No one likes other tour groups. They are large masses of human, difficult to navigate around or through when they walk the streets on their walking tours and orientation walks and they usually dominate a space with noise or crazy antics making your lonely group of two look seemingly lame as you spend dinner people watching instead of talking to each other. Well that's me anyway. I can't stand them.
However, put me in a group and I'm no different to the other tour groups I hate, knowing full well that the general public probably hate me and my fellow London expats on tour. This time around it was a Travel Talk Croatia Sail. Being very conscious of the reputation Australian backpackers have throughout Europe and especially in Croatia we endeavoured to enjoy ourselves to life's fullest without being a public disturbance and only ever getting naked when we were docked way out to sea for a cheeky skinny dip (sorry you had to read that Nanna and Grandad). We seamlessly got the bus to Dubrovnik from Kotor arriving 2 nights before the tour started so that we could have a couple of days to explore the city. My body had other ideas in mind striking me down with a 48 hour bug which passed just in time for the tour to start. So activities for this pre-tour time were strictly limited to those within easy access of a toilet; walking the city walls was out of the question. Despite the bug we still managed quite a few activities including views from the fortress that overlooks the old town called Lovrijenac and a sunset over the city after taking the cable cart up to the overlooking mountain.
Dubrovnik is one of the coolest places I've been. Because of the age and the unique buildings of the old town, Dubrovnik is a deserving UNESCO world heritage site. Boxed inside it's extravagant city walls, Dubrovnik will leave you wandering around, mouth agape in wonder through alley ways and main streets alike. Along with some sneaky swim spots through holes in the old town walls and tiny bar strewn pebble beaches in places outside the walls we ate and swam our days away in the lead up to boat life. Definitely do a walking tour while you're there. We were lucky enough to be guided by a lady who was born and lives inside the old town and lived through the fascinating homeland war.
Now about the sail. For those of my 15 avid subscribers who are not an Aussie in their 20's to 30's, a Croatia Sail is a rite of passage for Australians, especially those living in London. Our boat was almost 100% occupied for the week with Aussies and Kiwis from London with the exception of a few who were travelling through Europe. On a Croatia sail you sleep, eat and play on your mode of transport for the week, a boat, and usually dock every day for a case of the old sea legs and wander around Croatia's coastal towns. Strict curfews of 5am ensure we don't leave anyone behind after heavy nights in the town and we would usually wake up in a different destination to what we fell asleep in as the crew set sail while we mere mortals nurse ourselves back to health. The tour takes about a week to get from Dubrovnik to Split stopping in stunning Mljet, "mini Dubrovnik" Korcula, party party Hvar, "all-the-activities" Makarska, sleepy Omis and finishing in Croatia's second largest city behind it's capital, Split. These tours go back to back from Sunday to Sunday and our tour leader and the boat crew take about 4 hours to themselves in between the group change over as they impressively back it up day after day for the whole of the extended Summer.
Travel Talk is by far the cheapest company to book a Croatia sail through and I never felt that paying more money would have made the experience better. In fact I quite liked that we had the smallest boat because the novelty of climbing over and through up to 9 boats to get to ours never got old. Because there were so many boats in harbour, boats would dock parallel to each other only tying onto the boat before and after it and not tying to land unless it was the biggest and best. Ours was always the furthest from land meaning we never had strangers wandering around our boat... except for that one morning. Plus, having a smaller boat meant that our group was a manageable 20 people to get to know in a week. However, don't ever pay full price for a Travel Talk tour as there are always 2for1 deals or huge discounts at the TNT travel show in London.
On board breakfast was included and Mumma would cook up a 3 course storm for lunch every day which always included a salad, soup, a hot meat dish and a dessert of some kind. If you're like me and don't like to eat too much meat then it might be best to put down that you are vegetarian as it got pretty heavy for me by the end of the week. Mumma also worked the tiny bar tirelessly free pouring her famous "Adios Mother F***er" cocktails and generously ringing the bell to call everyone in for shots on the house at least twice every evening. We had a tiny room above deck with bunk beds and our own toilet and shower. There was plenty of room to lounge around while we were sailing, reading and sun baking on the roof and elsewhere around the boat. We would often stop for swim stops, dropping the anchor and jumping into the refreshing waters of the Adriatic to cool off. Additional extras include the likes of blue cave swims, lots of cliff jumps, zip lining and white water rafting.
Avoiding bad weather meant that we docked in at Split earlier than planned and spent two nights on board in the port. Additional to this I'd made a mistake in my travel bookings which meant we had to add another day to our end of tour hostel totalling 6 days in Split all together. More than enough time to get acquainted with the city and visit the highly recommended Sexy Cow for lunch more than once. It also set us up for the perfect opportunity to do a day trip out to Plitvice Lakes National Park.
Being a 3.5 hour drive away from Split, Plitvice is a full and exhausting day out but well worth the effort. We were up at 6am to catch the first bus in, spent 6 hours walking around and caught the last bus out to be home by 10pm, 23,000 steps later. The national park is one of the oldest national parks in Southeast Europe and the largest in Croatia and consists of 16 aqua blue lakes that can be seen from the surface and hundreds of jaw-droppingly stunning waterfalls throughout. Plitvice is a day trip more easily done from Zadar or Zagreb so it just meant that we weren't able to avoid the midday rush as we arrived at 11am. Even in the shoulder season queues were 100's of meters long to buy tickets to enter the park at this time. To avoid the main crowds, go to entrance 2 and do the 5-6hour walk from there if you have the time. Be sure to buy your return ticket before entering the park as they will be sold out by the time you exit and you will be stuck in Plitvice trying to find a place to sleep for the night. The bus ticket there was 150 kuna, return ticket was 180 kuna and entry to the park was 110 kuna roughly equaling a £54 day not including the packed lunch. Now allow the pictures to do the rest of the talking...
Croatia has always been on the bucket list and I have absolutely loved it. It's history, scenery and sun has made this a top notch 2 weeks indeed.
Notes for the environmentally conscious traveller: Travelling on the ocean all week made me especially conscious of the impact we were having on the Earth. Here's my 2 cents.
I found that buying lots of things in bulk, such a nuts and dried fruit was common practice at all supermarkets and outdoor markets so if you have a paper bag that you've accumulated from the bakery or something then you can purchase snacks waste free.
I found it very pleasing to see solar power park benches in most of the towns we visited allowing people to charge up using green energy. If you're that person who is always running on a low battery, carry your USB charger around in Croatia and take a charge up rest.
Recycling seemed to be common practice in some places and where it wasn't you would often see locals scrounging the bins for plastic bottles to recycle possibly for a rebate.
Tips to reduce plastic use in Croatia:
Straws: Straws were in crazy excess in all bars in Croatia. It almost felt like a competition who could have the most straws. And they weren't ordinary straws, these straws are about a meter long. It felt extremely unnecessary to me so just a simple reminder to say "no, straw please!" Water bottles: On the boat we did not have easy access to drinking water. We were supplied with 2x 500ml bottles per day by Travel Talk. That's approximately 500 bottles just from this boat in 1 week that will exist forever more and many of which will end up in the ocean. And there are hundreds of boats doing the same thing. I think this is crazy when it would surely be just as cost effective to provide a water dispenser for people to refill a bottle or cup with water (not a disposable plastic cup either!). It was easy for me to not use any of these bottles on every day except 1 where we didn't dock on land due to the wind and I had run low on supplies due to the heat. I would make a conscious effort to always have my water bottle on me when we went into the towns and refill at the public drinking fountains (which are everywhere!) or simply ask staff behind the bar to refill them or refill in bathroom sinks. By doing this every time we were on land I managed to only use 1 of my bottles. The public drinking fountains provided the most delicious, natural and cold water straight from the mountains through medieval aqueducts that I would prefer this over bottled water any day. In Dubrovnik I noticed 4 different fountains, 1 of which is just as you enter the old town and has 16 taps surrounding it for the easiest access to fresh water. It was just a case of always topping up when I came to one even if my bottle was still half full. In Croatia the tap water is great for drinking and there should be no reason for people buying bottled water here.
Ice cream:
Ice cream spoons are probably in the top 5 things I pick up during my beach cleans behind cigarette butts, water bottles and straws. Even if people do put their plastic spoons in the bin, sending them to landfill is not a sustainable option. The solution? Buy your ice cream in a cone! Just like the old days. If you don't like the cone, first offer it to someone else to eat (I would eat it!), or else putting that in the bin is better for the environment than putting the spoon and tub in the bin.
