Croatia – Plitvice -Dubrovnik

September 27, 2019 Maryann McDougall Leave a comment

Wednesday 4th September. Happy Birthday my beautiful daughter Carly! Thinking of you lots today. Love you so much.

Wow! If I wasn’t already in love with Croatia, I certainly am now. The drive from Plitvice Lakes to Dubrovnik was amazing and Dubrovnik, well, I’ll get to that later!

The topography of this country continues to surprise me. I can see why Brad Pitt recently described Croatia as “the most beautiful country on the planet”! We left Plitvice about 10am and for the first hour the drive was very green and hilly.

As we pass through Lovinac the terrain changes, less green and more stone and then we see this amazing range pop up in front of us around Lovinac.

The road takes us towards and then left and then through the Stone Mountain – the area known as Velebit! There are lots of tunnels in Croatia as there is so much limestone. The view and the change to landscape on the other side is more like a desert, dry and lots of stone. We end up back near the Coast at Jasenice.

The road turns slightly away from the coast to the left and we are now heading towards Zadar. The dry landscape continues and we pass through tunnels that have been built to allow wolves and bears to pass over above!

The highways here are amazing by the way. Very well done. Lots of Gabion (rock basket) walls on the high passes and lots of tunnels too.

As we sweep through Vrgorac the landscape gives way to soaring mountains and then a beautiful green valley that we seem to drive all the way around, swinging left before heading right… and we are back on the coast again..

We pass through Ploce and their are many colourful market stands, produce from the valley I think. Some even have little water fountains keeping the produce cool.

The drive along the coast is known as the Croatian Riviera. The road hugs the cliff tops as it winds along and the beautiful coastline opens up before us.

Klek

I found out the next day that this super yacht; the Elysian (I think) belongs to the owner of one of the big English football teams. Nice way to travel I must say!

We arrive Dubrovnik about 4pm, locate our B&B in Babin Kuk and immediately head out for a walk. Our host has supplied a map that takes us around the headland with some local tips for bars and restaurants, we catch the sunset and then find dinner. Great day and an excellent bottle of wine that we enjoyed with dinner.

We are off to Dubrovnik old town tomorrow. I’ve been looking forward to this since hearing about my friend Alison’s trip last year!

Places we have been

Bale – Plitvice Lakes

September 14, 2019 Maryann McDougall Leave a comment

We have had seven idyllic weeks in Bale so far, enjoying a summer like none I have ever known. Our time in Croatia is drawing to an end however so we have embarked on a week long trip exploring outside of Istria into Dalmatia.

The first destination is across to Plitvice (Plit vizza) and specifically the National Park. This is a UNESCO listed area of natural beauty about 3.5 hours drive from Bale.

We leave Bale Monday 2nd Sept in the afternoon, it has been hot; in the 30’s for weeks with no respite, so we are looking forward to some cooler weather in the mountains as the season turns towards Autumn (Autunno).

As luck would have it we drive straight into a strong weather front that tails us all the way as we drive through Kanfanar, Pazin and the Ucka tunnel towards Sagreb…

We bypass beautiful Rijeka still heading towards Zagreb and Split before deviating off towards Split, stilled tailed the whole way by stormy weather.

Our journey continues west and then turns South as we head towards the middle of Croatia. The storm catches us and there is lightning, thunder, heavy rain and hail and I’m so grateful for Rob’s excellent driving skills!

The drive through the mountains during a storm on narrow winding roads is exhilarating to say the least, but there is little traffic thankfully and we arrive safely at Plitvice around 7pm.

Plitvice Lakes National Park

The park is 295 sq km of designated forest reserve; since about 1949 and it’s easy to see why. Comprised of a chain of 16 lakes cascading into each other with inspiring walkways around and over the lakes including up and down waterfalls this place is truly one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.

Rob and I spent the whole day starting out on Programme C (about 8 km’s) but we enjoyed the park so much we extended our walk and did over 18km’s with a full circuit including some crisscrossing and also returning to favourite spots.

The park caters well to all with ferries and shorter walking programmes including boat rides and is well catered with cafes, picnic areas and toilets.

We arrived early, just after 8am to get ahead of the bigger groups and to get some photos of the bigger spaces without to many people in them which I would highly recommend.

Our day stared out cool and wet after the heavy rain the night before which made the waterfalls even bigger! By the afternoon the sun was out and the sky’s blue again.

Between us we took about 300 photos. I’ve included our favourites here for you.

From the start of the walk looking down and across to the big waterfall.

Amazing walk way up a waterfall!

All the walkways were made of wood from the reserve!

View From the other side looking back at the first 3 lakes.

Beautiful blue acqua from all the limestone.

My favourite waterfall. Over 30 cascades.

Another of the beautiful cascades between lakes.

Water so clear you can see the fishies.

If you visit Croatia please ensure the Plitvice Lakes is part of your itinerary! I guarantee you will not be disappointed. Plan to spend the whole day, go early and take your time. So beautiful it made my heart sing!

Interesting too that the lakes form only about 1% of the total National Park Reserve. A big nod to Croatia for recognising and protecting these very special places of Natural beauty and what a great job they have done with the walkways that showcase the lakes to their very best advantage And allow people to enjoy them so closely. I never thought I would walk up and down waterfalls.

I love this place!!!

Next up we are off to Dubrovnik which is a big drive, about 5.5hours and we plan to visit Pag Island on the way back to Bale so that we can catch up with Rob’s cousin Ervin.

Europe, Places we have been

Croatia – Bale, Pazin, Rovinj Nights

September 13, 2019 Maryann McDougall Leave a comment

24 August – 30 August

Summer is drawing to an end so the regional festivals are all but over. This week we have Rovinj nights to look forward to and a visit to Pazin.

Pazin

Jules Verne inspired by the travel writings of Charles Yriarte included Pazin as a location in his book Voyages Extraordinaries, Mathias Sandorf and some say it was also inspiration for Journey to the centre of the earth!

Pazin Castle features in the book as does the Abyss. Pazin, located in central Istria is built on top of two underground rivers that join to create a siphon with a large valley adjacent to the town.

It’s unique characteristics today ensure it is a popular tourist attraction which includes an annual event in celebration of Jules Verne and other writers and a zip line criss crossing the valley.

Across the valley to Pazin

Looking at the chasm from the castle wall

Across the valley and the zip line from the castle wall

Old castle from opposite and across the valley

The two castles and the town from across the valley

If you zoom on some of the wider shots you will see the amazing zip line that traverses the valley in two directions. As we walked around there were many shouts of “Yahoo” and I was almost tempted to have a go! One of the instructors; I think, even went across upside down!

Rovinj Nights

Across the last weekend in August, Rovinj celebrates summer with Rovinj Nights with free musical performances for its visitors. There was also mention of grilled sardines so we were keen to go.

The first night Friday was so much fun!

We had a simple meal of Sardines for Rob as you may have guessed and grilled Calamari for me and salad to share. Just watching the two older gents grilling the sardines was such a treat and they smelt divine!

We shared our table on the wharf with a couple from Germany, Matthias and Annette, and had a lovely conversation with them including lots of suggestions for our time their in October and even an invitation to visit!

After dinner we went our separate ways and Rob and I enjoyed one of the bands, dancing the whole set!

The next night was a repeat performance only this time there were even more people and lots of band performances including a Marching band and fireworks at about 10pm.