Croatia

Of all the places I thought I'd go in Europe I'd never thought I'd be going to Croatia. Albeit it took seventeen hours on a coach bus each way to get there but I would somehow say it was worth it. Without going on a tour group I don't think I would have made it to this country.

me on the first day in Croatia

I set out with two friends, Maggie and Judy, to the Roma Termini bus station on Thursday after class. We left with the bus2alps tour crew at 5pm and headed to Florence to pick up the rest of the group, which was all students. I was able to sleep for most of the ride and we arrived in Split, Croatia around 9am.

We checked into our hostel which was located right outside the Diocletian Palace, the "Old CIty" center of Split. The hostel manager, Irwin, then took us on a tour around the Old City and showed us his favorite resturants, coffee shops, and bars.

the "silver gate" entrance to the Old City near our hostel

Split bell tower (decided it wasn't worth the €2 climb)

view of fisherman's area of the harbor

We spent the rest of Friday at the beaches near Split. The water was amazingly clear and the view was so beautiful that we didn't mind that it rained for a bit.

me and Judy at the beach

That night we went to a traditonal fisherman's resturant known as a konoba in Croatia. We shared seafood risotto, fried calamari, and the local specialty, black cuttlefish risotto. We met a group of two other girls (one from DC and one from Australia) who were traveling and talked with them during dinner. At the end of the meal, an older man named Dave from Napa Valley was seated next to us. He shared that he had not been to Croatia since 1965 and decided to buy a one way ticket here and travel from here on out. We all decided we wanted to be like Dave when we were older!

dinner at Fife with our new friends

Saturday we had booked a boat tour through bus2alps and headed to the harbor at about 10am. We were on the boat for about an hour each way headed to the island of Brač. We were served dinner on the boat and spent the afternoon on the beach.

boat tour to island of Brač (warning candid picture)

On Sunday we had an early departure to the Krka National Park. Here we saw the famous waterfalls and swam in the (cold!!!) water. We enjoyed some pancakes and then changed and geared up for our seventeen hour bus ride back to Rome. We got back to the Termini bus station around 2am and took a cab back to campus. I was able to sleep in Monday morning then I had a full week of classes!

Krka waterfalls

the water was pretty cold!!!