The last stop of my trip was Croatia. I started in the capital, Zagreb, and arrived around 9 PM. I then followed the poorly written directions to my hostel. I finally arrived at the hostel around 10:30, tired and frustrated because of the poor directions. All I wanted at this point was to shower and sleep, but that was not in the cards for me. The owner told me that they didn’t have space for me and I should have made my reservation sooner, I made my reservation before I left Slovenia while I was waiting for my train, thinking that I wouldn’t have a problem since they still had space available on hostelworld. Instead the owner told me that there was no space and it was my fault since I didn’t book enough in advance. (Note: Funk House Hostel has awful customer service) Eventually after complaining enough she called another hostel and paid for a taxi for me to get there. The hostel I ended up staying in, wasn’t bad, just pretty far away from the center of Zagreb, I did get a room all to myself though. The next day I spent the day in Zagreb exploring. It wasn’t an amazing city, but parts were really pretty and I would have enjoyed myself more if it hadn’t been raining all day.
I took a night train to Split, and arrived in Split around 6 AM. I wasn’t sure what to do at first, but was so pleased with the beautiful weather. I had some time to kill before I could check into my hostel, so I stored my backpack, grabbed a coffee and started walking. It was so peaceful since almost nothing was open and there was not a lot of people around. I found a bench along the water and read my Kindle for a few hours. Sitting there reading was where my vacation became exactly what I thought it was going to be. Around noon I collected my backpack and checked in to my hostel. The Tchaikovsky Hostel was probably one of my favorite hostels I have ever stayed in. It was really clean, had super comfortable beds and the owner was fantastic. Since I forgot that Easter was the next day a few hours after I checked in I added an extra day to my stay since I heard that nothing was going to be open Sunday. That night I met some interesting people, a couple of Americans, a guy from Britain, one from Mexico and one from France, we all went out and had a few beers. The guy from Britain was my favorite, he was killing time in Croatia before he went down to work in a nudist colony in Montenegro. Easter Sunday was pretty relaxing, in the morning it rained and later in the afternoon I went for a walk around town, met a couple of guys from my hometown who went to WSU and had some homemade wine with the owner of the hostel.
Monday morning I made my way to the bus station to catch the bus to Dubrovnik. I had made reservations at a hostel in the old walled city. They had amazing directions to their place and when I arrived I was welcomed with a shot of homemade alcohol. It was delicious and had a nice nutty flavor. One of the other people on my bus showed up a few minutes later and we decided to go out and find some seafood. We went to a place recommended by our hostel and I got a pan full of little fish, while she had some fresh mussels. The hostel also did a happy-hour at 7 so you could meet some of the other travelers. I ended up going out to a nearby Irish Pub with a few. The next day the weather was awful so I spent most of my time inside, but did get out to have some excellent Bosnian food. I then went back to the hostel to dry off since my shoes were soaked from all the rain and I was cold. From there I learned how to make a balloon dog and watched one of the other travelers make all sorts of flowers and hats with balloons. Later that evening it finally stopped raining so I went out for dinner with 2 people. We got a seafood platter with shrimp, squid, mussels and octopus. The next day I made my way back to Zagreb so that I could catch a flight to Chisinau. I felt blessed to see some amazing places, meet some great people and eat some great food.
To see photos from Croatia, check my Facebook album.
O zi buna!
There's Something about Mary 