Coastal Driving

Yesterday, we decided to drive south along the coast and stop at a few of the little towns and enjoy the beaches. If you rent a car here I would definetely recommend it as the views were astonishing. It reminded dad of Kelowna with the big pine trees and cliffs along one side of the road and then the ocean along the other side.

We of course had to start the day with our two-tiered breakfast to energize us for the day.

Our first stop was Brela. We didn't look around the town at all, just stopped at this gorgeous rocky beach right off the highway.

We bought cherries, figs and nectarines from the fruit stand lady.  When we went back to finish off the bag of cherries they had cooked on the rocks, which I thought was going to taste gross but they were so good, it was like eating cherry pie.

We then drove on to Makarska, which seemed to be more popular as it was quite busy. 

This was the first thing we saw when we entered the town... a donkey getting loaded onto the ferry, you can kind of see his ears in this picture.

We didn't explore the town here either and headed to the beaches. We first started walking the path to this nude beach (because apparently we are nudists now), which had gorgeous views and took about 30 minutes.

We came across these goats on our walk to the beach.

Dad in his constant zen state. I keep a soothing, rubbing rock from the beach for him when traffic gets too stressful but I am the one that just ends up using it, when we pass on the one lane, winding roads. 

The view of the beach down below

The beach was gorgeous but the water had some plant material in it so we didn't like it as much as some of the other beaches we had been to. It was all fun and games until the guy beside us kept getting turned on by me and the girl on the other side of us. He kept alternating which way his head was turning and I watched him stare from beneath my sunglasses out of the corner of my eye. He kept having to take his swimsuit off and on about 10 times to try and hide his arousal. It was time to leave haha. Dad and I laughed about it as we walked back on the trail...he should have just kept his swimsuit on if he couldn't control himself. 

We headed back on the trail and climbed down these rocks closer to town to our own private location where we lounged on the rocks and jumped into the ocean off of them. 

After a day of lounging we headed back home to Split, where we had dinner at Villa Spiza again. This restaurant is really good but my one complaint is that I find it too salty. It is worth trying but I prefer Figa.

Tonight we had the risotto with seashells, mussels and lamb. It was all very good, I even enjoyed the shells but my lamb had slightly too many fatty pieces that I had to spit out. 

There is also a Street Art Festival here for the next couple of days and there were tons of people out on the Riva, including dancers and singers. These are the types of things I love! All of the artists are using pastels to draw on the pavement for these elaborate pictures.

-A

Dinner in Split

The other night, after Krka we went to dinner at Villa Spiza, recommended by Lonely Planet. It was located on a quaint, narrow street within the walls of Split. It has limited seating but it worked out fine for us since we eat at the typical early North American hour. We ordrered mussels, black rissoto and pasta with shrimp and zucchini. All the food was amazing and that is saying a lot from a non seafood eater. The mussels were seasoned deliciously with a garlic sauce and the risotto was far more flavourful than the one eaten the previous night at Fife. I still think I prefered my pasta at Figa but the seafood at Villa Spiza was the best we've eaten so far and we plan to go back! The environment was also so peaceful as you are in such a cozy space it was impossible not to watch the chef prepare the meals on the gas stove, moving flawlessly with ease as if it was second nature. 

-A

Krka waterfalls

Last night we walked around town looking for another place to eat but decided to go back to Figa because the dinner menu looked delicious. 

We shared scallops as an appetizer and then I had Figa pasta with dried figs, arugala, capers and proscuitto and dad had tuna steak, which I tried and it was actually really good...apparently I actually don't mind seafood.

The thinly sliced grilled vegetables with the steak were also soo good!

We then went home and had a very late siesta and when we woke up around 9 pm the streets were full of action, everyone was out for dinner and around the Diocletian's palace there were tons of little bands playing live music and it was lovely to just sit on the steps and listen. 

It's my store! Pharma gal!

Today we woke up and had breakfast at an amazing place on the Riva called Brasserie on Seven. We had the most amazing two tiered breakfast. One tier being an omelette with asparagus and fresh goat cheese and the second tier being cinnamon french toast with ricotta, caramalised banana and maple syrup. 

View from the restaurant

Then, with our full stomachs we headed off to Krka. 

Excited to start our day off in our cute little VW!

Our books said the best place to access the Skradinkski buk, the longest waterfall on Krka, was from the Lozovac entrance, so we entered that in our google maps and headed off. When we picked the choice from the drop down on google it said it took two hours, which was surprising to us, as last night when we checked it said one hour, but we continued on our way anyways. When we arrived at the toll booth, we were both not using our brains because we expected there to be a person there that you pay to let you through like there is in Canada. I saw one guy pull over behind us to the side of the road and put his hand in this machine and then go through the electronic ticketing...so I thought he had bought a ticket here. This caused us to do some backing up on the freeway...never the best idea haha, but it ended up just being werid looking garbage cans. We decided we were probably being dumb and that there was likely a button you pressed to get through and then pay later depending on where you exit..which happened to be the case. After we had driven about an hour we started seeing signs for Krka but our google maps still said one more hour. We quickly pulled over to the side of the highway near one exit and noticed all the tour buses going off that exit. We did some more backing up on the highway...haha. I re-entered Lozovac on our map and instead of choosing a choice google gives you I just hit enter and it gave us an entirely new route that said 14 minutes away compared to another hour. After we passed the toll booth again our map to Lozovac was telling us to do a U-turn back to the highway but we knew that was wrong so we followed the signs to Skradin a location near Lozovac. I suggest anyone driving themselves to just set their google maps to Skradin. Once we reached Skradin, people with Parking symbols on their vests said we had to park here (which was basically in their back yards on grass marked with white spray paint and that we could not go any further only buses could. At first we were going to do it, as dad asked two of these people and they were saying the same thing..but then he thought it must be a scam because he remembered that we should be able to walk from where we park to the waterfalls. This may just be the Skradin entrance though, but we didn't want to do that anyways. We decided to continue along the road and we made the right choice! As you continue along this road you see the sign of Lozovac, but you still need to continue past this until you get to a fork in the road. Our google map said to turn right at this fork...it failed us again...as we turned right I saw a huge sign saying Krka waterfalls on the right so we did a three point turn on the road and finally found the parking lot at the correct location...which was not sketchy in a persons backyard. From here you can either walk 800 meters down (which we did) or take a shuttle bus.

All the mishaps we had was worth it because the waterfalls and all the scenery around them were absolutely breath taking. 

The current in the shallow areas was so strong it was like swimming in one of those "tredmill pools" that have a strong current so you can workout.

The waterfalls are created by Travertine barriers, islands and lakes. Travertines are deposits made of limestone and the ones at Krka are over 7000 years old, still active as they continue to grow today.

Hello Mr Frog. There were also millions of blue dragonflies that were gorgeous...but impossible to catch good pictures of, flying around everywhere. Their wings were dark, unlike the clear winged ones we have back home. 

There was also an area showing where they ground corn etc. that we explored.

Tomorrow we are off to Plitvice Lakes National Park, I will miss not being able to swim but cannot wait for the magnificant waterfalls! (and I'm sure more driving adventures)

-A