Croatia - Part II

JG: After a few days, we took a few-hour bus ride down to Split - a little more of an overtly tourist feel to the city, but the highlight was hooking up with my sister's friend James, a yacht skipper and bee-infatuated great guy. (The man is a connoisseur of bees.) James arranged for us to join a skipper friend of his and their crew sailing around the neighboring islands Hvar and Vis, ending a bit north in Šibenik. What a great few days of sailing, swimming, and getting to know a great group of people from the UK, Slovakia, and South Africa. Not to mention almost drowning trying to swim into the "blue hole" - boy, did I ever get banged up underwater from the stone and corral. Otherwise, the four days was full of great conversation, drinks were flowing, and James even instigated a dance party at a restaurant on our last night!

Dubrovnik was our last leg in Croatia, and the walled old town is as good as any. In addition to strolling the cavernous streets, we day-tripped to nearby Lokrum Island, which had a botanical and (our priority) pretty good stone beaches. 

Many thanks to James and Kevin and the entire yacht crew for a friggin' awesome and somehow exhausting few days. We hope to see some of you in South Africa in a couple of months, and maybe others at a later date. Until then, we'll continue to try harder and do better. 

SS: There is no better way to visit Croatia than to get on a yacht and cruise through the waters island-hopping. Thanks to Bernie's contact, James, we were able to experience this. We were a little nervous to join a boat full of 9 people but as our luck had it, they were more than gracious to us. Everyone was amazing and it was such a pleasure to spend 4 days cruising the sea, enjoying dinners and engaging in a few cocktails over fantastic company. 

On one especially windy day, having 4 captains aboard, we did what is considered to be real sailing. The boat was near sideways and we were whistling along holding on for dear life! But we were in good hands and it was excellent to see the team working together. Even Johnny took the captain's seat for awhile steering us through the deep blue waters.

I was sleeping soundly the morning John almost drowned swimming through the blue hole. He came in all scraped up from the coral and I just speculated he had lost the battle with a feisty starfish. War wounds he kept for days. Try hard and do better John. ;) 

We have traveled seaside from the very top of the Croatian coast all the way to Dubrovnik in the south. Such beautiful sights along the way, now ending at this beautiful historical fortified city.