After spending a lot longer than I originally planned around Venice I decided to make tracks and and try and speed it to the Croatian coast. This proved a little too effective as I nearly rode from Italy, through Slovenia and into Croatia in one afternoon...
I made camp early so I could at least spend one night in Slovenia. At another time I'll go back and experience the country properly when I'm not so time dependent. The foreboding clouds that hovered over me all night were pretty exciting though. They never broke.
I reached the Adriatic. I had a humble lunch looking out over the water as a storm was raging far out at sea, casting lightening in the daylight. I never thought that the storm would be so quick to come over, but for the following three hours it felt like I was racing the storm, circling the coast as the rain came and went, black clouds in my mirrors.
Heading up into the mountains to find a place to sleep. The coast has been very problematic for sleeping for pretty much the entire trip.
I was really far away from people here. Or at least it felt like it. And there are bears and wolves that live in abundance in the forests and mountains of Croatia so I tied my food up a tree about 200 meters away and 'slept' with my imagination going overdrive. Was pointless. I was fine. My food was fine. And later the locals said it will be fine.
I made my way further south to a town called Zadar. Pietro in Padova recommended the place to me, and it didn't disappoint.
A harbour basically circles around an old town, some which is still made from Roman relics from the distant past.
Back wild camping. This time I was lucky enough to find somewhere on the coast, in an olive grove that overlooked the setting sun over the sea. The farmer drove back and forth three times that night but was none the wiser to me behind his wall. Of course, the chorus of barking dogs accompanied the crickets all night, as they do every night. I wonder if that is just what the dogs do every night or whether they have caught my scent...
Here we have Dubrovnik, aka Kings Landing. It's the first time we saw it after descending from the mountain.
Dubrovnik is a really special place. Admittedly, I am an absolutely massive fan of Game of Thrones, but there's much, much more to Dubrovnik than seeing where a few scenes in a show were filmed. The history of the place is fascinating and the architecture is incredible. It's a place that I am definitely going to go back to and explore further.
This was really unexpected also. We saw a little, dark passageway and deliberated whether we should follow it or not. We did and it led to a carved causeway with access to the sea, surrounded by battlements from the old town. Blue and green water in the 35 celsius heat was amazing. I don't think in England they would just give people free reign to jump into water unsupervised at what should be a Unesco site.
Joe has an interesting swimming technique. Thankfully the old lady is looking the right way.
That's what we call a manatee, or in nautical slang, a sea cow.
I think this cat came with a local. Nice life.
I managed to climb up those rocks out of the sea, and then stood in fear for about 15 minutes about whether or not I should jump. I did in the end. But even though my feet hit the water first my arse took the brunt of it. Felt like I'd been slapped by a gorilla.
The steps of shame.
I rang an imaginary bell behind this lady.
I don't think she was very amused.
Joe's post water based self-violation elation.
Goodbye Dubrovnik. Until next time.
We stayed in Bosnia for only three days and went to Dubrovnik from there as it worked out way cheaper. I really liked what I saw of Bosnia and it's a shame that we couldn't spend more time there. But I think on the way back we will make a detour and dip into the country again.
I'm currently in Albania. Albania is everything I imagined in a country and more. I've wanted to come here for years and it hasn't disappointed and the slower pace we are taking through the country is very welcome. We can't keep this pace up forever though, which I think is going to be very problematic. South east Europe is currently in the grip of a heatwave. We're talking 45 celsius temperatures. It hurts. Not just us but the bikes also. We're in Vlore at the moment and for a good chunk of that ride we did in the dark to escape the heat. And we're still heading south... we'll just have to see how we get on with it.
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