Lokrum

Today we took the short ferry ride over to the island Lokrum. I was super excited because my friend Krysta had said there are wild peacocks on the island. I convinced Dad that we should walk around first before going to the beach, mostly so we could find these birds.

Lokrum, from our hotel; Hop, skip and a jump away

When we first stepped on the island we heard a massive squawk, and looked up in the tree to see my first peacock! I didn't know they flew up into trees, Dad said they just placed that one there to get people excited about the island and it's probably the only one on the entire island. If you look really hard at the middle tree you can see the long tail of the peacock. 

This just excited me to find more, up close and personal. 

We had no idea where we were going (as per usual we didn't bring a map) but just followed one of the paths (avoiding the path all the school children went on). We walked around for quite awhile when we came upon 5 female peacocks right on the trail! I was so excited and ran up taking a million pictures when a male came out of the bushes (the males have the colourful tails)!

My entire goal of the trip to the island was fulfilled and now I was more relaxed to do whatever, even just lay on the beach. We came upon a little park with the outdoor workout equipment, like a manual elliptical etc. Dad started working out on one and I took a video when I looked to my right to see a male with his full tail expanded. I quickly ditched videotaping dad and ran to see. It was hilarious because as soon as he expanded his tail, around 6 female peacocks ran as fast as they could past him to get away. Dad and I thought they did this to mate so we weren't quite sure if the females were just running because they didn't want to mate or what. I read more about this when I got home and apparently the males expand their tails to attract the females. The bigger the better (unless it's too big then it also can scare the females away)...sounds similar to humans ;) . Also there is importance of how many of the circular eye patterns they have on their tails. From this, it seems like that male we saw was not very attractive as the females could not hurry out of the area any faster. The really cool thing he also did when his tail was expanded was shake it with the hard bony looking projections holding it up. It was almost like it was vibrating and it made a really cool sound. Of course I videotaped him for like 2 minutes to capture it and he wouldn't do it again but as soon as I turned the camera off he did it 10 seconds later...typical. They also do this shaking thing to attract the females attention to them. Poor guy, after the females ran away he continued to do this in a field...by himself.

All the ladies

My first male spotting

I then saw some people in the park feeding another male treats. I walked over to them and asked what they were doing and if the bird was aggressive. They said no want to feed him some bread? I of course said yes...what a dumb tourist, setting myself up for losing some fingers. I was nervous to hold the bread in between my fingers like the lady so I left it flat on my hand like they taught us in elementary when you feed horses at the zoo. Still have all my fingers at the end of the day :)

We then set out to find this salt water pool, which we didn't know the name of but had heard about from Krysta and the German lady, who had been here the day before. We decided it must have been number 12 on the map so we started walking to the far side of the island. 

Along the way we then took a jaunt through the botanical gardens. 

This is easier to read on my computer somehow but it explains the botanical gardens. Basically, it was established in 1959 to study how non-native tropical and sub-tropical plants adapt to the Mediterranean climate of this region. In the War of 1991, the garden suffered more than 50 direct artillery hits.

Then we climbed up the steep hill to the fort.  Half way up, we asked these firemen where the pool was and they laughed and said all the back in the direction we had come from. We decided to keep going since we had already made it so far. 

The panoramic views were well worth it. 

Had to cool down with a swim after the uphill hike. 

Finally found the pool, which was right beside where we saw the peacocks in the beginning. It wasn't that exciting because it was old stale water, but it was cool that there was a lake in the middle of the island filled with salt water with no evident inflow from the ocean. 

Finally time for what dad has been waiting for, the beach!

The German lady on the ferry over (who actually was at the table before us at the Taj Mahal the night before) said there was a gorgeous nude beach here. We found the sign for FKK and headed that way. We looked up FKK later and found it was short for a German word (Freikörperkultur) that basically means Free body culture. When I was looking this up I also found that we have visted all of the nudist beaches in the Dalmatia gulf. 

It was acutally gorgeous because it was layered rocks all the way down to the water so everyone had their own little rock pod to sit in.

The glass boat tours that go along the island come very close to the shore and the drunk tourists on it giggled and hooted at anyone standing up when they passed. The people most excited by it were the Asian tour groups who laughed the hardest and hooted and hollared the most. Everyone on the boat would rush to one edge of the boat to take pictures with their iPads. Dad joked that the boat was going to tip over by how quickly everyone rushed to the one side. 

If you walked to the very far end of the beach there is an amazing cave to swim into. About 5 of us jumped in and swam towards it and were met by a group of kayakers. 

Time to go back to the ferry. 

For dinner, we went back to Taj Mahal.

We already knew what we were going to order, the Genghis Khan platter for two, which contained grilled minced meat, turkey skewers, pljeskavice, sudukice, rumpsteak and chicken. It was so delicious. All of the meat was juicy and seasoned so well that I didn't add any of the sauces that came with it. Out of the 6 meats we had there was only one that I didn't love, only because it wasn't as flavourful and juicy as the others. I forget which one it was but I'm guessing it was the rumpsteak. 

The British people next to us said they will order it next time they came because of how good it looked. The turkey on skewers was even better than the turkey on skewers I had the day before here, I think because without the spinach it was extremely moist. 

The funniest part of the evening was at the end of the meal when we talked to the British couple more and Dad said "We have been here two weeks and the weather has been brilliant." I had to hold my tongue to keep from laughing and saying, Oh i guess you are British now Dad. I told him after that I noticed he had said it and he said ya I was trying to sound British to relate to them. We laughed the whole way down the street. He should have told them what a jolly good time we've been having. 

On a side note, for everyone who laughed at the video on the parrot jumping on my head and me saying "excuse me lady," I think I must have subconsciously picked it up while I was here. I have never referred to someone out loud as lady before and ever since I said it here and people pointed it out Dad and I have heard the locals say lady to people all the time. "Hey lady, you forgot your leftovers," was just one of the examples we heard of many. Another thing they say here that we always laugh about and now say it is "welcome." You wouldn't think that's werid but without the your in front of welcome it sounds quite odd. They also say it with a little accent to or almost sharply so it's very cute and entertaining. Poor Ingrid, I'm sure Dad will be saying it to her at work for the next month or so. He also will probably be talking to her about the punishment corner, which was an area in Zadar they had a long time ago for people who had done something wrong. Anytime we do something bad here we say to each other that we need to be sent to the punishment corner and I'm sure Dad will continue this at work for the next while. 

This trip there has not been any shopping. Dad said I could look in stores if I wanted, but it gave me anxiety with him just waiting for me outside bored. So don't expect any gifts back home :). One thing I finally did buy was this cheap little coin that Dad laughed is probably worth 5 cents. It's like those squashed, stamped pennies you get from Disney world with Donald or a character on it. I asked Dad how I should explain it for the blog and he laughed and said "junk jewellery?" Anyways, I like to have a piece of jewellery to remember my trips by everytime I put it on. Each of the "coins" had different stamps on them, some boats, etc. Each with some kind of meaning. I wanted mine to be most similar to an actual coin of the past so I picked one with the indentation of the old currency.

It came on an ugly, cord so I switched it onto a long chain I had.

Dad said it looked cute today :P

Today is rainy, so we are just sitting inside relaxing right now :( ...waiting for our manicure appointment. Man, vacations are tough work.

-A