Jem and Lyss Abroad: September 2014

We left our hotel at 9pm for the Santorini airport. We flew to Athens and waited for 5 hours to fly to Belgrade, Serbia, where we waited for 8 hours, before we could finally fly to Dubrovnik.

Finally at 4pm, after a 19 hour journey, we met Carla on the steps just out the front of our apartment in the middle of old town where we stayed the night before jumping on the yacht.

Carla took us to a cool beach where there was a game of waterpolo happening in the ocean, surrounded by small boats (couple of dingys had people playing drums and lighting flares) and heaps of people cheering, sunbaking, swimming and just generally having a good time. After this we set off on a hike to the top of the mountain in Dubrovnik which had sweeping views of the entire town and ocean. We unintentionally timed this to be at the top of the mountain for sunset, which was pretty breathtaking.

The following day we checked in on the boat for Sail Croatia which would be home for the coming week. We paid premium to have the “better” rooms which were somewhat laughable – tiny bunk beds with an ‘ensuite’ – a toilet, sink and shower all in the same space. Our rooms were also right next to where people got on and off the boat, and next to the engine room. We won’t complain too much, but let’s just say we didn’t get too much sleep for the week!

Our first night on Sail was in Dubrovnik, so after checking in we had a day to check out more of the town. We spent the day cliff diving, exploring the walls of the old town/Kings landing.

We had dinner with everyone on the boat and met who would become our besties for the week: Jen and Tom from NZ and Ali and Adam from the UK.

We set sail at about 730am, and paused after a couple of hours for a swim stop. After this, we then made our way to the island and national park Mljet. The national park was beautiful, the highlight being the crystal clear, light blue watered lakes.

The next day we set sail, continued the daily routine of a mid-morning swim stop in beautiful clear blue/green water, and then docked at the next island – Korcula. Korcula has a small old town that we explored during the day. At night, we had a whole boat dinner at a restaurant that served warm beer and chilled red wine, then we had our first Croatian night out at a classy establishment called “Boogie Jungle”.

Hvar was our next stop, where due to a busy port and the 750 million euro super yachts taking priority in the port, we were unable to make it onto dry land until 6:30pm. We watched the sunset on some rocks at the famous beach bar called Hula bar, had dinner with our new besties and decided to have a quiet night instead of forking out the mega bucks to party at the famous island club “Carpe Diem”.

Stari Grad (literal translation is “old town”) was a short sail from Hvar. Here we had a nice afternoon at a local winery. While the taste of the wines were questionable (the red apparently had notes of chocolate and date…), the landscape was relaxing and we were able to taste some of their local produce. Nige’s taste buds still haven’t come around to wine yet so his became the group’s prize for losing at drinking games.

Makarska was a small coastal town home to some pretty breathtaking views – large mountains played backdrop to old buildings, markets and beaches with lots of water sports. We spent the afternoon at the beach swimming and playing with the woboba ball and shopped for pirate costumes which we sported that evening at the “Rave in a Cave”, which was literally a club in a cave on the beach. We were lucky to arrive in Markarska for the European holiday of the feast of St Mary, meaning that next to where our boat docked, there was a large street festival. We joined this at dinner, enjoying beers, cocktails and beautiful fresh seafood cooked on grills on the street.

Our final stop on the cruise was Split. We spent an additional night in Split after Sail had finished so we could day trip it out to the Krka National Park. The National Park is world famous for its stunning waterfalls which you can swim amongst. We decided to take public transport there ourselves instead of going on a tour.

Getting there was easy enough – getting home proved slightly more difficult and what should have been a simple 90 minute bus trip turned into a three and a half hour “scenic tour” of the Croatian countryside.

The next day we caught a ferry to an island off Split called Brac and stayed in the town of Bol. This was a particular highlight in Croatia and we wish we had more time there. We packed in a full day of activities – in the morning we scuba-dived in unexpectedly cold water with Octopus, huge clams and schools of small fish.

In the afternoon we did the grueling four hour return hike to Vidova Gora that involved 2 hours of vertical ascent, followed by an equally challenging two hour descent. The panoramic views at the top were pretty rewarding!

Bol was a great way to end our time in Croatia, next stop Italy!