I Visited Croatia
and had a wonderful time
My Visit to Croatia
The title of this Substack is “Writings and Wanderings.” I’ve been sharing the writing side of things for a while, so I thought it was time to hit the wanderings. A few years ago, I was part of a small group touring Croatia with a focus on photography. The pandemic had curtailed travel for some time, and things were just opening up. We sailed from Split to Dubrovnik on a 40-passenger yacht.
Overall Impressions, in no particular order:
The Croatian language uses lots of consonants and not many vowels. They also love to throw Js into words.
Tip: Get the “Google Translate” ap for your phone. You use the camera to show it something written in Croatian, and it translates it into English.
Ubers are all over, friendly, and inexpensive. Where a taxi wanted 100 kuna to bring us back to the hotel, the Uber ride was about 40. (Exchange rate at the time was about 6 kuna to one US dollar.)
Croatian red wines are very good.
Restaurant portion sizes were consistently huge. Lots of pizza offerings—Italy’s not far away, and Croatian history includes many cultures. A “personal size” would easily feed 2 people generously. Food was excellent, and I love trying new things. Gelato is also everywhere.
Unlike in the states, hotels are set either to heat OR a/c, which is dictated by the venue, not individual rooms. So, if they’ve switched to heat, it doesn’t matter that it’s hot outside. Same goes if a cold snap blows through and they’re still on a/c. Bring clothes, especially sleeping attire, for all contingencies.
Hotel bedding is duvets with no top sheets.
Cats are everywhere.
Here’s our first day in Split.
Our photography leader (who happens to be my son), his business partner and wife, and I chose to arrive a couple of days before the tour began. This way, we were over the worst of the jet lag, and my son had time to do some photography scouting before boarding our yacht.
We enjoyed the breakfast buffet in our hotel, followed by a brief orientation where Jason, our leader, gave us the overview of how to approach the picture-taking. Although there were no “assignments” we had guidelines suggesting we shoot things like closeups, textures, reflections, and try techniques I’ve not tried before. (And, given my photography is of the hobbyist variety, I confess I still haven’t tried many of them.)
We set out for the Klis fortress to start the photography portion of our trip. Immediate observations. No way this centuries-old place would be allowed to exist the way it does in the US. It’s “wander on your own, and at your own risk.” No signage, no guard rails. Just lots of rocky pathways winding up and down the grounds and inside the structure. No gift shop. No concession stands. The admission booth was halfway up the trail to the fortress.
As with so many of the places we were going to be visiting, Game of Thrones fans were taking in the sights and comparing what they saw to the show. Since I’ve never watched Game of Thrones, I simply took in the sights.
When we finished, our leader wanted to go to Diocletian’s Palace as a preview of where his group would be going that night. This sprawling retirement “home” is a small city, with shops, apartments, and plenty of sidewalk cafes. We took more pictures, stopped for lunch, and went to back to the hotel to rest before our evening walk.
For our “blue hour” photos, I managed the tripod that had arrived the afternoon before I left Colorado, and once the Hubster verified the camera fit, it went straight into the suitcase. Thanks to Rick, for helping me set up on site, since my tripod experience to that point was zero. But given one can’t hand hold a camera for the long exposures for these shots, it was worth the schlep.
Come back next week, when I’ll have more about my trip.
I had no idea you were a photographer as well as a writer -- what a COOL trip!