The first leg of our Croatia trip was the fair city of Dubrovnik. Photos photos photos

We arrived in steamy Dubrovnik after a fairly uneventful few hours ride on EasyJet. We’d all had to get up very early to catch our AM flight with some of us, including me!, having only got a couple of hours sleep the night before … sometimes with flights like these you wonder if its not better just to stay up all night! So, we may have been a little bit subdued when we landed. However as soon as we caught our first sight of the Adriatic you couldn’t stop us going crazy. Suddenly all the cameras were out and random shots being taken from our van out the window even though blatantly none of them were going to be worth a penny!

The Experience

We were staying in the old town of Dubrovnik to be close to the action. This UNESCO World Heritage sight surrounded by the majestic city-walls and paved in gleaming cobblestones was utterly charming. Strangely, despite not being a huge area geographically, it never felt like it was overwhelmed with tourists. Our apartment was, whilst old, perfectly located (close to the action but still tucked away) and huge (three bedrooms, two bathrooms including one bathroom which had two sinks and a separate bath and shower, a giant lounge and kitchen) so we were sorted!

Day 1 in Dubrovnik was basically: arrive at airport, arrive at apartment, go out for lunch, go sit on the beach (no s*x allowed though – heh heh), troop back to the apartment to get refreshed around sun down and troop out again for dinner. Nothing too stressful there!

For dinner we ended up at this restaurant (Lokran), as recommended in a guide book, by the harbour. We joined the queue at the perfect moment as we didn’t end up waiting long at all. Not long after we sat down the queue was quite massive. The menu was very simple – so simple they didn’t do chips! I think we all fell in love with the fact our waitress was so honest with us, and of course she was very attractive in the way many Croatians are! She told us that their restaurant didn’t do anything particularly special with their food but they were popular only because they’d been recommended in a guide book! I did feel a bit sorry for Roops, being the lone vegetarian and having as her only option cheese!, whilst we all pigged out on massive pots of squid ink risotto and giant plates of fried fish!

Following the advice from our waiter at lunch the day before, Day 2 involved us heading out of the old town and away from the tourists to hunt down one of the local watering holes. I say watering hole as it wasn’t exactly a beach we found. It was journey well worth it as we not only got some nice hilltop views but we found a little intimate place to relax away from tourists. Don’t you love how I try to pretend I’m not a tourist myself …

At the watering hole we entertained ourselves with floating stars, jumping off rocks, handstands, making friends with sausage dogs called Bruno (he was the cutest thing – he even went swimming, with his own life jacket!) – the usual water shenigans.

… the only negative was that we’d pitched up on to an area which apparently had been “bagsed” by this lady who didn’t even turn up until a couple of hours after we’d been there who, in a passive aggressive manner, showed her discontent. Lucky her timing coincided with our having to leave to embark on what turned out to be a Sea-Kayak-Journey-From-Hell!

The kayak adventure was supposed to be a relaxed enjoyable sunset tour from the Old Town, along the coast a bit before turning and heading around Lokrum Island, in our little kayaks. The first half actually went very well – though we did spend an enormous amount of energy playing around trying to get ahead of each other by pushing off each other’s boats. Su Yin and I were in one boat, the Comello’s, Nige and Cath, in another and the “married couple” Roops and Daryl in the last. Su Yin and I would try to launch sneak attacks on Roops and Daryl especially but apparently they could always hear us coming because of our giggles!

We had a break about halfway through to stop off at a cave where we were supplied with some snorkels for exploring. I must admit it was nice to swim from out of the cave towards the horizon to watch the sun start to come down. Not much to see under the water though even with our snorkels.

Once we started the other half of the loop to head back circumstances got horrible quite quickly! After we waited for the cruiser to get past us … the wind took a turn and we were suddenly caught in a combination of rips and crazy winds. We were practically going backwards or at best sidewards only! So many times Su Yin and I came close to crashing into the coastal rock wall. We were way exhausted trying to fight and eventually we were one of the first, though certainly not the last, boat to be towed back in. Never one to waste an opportunity I used that opportunity to take some snaps of the sunset …

Its fair to say that the end of Day 2 saw us pretty much passed out in bed from our exertion, after a massive dinner.

Day 3 in Dubrovnik was a trip to the island of Mljet. About an hour and a half out of Dubrovnik on a fast catamaran this beautiful island is dominated by a whole lot of forest. One of the best options for getting around the island, if you’re game, is to hire a bike. This was kind of a scary proposition for us since it had been years since most of us had been on one. We were all fine for the first half of the trip … but the second half was a bit of a disaster with Cath taking a major spill and Daryl breaking his bike chain! I’m seeing a sort of pattern to the “second half” of our adventures!

Be warned if you take the bike option – one of the first challenges you’ll face is a massive slope. This was quite good and I welcomed the opportunity to work out our bottom half having worked out our upper bodies so hard on the kayak the day before although I couldn’t help but wonder … weren’t we in Croatia for an idyllic holiday??!! Still, I think we all enjoyed it and it made us appreciate our later sunbathing by the lake a lot more!

Apart form the mishaps on the bike the day was a lovely one though again the work out meant we had plenty of appetite that evening. When we got back to Dubrovnik we hit what was to become our favourite restaurant in Dubrovnik with huge portions (which we didn’t realise we’d get), tasty food and a fantastic waitress. We couldn’t really ask for more, Vesna was a total darling!

Our exertions with the kayak and bike must have stimulated our energy levels somehow and with the extra motivation of working off our giant meal we ended the day by hitting a local club. We were hoping for some hot salsa … unfortunately all we got were a lot of teeny boppers! I swear most of them were about 16 years old – certainly their maturity seemed at that level jumping around on the tables, chairs and up on stage. After some near crashes with people tumbling off tables we decided to get out of there. Man … feeling my age much!

Day 4 in Dubrovnik was Roop’s birthday so we decided to walk down to the Exelcisor Hotel for a posh meal. We ran into the manager on the way to trying to find the restaurant and had the funniest conversation with her. She mentioned the fact that she thought many tourists still thought that Croatias eat their young! And she didn’t think too highly of the Russians and their new money either!

Lunch was lovely – seafood was fresh and our desserts were lovely and a delight. The Croatians, or those in Dubrovnik at least, love their crème caramels so that was the order of our stay in Croatia. Yummo!

The city walls around the Old Town in Dubrovnik are its most prominent and well-known feature so after lunch Su Yin and I took a walk around the 2km wall whilst the others headed to the beach. We got some fantastic vistas up on the wall and seeing the tiling of the red roof against the background of the blue sky was cool. We sort of timed our finish on the wall at sunset too before running down to meet the others at one of the Buzas. Buza, meaning “hole”, is a hole-in-the-wall café bar nestled in the southern walls of the city. An interesting venue for drinks it was certainly popular with both tourists and locals alike, a nicer place you won’t find to watch the sun going down.