Plitviče

Is awesome.

A bunch of cascading lakes joined by waterfalls. Water calcium rich to the point that much of the water is a Disney retouched shade of blue. Brilliant green lizards, neon blue dragonflies, a ton of trout, and at least one snake. And one apparently chainsaw hewn wooden bear?

An Aussie told me on the boat trip near Dubrovnik that I had to go there. There's a first time for everything so I took her advice. Though I do note that I would normally take anything that a recent business school graduate who is going straight into lecturing on business at said business school says with a smattering of salty goodness...

Anyway, Step confirmed that the lakes were awesome, so the plan was to head there on Saturday (and cadge a ride part way with Step and his missus). Then the planned changed to head there on Sunday as Step's stepdaughter (Step2daughter?) invited me to a party on Saturday night. I'm sure said party being on the night that Step and her mum were away is pure coincidence.

I got home from my riding lesson about 10am on Friday. (baha haha ha ha ha. That is actually true, by the way. Apparently I can't trot...now I feel sorry for the Icelandic ponies...). All was calm on my re entry to the house. I made plans to cycle to the nearby lake for a swim after lunch.

But when I got out of the shower it seemed there was an emergency. Step, whose maxim to date had been ˝there is no rush˝ was emanating a general sense of urgency. Voices were raised. It got terse.

It was going to rain on Sunday!

The result of the general melee was that I packed in a hurry, Step sped me to the bus station and I went straight to Plitvičce to ensure one full day of sunshiney goodness!

Thank jebus actually, because it did rain and get cold and stuff on Saturday night/Sunday. and I made up for missing the BBQ by having a beer with three Croatian guys who worked at the campsite. Thy had about three words of english between them (which is two more than my Croation). Fun and games until the (overly) friendly waiter confiscated the Boules we were playing with in the bar courtyard.

Anyway, Plitviče is well worth missing any number of parties to go to. I did the long walk (most walks had a large boat or tram component) and wound up having large stretches of time alone in the bush and lakeside, the path sometimes turning to mud or being indistinguishable from the lake itself.

The only down side is that I didn't manage to find a suitably hidden place to break the no swimming rule, but the river ran through the campsite anyway so I reckon I broke even on that count.