also experienced our first Escape Room game in Eger in addition to entering a few museums and other sights.

Alcohol: $34.50

We did a Pub Tour in Budapest and wine tasting in the Valley of Beautiful Women so this is a little higher than other locations. We also purchased a few bottles of wine.

Food: $199.91

We think we ate out one to one and half times a day. We did not cook as many times as in other locations.

Miscellaneous: $5.25

We purchased a few post cards, public bathrooms, and one souvenir.

Transportation: $136.46

We took a few metros and trams in Budapest which were not super cheap, but quite convenient. Our big transportation expenses were train tickets to and from Eger and then a long train ride from Budapest to Zagreb to meet Della’s parents!

This divides out to $95.97/day which, thankfully, is just under our $100/day budget. 

Fast Forward Friday: Varanasi, India

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Fast Forward Friday is our series where we share our anticipation for our upcoming travel destinations! Check our itinerary for more details!

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Varanasi is a holy city in many religions: Hinduism, Jainism, and even Buddhism. Many people make pilgrimages here to bathe in the holy waters of the Ganges river. It will be colorful and overwhelming, but we are excited to experience this place.

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