Budapest - Boarding Amadeus Silver II

Thursday, October 1, 2015

I am going to go ahead and post this in the morning from the hotel because we may or may not have Internet for the next 28 days! We know Amadeus Silver II is docked down on the Danube here so it is a given that we will board this afternoon. When this blog will be updated again is less clear. This morning we plan to visit the House of Terror on Andrassy Street used first by the Nazi SS and later by the USSR's KGB. We know what happened in that house. The Hungarians made a museum there. I'm not too sure about this but we need an easy thing to do with a few loose hours and it has been highly recommended by 2 different guides now. So. That is where we will spend our time before boarding. Wish us luck for perfect water levels and fair weather!

Budapest Day 4

Wednesday, September 30, 2015

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I was up first today at about 20 of 7am! Breakfast buffet was about the same. We were out on the street again around 9am. No HOHO bus today. We are finished with our 48 hour tickets. So, we walked around the corner and about a half block to go downstairs to Keleti Metro Red 2 line. We took it over to Deak Ferenc station to change to Metro 1 Yellow line. I think Yellow 1 line is a lot older than the other lines! We took Metro 1 out to Hosok tere or Heros’ Square. We had missed this part of town using the HOHO Big Bus. After walking around, we found a bus stop for bus 105 to get back down by the Danube. I wanted to see Andrassy Street since it supposed to be Budapest’s Champs Ellyses. Unfortunately, the bus was crammed full and we couldn’t see anything between the low leafy trees and the people standing and sitting in the bus. Oh, well we tried. We went down to the river embankment to walk between the Chain Bridge and Parliament to look for the Holocaust Memorial of bronze shoes along the river embankment. It was very moving. Near the end of the war, the Nazis lined up Jews and tied them together with ropes, then to save bullets they would shot one and when he fell in the Danube and was swept away, the others would be dragged along and drowned. This also spared disposing of bodies. It was an awful time and this is to remember. We walked around Parliament and took the 2 tram back and forth along the waterfront before taking the Metro back to Deak Ference ter. to look for lunch. Nothing opened until noon. We weren’t all that hungry yet, but our 3-hour Segway tour started at 12:30pm and ended at 3:30pm so we knew we needed to eat something now. We found a street stall place with some seating on Vorosmarty ter. and ordered ribs and fries for Clay and a sour cream & cheese langos. This is a big round flat piece of salty fried bread dough. It was interesting and certainly was filling. We arrived at Segway Tours Budapest a bit early. They had us sign waivers and then gear up. They loaned us helmets and quilted vests. We would spend quite a bit of time near or crossing the Danube and the wind was strong and chilly. They told us it was supposed to be about 23C here again by the weekend! You couldn’t tell it by the temperatures for the past couple of days in the teens C. Anyway, we were joined by a father and 2 kids for the first hour. The father was very uncomfortable with the Segway and his kids were a menace racing around in circles. The last 2 hours was just us and the guide, Zoltan. It was quite pleasant and informative. We crossed the Chain Bridge over to Buda and toured the Castle district (those cobblestones were much easier on our big wheeled Segways than on foot yesterday!) and then crossed back over to Pest via the Elizabeth Bridge. It was a good tour. We saw a lot on both sides that we had not previously seen. We saw the last Communist monument left in the city and right near it, the US Embassy. After the tour ended, we walked back to Zoltan’s favorite chimney cake place that he had pointed out to us. Cafe Molnar’s Kurtoskalacs. We had a great view of them making them, rolling out the dough, cutting it into strips, buttering the wood dowel, wrapping the dough, flattening it out then buttering in and rolling it in sugar, putting the dough-covered spits in the special ovens to spin and bake, then pressing them in the various flavors. They re-bake the almond ones to toast the nuts! It was also a tastier cake than the street stands we thought. They cut it in half and served it on a plate unlike on the street where you just unwind the cylinder to eat it. Here you just eat little half circles at a time. Now for the big reveal! We took the Metro to the 2 tram and went out to Mahart 8 on the Danube to look for Amadeus Silver II which should have arrived this afternoon. We had been by the docking spot in the morning and it was empty. When we got back this evening there were actually 2 Amadeus boats docked there and one in front of them. We were so relieved. Fingers crossed that we are breaking our river cruising curse! We have yet to sail the Danube, but at least tomorrow when we arrive there will be a boat there and that puts us ahead of where we usually start out on river cruises! For dinner, we walked back to Basilika where we had soup with bread on top 2 days ago for lunch. We really liked it and wanted another bowl each so that is what we did. It was especially good since it was so cold and blustery today.

We got new 24 hour transit passes so we are set for getting around before we take a cab down to Mahart 8 from Royal Park Boutique Hotel tomorrow at 2pm.

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Budapest, Day 3

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

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Clay was up first this morning and woke me with his tablet in bed again. It was about 6:30am. He asked me if I was alright. I said I didn’t know yet and he told me I was hollering in my sleep and struggling. No idea. If asked, I’d have thought I was too exhausted to have nightmares. I don’t remember anything. We got to breakfast with fewer people this morning. The buffet was slightly different but mostly the same. We met the Big Bus for our second day as it made its first stop of the day around 9:15am. The problem that exists with all the world’s HOHO buses exists here, they don’t run enough for you to possibly schedule to use all the benefits you purchased in the time allotted. We did not get the full route ridden in our 48 hours because they stopped running this evening 2 hours before the scheduled time. We never did get a night ride on bus or boat or a boat ride at all, because we were too tired last night and tonight because the bus we were on went out of service and another never came. We did get our Buda walking tour today at 2:30pm. We had to use public transportation to get to the meeting place. We got directions for doing that from our lunch waiter at Trofea Grill in Buda, but we still got lost before we got there! So, we visited the highest view point on Gellert Hill today at the Liberty Statue. We also toured the Great Market Hall. We had lunch at Trofea Grill. That was all we got done. I feel like I’ve walked miles but I don’t see how that’s possible. I can’t account for my time today. Budapest is a bit of sensory overload. There is a lot to see. It’s the details, like Disney World! We rode the Metro home and stopped at the KFC on the corner to bring a light dinner back. Clay thinks he is getting a sore throat. I hope not, but I really hope that like last trip when he got sick and I didn’t that I won’t this time either! I guess that is really selfish.

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Budapest Day 2

Monday, September 28, 2015

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I forgot to mention the one very odd thing about our hotel room yesterday. I guess because I didn’t take a shower until this morning. There is a large glass window serving as the wall between the bathtub/shower and the bedroom. You can see right out the room and outdoors. There are miniblinds on the the window but they work from the bed side of the glass not from the wet and naked side. You have to plan ahead! Yikes!a

So, today we were up at 6:30am again. I don’t know what Clay was thinking other than he had gone to sleep about 7:30pm last night. When I was turning off my light to go to sleep at 20 of 10pm last night he got up and asked me the time. When I told him, he laughed and said he thought it was time to get up. Well I guess when you go to sleep right after sunset! So, we missed the crowd at the breakfast buffet in good news. It was a little weird they had noodles with bacon and onions for breakfast. Of course, they had other normal stuff too so it was fine. Again, for a major capital city and centrally located at this price, it is a fantastic value and more than fine. We headed out a little before 9am to wait for the Big Bus at the stop around the corner across from Keleti station for the first arrival at 9:15am. Clay bought our tickets from the reception desk at the hotel for 7500 HUF pp. The tickets are good for 2 days and include a HOHO bus route, a HOHO boat route, 2 walking tours and a night bus route and a night boat route. Since our upcoming cruise has a night cruise the first night we’ll probably skip this one. We still haven’t ridden the full HOHO day route. We took the Pest side walking tour, visited St. Stephen’s basilica and saw the black Madonna and the relic hand of St. Stephen, then we had lunch. We had local stuff. We had a bowl of goulash, a bowl of sausage bean soup, a Dreher beer and a Tokaji wine. After we walked over to one of the many chimney cake stands we had seen and I had a cinnamon one and Clay had a yummy messy chocolate one. The wine must have been a mistake. I had the rest of the day planned to the minute. We would cross to Buda and take the walking tour, cross back to Pest and go to the 5pm organ concert in St. Stephen’s, have a quick dinner and then take either the bus or boat night route. I got lost (I don’t know what Clay’s excuse is) like I do in Cary once we crossed the Danube. I just couldn’t get my bearings again until we got well away from the Danube and nearer the hotel! So, we missed the Buda walking tour. We made the concert and I really enjoyed it and was glad we had paid to enter earlier in the day because the side chapels with the relic and Madonna painting were both closed when we paid to enter again at 5pm. But, I got very tired and sore and cranky during that hour and just wanted to go back and go to bed while Clay was expecting a big meal and then he wanted to go to bed. We both wanted to find a Hungarian place and had an unexpectedly hard time. We could have gone back to the lunch place right by the basilica but didn’t want to repeat. When we finally went to the Bistro at Gerbeaud I was just exhausted and knew they didn’t have anything on the menu I wanted to eat except maybe goulash again and I didn’t really want that. They had chicken legs paprika with gnocchi. I asked for just gnocchi and got a bowl of what we would both call spaetzle. That was fine. I like it. Clay got a twice cooked ham hock with lentils, sauerkraut and a sausage that was very close to his all-time favorite pork dish from Vienna in 2003. As I recall that was called a pork knuckle but it looked like tonight’s ham hock He didn’t think this was quite as good, but a close second and much less expensive than that meal was. So, a win for him and for me since it was more than he could eat and he gave me half his sausage so I had a full meal! We skipped dessert. We stopped at a couple of drugstores trying to find some good bandaids that will stay on my blistered toes without causing more blisters! We also stopped at Hard Rock Café. I forgot that earlier we stopped at Starbucks and got me a Budapest mug. It has Parliament and the Chain Bridge on it. So anyway, it seems like no rest for the weary. Even once we have gotten on our own, we haven’t let up the pace. Tomorrow we need to make the most of what’s left on our Big Bus and transit passes. Wednesday Clay has us booked for a 3 hour Segway tour. Thursday at 11am we have to be checked out of this hotel and at 3pm cabins should be ready on Amadeus Silver II. I should warn that they warn their Internet access is by satellite and slow and unreliable. So it is not clear that we'll be able to keep up with real time posts!

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To Budapest

Sunday, September 27, 2015

Clay was up first again and he woke me up about 6:45am with the light from his tablet in bed.  Today we have breakfast and pack up, check out and leave Croatia. We were later to breakfast and had a 2-top so it was more relaxed dining this morning. Though these tour hotel’s buffet breakfasts are never too pleasant. Anyway, we weren’t rushed. We were downstairs and checked out and had checked with the guy at the front desk whose name we never did get by 9:40am. Clay tipped him and thanked him again. Valentino seemed like he was going to offer to drive us himself last night when we got the bus mileage from him. Too bad we didn’t ask him first. I guess he didn’t learn that we needed a ride to Budapest until the last night. We’d have been happier giving him 400 Euros than someone we didn’t know. But, anyway the unknown front desk guy came through for us in 2 minutes work what we had waited 10 days to hear without ever getting a reply, so good work. Radomir arrived by 9:45am and was ready to go. Since we had just gotten comfortable in the lobby, we were ready to go too. Radomir had a nice 4 door Mercedes and we were comfortable. He had stocked the back seat with water, 4 bananas, 2 snack bars and some candies. We drank one of the waters, ate all the snacks except the bananas and he insisted we take those with us when he dropped us off. The ride went quickly. We saw miles and miles of corn fields and had several views of a giant Hungarian lake. It was about 3 hours total. Both the train or bus would have taken closer to 5 hours so this was pretty painless except for the price difference. I think it was so quick because there was virtually no traffic on the road until we reached Budapest. There is a big modern highway, the E71 between Zagreb and Budapest and we just about had it to ourselves. Unlike the other border checkpoints we have been through on this trip, there was no line at this one. We were the only vehicle from Croatia to Hungary while we were there and we only saw 3 cars come through from the other direction. Both countries’ checkpoints were back to back again and after Croatia’s border guard stamped the passports, he handed them across to the woman in Hungary’s checkpoint where she stamped them. They both checked documents thoroughly but quickly. There were a lot of border guards from either side standing around so clearly this was unusually light traffic or they were expecting something to happen. Once on the Hungarian side, Radomir stopped on the side of the road and parked and told us he had to go to a stand across the street and get a highway permit for Hungary. He came back and showed it and said it cost 10 Euros and was good for 7 days, as I recall. While he was over there, I noticed the armed soldier standing by what must have been at least 2 dozen empty buses. I guess Hungary was expected a lot of people to arrive soon! Fortunately, we didn’t see any trouble getting here or since we arrived. Radomir dropped us off at the Royal Park Boutique Hotel at Nrfelejcs utca 6 about a half block from Keleti Palyaudvar (the main train station). We picked this place because it is convenient to the train station and the price was good. If we’d known we weren’t taking the train, I don’t know if we’d have stayed here. The good news is that it is clean, quiet, modern and well maintained. We paid 376 Euros for 4 nights and it includes breakfast and free wifi. So far I have no complaints at this price. We needed to do laundry and that was what we did the rest of the day. We asked at the front desk and she gave us a map and marked the hotel and the approximate location of the self-serve laundry. She told us where to go to buy Metro tickets and to take the red line 1 stop and the walk about 2 blocks. She was right, but we wouldn’t have found it without the street address for which we thank Clay’s phone! We paid 3200 Hungarian Forints to wash and dry 2 loads. That equaled $12. It was all good except the dryers were set to no go above 30C max so we would still be there waiting for the jeans to dry! The jeans were the only thing we can’t really hand wash for the same reason so we aren’t sure what to do about this in 2 more weeks. For example, the laundry list in this room says 1 pair of jeans can be sent out for 2300 HUF, so I have 3 pairs of jeans with me and the longest I can wear a pair is 1 week which means every 2 weeks I need to launder them. If the Amadeus ships have any laundry service on board for similar prices then it makes sense to hand launder every night and always have something hanging up to dry but send the jeans out. We’ll have to see.  I wasn’t hungry and it was drizzling when we headed back to the hotel. So I started distributing our damp laundry and Clay went out to one of the dozens of kabob and gyros stands we had passed. I ate a banana and some of the big bag of dry roasted peanuts Clay bought at Lake Bled with a cup of in-room Nespresso decaf. I took my pills and worked on this entry. Now Clay is snoring in bed and I need to join him, in bed, not in snoring, I hope not…

Anyway, we are on our own until we join Amadeus Silver II for our 28-day Complete Europe. According to Marine Traffic, Amadeus Silver II is on her way south so we have high hopes of finally cruising most of the Danube. Yesterday she was in Linz and today she is in Vienna so as long as she keeps moving along, she should be here to pick us up! If you know our history of arriving to river cruise and the boat not being there then you will know how happy this will make us!

Clay said he didn’t take any photos he wanted to post today. 

Zagreb - Last day

Saturday, September 26, 2015

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Clay was up first again and woke me at about 6:30am. Breakfast was already being served. We made it there about 7:30am and found it very crowded. We couldn’t find a vacant table and had to share one so we didn’t get to eat much for responding to the quiz. Since most of our group is departing early tomorrow maybe better luck then. I only had a carton of yogurt and a cup of coffee so I can’t speak to the food quality at all though I prefer it when they have a cappuccino machine and this one didn’t that I could tell.

We loaded the bus at 9am with our local guide. We drove around for about an hour. Then we unloaded and walked around for another hour. Free time was for the last hour. We asked Gabriella about her gold bracelet jewelry store recommendations and went to 8 stores within a 40 minute walk and only found 1 bracelet that was a modern twist on the traditional with a necklace clasp. Sadly about half way through our 1 hour walk, we walked past a shop with the exact bracelet from Split but it was too far away to get back there, find it, shop and get back to the noon meeting point. So, the final answer is no to the gold filigree ball bracelet. When we got back to the hotel we went to the room for our first toilet opportunity of the day. Then we went out looking for lunch during our noon to 2pm break. There were a couple of bakery sandwich takeout type spots about a block away towards the train station. We didn’t see them last night because they were across the street. We had a ham and cheese sandwich and an apple pastry and a Coke Zero to share for less than $4. The bread and pastry were very good.

At 2pm, about 15 of us met to travel to Kumrovec to tour the museum village and birthplace home of Tito. It was interesting. It was about an hour drive in a new direction. At one point we drove through a small valley next to a river that forms a border with Slovenia. After all the fuss about crossing that border the other day, there was nothing but basically a creek to keep you out or in. The weather had cleared and it was warmer and sunnier than this morning. The best part though was that we were the only tour bus there and there were maybe only 3 cars there. It was so nice to not be in a crowd! We had about an hour there and then drove through some hairpin turns to get to our dinner spot at Gresna Gorica. We had taken longer than expected to get out there in the first place because of road construction and they didn’t want to travel that way again. The other way they would normally take, they said the road was closed due to construction and that left the winding narrow mountain road that we took. The views were fantastic again. There was a long steep climb to get up to the restaurant from the bus but the views of the castle and across the valley to it were just ideal. The meal was served family style of all locally sourced local recipe dishes. The mains were duck and veal so I ate a pickle, bread, some beef, some noodles, some potatoes, a glass of wine, 2 glasses of water, a cup of coffee and half an apple strudel and half a sweet cheese strudel. (They do salty cheese strudels here but we have declined to try one. It doesn’t sound right!) Clay ate everything. They had 2 pine martens stuffed by the front door. Why? In Croatian, pine marten is kuna. Kuna is the name of their currency and a kuna is on their flag. They looked cute but I guess they are really vicious. It was dark shortly after we started back for an hour and a half drive so we didn’t get to see much on the way back. I asked Gabriella and Valentino how much mileage we had put on the bus. When we got back to the Westin, Valentino checked his bus logs and from Tirana to now he had driven 2272 kilometers. We spent a lot of time in that bus! But out of all our trips, Valentino has been hands down the best driver and that is saying something. And he made it all look effortless. The bus was always spotless especially the windows. That is so important when you are spending so much time sightseeing from a bus. It has been a pleasure. I can recommend Kompas Tours in the former Yugoslav nations with the caveat that you need to be fit. This is not a trip for anyone with mobility issues.

Tomorrow morning we can sleep later and have a leisurely breakfast. Fingers crossed our private Mercedes Benz and driver will be here to pick us up at 10am and in about 5 hours we’ll be at our Budapest hotel that will be our home for the next 4 nights. It has been raining in Budapest for the last 2 days so there should be plenty of water in the Danube there and we hope north of there by October 1!

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To Zagreb, Croatia

Friday, September 25, 2015

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We were up about 6:30am this morning. Clay woke me. I don’t know how he woke. Breakfast was not too crowded which was a surprise because we knew there were 10 tour buses parked at the hotel last night when we got back from dinner. It was cool, windy and cloudy and did not look like the clear warmer weather forecast for today. The forecast turned out to be almost completely wrong. It was warmer, but it was socked in with rain all the way from Bled to Zagreb. I guess the good news is that the majority of the day was spent sitting on the bus. The bus left at 9am. We stopped Ljubljana about 11am and had a guided walking tour with a local guide. Then we had free time until 1pm. We were near an open air market and old town along the river. We were to find our own lunch and/or do sightseeing. We found a kind of bakery that was selling pizza rolls and chicken rolls so we got those and a Coke and a locally brewed Union beer for Clay and found a covered area with a table by the river to eat. Mostly we just wandered around trying to stay a little dry. My windbreaker doesn’t keep me dry and now my little umbrella is leaking as well. That was an expensive umbrella that we had to buy in Dublin too! I can’t tell you much about Ljubljana except it is the capital and it has a lot of buildings in Viennese Jugendstil-style architecture.

We got back in the bus and drove a couple more hours to reach the border between Slovenia and Croatia. In the ever increasing border tensions in this part of the world, Valentino and Gabriella informed us that things change every time they reach a crossing. Today we got moved from one line to another and then we had to get out of the bus and walk across single file. We each had to present our passport to the Slovenian border guard for inspection and a stamp then cross over the hand the passport to the Croatian border guard and he stamped it. It was our longest time yet spent at a border crossing on this trip. Since traffic was heavy and the weather was bad even though they thought we were about 20 minutes from Zagreb, we stopped at the first Ina station in Croatia for 20 minutes to use the facilities. It took longer than 20 minutes to get into Zagreb and the Westin, our home for the next 2 nights.

We were lucky and got our room 1124 right away. We had told Gabriella that we would do the optional tour here tomorrow and we had an errand to run here. As soon as we got our luggage in the room, we headed out with umbrellas. Gabriella had never come up with an offer or quote for our travel options between Zagreb and Budapest and time had run out. We were going to the train station to buy tickets for Sunday, plus Gabriella needed to finalize our transfer plans.  We stopped at the front desk to ask for a map and directions. He asked us where we were going and told us he had seen on the news that the border was closed between Croatia and Hungary for trains. He offered to arrange a private car and driver. Gabriella saw us talking to him and came over and they argued in their language and she asked us to wait for free time tomorrow. We declined to wait another day in case the train was not an option we’d only have one day to make plans. We have already priced ourselves out of the flight option by waiting this long!  So, we headed off in heavy rain and traffic as the sun was setting to the train station. We were trying to hurry in case they closed at 6pm or something. We don’t know what time they close but we got there and the lady at the ticket counter informed us that the border was closed to train traffic. She confirmed that the border was still open to vehicular traffic now. We walked back quickly to make the farewell dinner. I earned 2 blisters in the process! I have walked miles over the last 2 weeks without incident and now I have a blister on each big toe! Anyway, we went back to the guy at the front desk who was like I told you so. He was right and we asked him to arrange a car and driver. He picked up the phone in front of us and it was done. Less than a minute’s work! It will be 400 Euros. That is a lot more than the train trip we thought we would be making but less than 2 flights booked 2 days in advance! Gabriella was disappointed when she asked us, but she said the guy she had been calling to try to set up to drive us had never returned her phone calls. So, just as well. Fingers crossed we get to Budapest in a day. If the borders close and the driver is willing, we can cross through Slovenia or Austria. Fingers crossed all this rain fills the Danube and Amadeus Silver II is in Budapest on October 1 and we sail all October!

The group’s farewell dinner was in a lovely Art Nouveau room on the 17^th floor of the Westin. They greeted us each with a glass of sparkling wine. There were 5 stringed instruments played by a group of men who also sang. Mostly traditional music we were told. There was one bass and 3 small guitars and one tiny guitar looking thing. It was nice. It was candle-lit. They served a chicken vegetable soup, followed by a cheese and pastry appetizer, the main course of either white fish or a breaded fried ham and cheese stuffed turkey cutlet with potatoes and vegetables all accompanied by red or white wine and followed by flan. Coffee and tea were offered self-service after.  We left soon after dessert.

Tomorrow the bus leaves at 9am for the Zagreb city tour. We also have an afternoon/evening tour booked. Tomorrow morning is the last time we will see Valentino and he was missed at dinner tonight. But, he lives here so he got to go home and will get to sleep in his own bed tonight so that is worth something too. We got our credit card forms from Gabriella for all the options we took and will fill them out for her to collect in the morning. I know we will spend tomorrow through dinner with her, but Gabriella hasn’t said if she will be around on Sunday morning when people transfer out of the Westin. Clay and I have scheduled our private car and driver here for 10am Sunday.

That is it for me today. Good night.

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Bled, Slovenia

Thursday, September 24, 2015

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We had a good long sleep last night. It is amazing what a couple of extra hours mean. We didn’t figure out the AC until morning though and since it was cold and windy and rainy last night we didn’t leave the balcony door open either so it was awful in the room by morning. I had hand washed some clothes since we are here for 2 nights and they were as wet the next morning as when I hung them up to dry. Oh well. Also, the Internet was out here last night and this morning, so I didn’t get yesterday’s post up until just now. We are on a short break between optional outings.

Breakfast was a buffet at the hotel where we had dinner last night. We found the specialties that Gabriella had told us about here. Barley coffee was an option in the automatic cappuccino machine, with or without hot milk. I should have tried it with milk maybe as I didn’t like it. The barley soup was chock full of weird meat and mushrooms. Clay tried it and said he didn’t see any barley but he ate it all and liked it as he said he’d have it for breakfast. Warm and filling. He said he thought he found tripe, sausages and beef. I did not try it.

We met the bus and the rain had not stopped as it had been predicted to do. So we headed out without being able to see out the windows again. I should mention that Valentino keeps that bus and the windows spotless. It was just the rain! We drove around Lake Bled and up the hill to the castle at least most of the way. There was still a crazy steep ramp to climb up to get there. There has been a tower and castle there since sometime in the 1000’s. It was a church property of a German diocese early on. After we climbed up there Gabriella handed out our tickets and gave a brief orientation and told us to be back at the bus in an hour. There was a museum, a forge, a wine shop, souvenir shops and a printing press that made souvenirs. It was interesting. The views were the big attraction but it was pretty socked in the clouds and rain. We drove back to the Park Hotel and unloaded. Those of us going to Bled Island and Lake Bohinj had on 30 minutes to get lunch, use restrooms or whatever and get back on the bus. We ran to the room, grabbed protein bars, used the bathroom and ran back down to the bar where we ordered and shared one of Sava Park Hotel’s famous Bled Cream Cakes. Later we saw a piece twice the size at the Mercator across the street! It was good, but it was not what either of us would have called cake! Back on the bus and it is a bit warmer, windier and the rain has stopped but the clouds are still low. We drove straight back the way we came and struggled to find a boat to take us to Bled Island to visit the church. When we were up at the castle, they were using covered electric ones. When we arrived after Gate One had hired all the boats that we now being paddled, we learned they had stopped the powered one and didn’t have enough paddlers. We eventually got across and back but it caused some timing stress. No one said anything about the 99 stairs you have to climb to visit the church. It was interesting. We were told it is the only genuine island in all of Slovenia. That seems weird. The church as a wishing bell but as there were at least 50 people in line to pull the rope to ring it 3 times and get their picture taken while they make their wish, we skipped it and climbed the clock tower to see the works inside. It was nicely done. We were supposed to go up the 99 stairs visit the church, ring the bell 3 times, climb the clock tower or walk around the island or use the restrooms, café for special cake there and or use the restrooms, but we also had to be back at the bottom of the 99 stairs in 30 minutes time! It turned out we all rushed and got back on time, but the boatman said he couldn’t take us. So we all walked around the island rather than back up and down again. We drove along the Sava River to its source at Lake Bohinj. There we saw the statue of Gold Horn, a mountain goat that is the symbol of Slovenia. There is a legend. I’ll let you look it up as well as the Bled Cream Cake. We walked partway around the lake to see an alpine meadow and then back. Briefly the clouds cleared and the sun shone atop the highest peak in Slovenia across Lake Bohinj. Lastly we drove to the first of 3 traditional Slovenian mountain villages. Though the bus barely fit, we drove right through. We stopped at the next one, Stara Fuzna, and walked through. Then we drove on to the 3^rd one and looped back to the road we arrived on for the trip back along the raging Sava River, the low clouds and some waterfalls from above.  We got back to the hotel about 3:30pm. We walked across the street to the Mercator grocery store to look for Clay a local beer in green can with a picture of Golden Horn on it. He found 2 and a bag of peanuts. We walked around the rest of the shopping center a bit and found the first Slovenia patch. I had given it up and since I lost my Albania (& favorite one) I didn’t even care. Clay promises to find me a replacement on Amazon for Christmas. We’ll see. Oh, the optional tours’ costs. This afternoon’s was $43pp and tonight’s is $50pp. There is one last one from Zagreb. The village of Kurovec (Tito’s birthplace and now a museum basically.) where they have an early dinner of local specialties and wine that Gabriella calls a medieval dinner. We haven’t made a decision on that one yet.

I guess I’ll save this ‘til after dinner in case it is good or bad. We’ve been waiting for Gabriella to get back to us with some information about getting from Zagreb to Budapest on Sunday since she didn’t like our plan to take the train. She still hasn’t gotten back so we cornered her during free time at Bled Castle and she said she was still working on it but that we might have been right about the train being the best option though she still thought it was too long a train ride but that now the bus ride was even longer and people were reporting border problems with it. As far as she could tell, the trains had not yet been impacted by the immigrant problem or any border closings. She still wanted to get a quote from Kompas for a private car and driver since it would be the surest way. She thought it would be prohibitively expensive though. She said if we had to go to the Zagreb train station to buy tickets that she would help us out. She is still nixing a backup plan of flying though that seems as sure as any method to me. She doesn’t like it because there is no direct flight. I don’t like that either, but I’d like to think I could get there in one day without getting caught up in any trouble and I haven’t heard any issues with migrants and flying at all! I’ll keep you posted. We leave here at 9am in the morning for Zagreb and Saturday is the final day of this tour. Sunday we all go our own ways again. We go to Budapest. Somehow.

Back from tonight’s optional dinner. I don’t really like these things. First of all food just isn’t all that important to me and second I hate a meal combined with entertainment. Only about half of the group went to the dinner. I think about the same number may have done the afternoon optional. I am sure the optional are probably good money makers. I don’t know what we’d have done on our own for dinner, but I can guarantee it would have been less expensive, I’d have enjoyed it more and we’d have gotten to bed earlier. All that said, we’ll probably do the last optional dinner too because it is paired with the Tito’s village museum visit. Anyway. It was mostly enjoyed and the food seemed to please most people and some were happy with being forced to dance for their dinner. Gabriella surprised us all with unloading the bus in the village of Radovljica at the Kunstelj Restaurant by saying we were going to take a 15 minute walk through town in the drizzle. No one had dressed for rain. No one had brought an umbrella even. Only half of us agreed to go with her. The rest of us sat in the restaurant and waited. When they came back, everyone found seats at the tables we’d earlier been shown to and then they came and told us we were going to begin in the cellar. Downstairs we went. This place has been in business with the same family for 140 years. In the wine cellar, we were offered red and white wine made somewhere locally. There were no labels on the bottles. Then they served cheese, cheese dips and sausages and sausages baked into breads. The accordion player played and talked and a couple danced. They entertainment trio were in traditional costumes. After 15 or 20 minutes of standing around in the cellar we were sent back upstairs. Gabriella again promised barley soup. It tasted like beef broth with vegetables, but there were clearly barley grains in it. Clay said otherwise it tasted like what he had this morning. I guess it might be one of the dishes that can have variation in available ingredients or recipes. Next they brought out salads and Gabriella insisted everyone try her other local favorite pumpkin seed oil. It was black and surprisingly viscous. It looked kind of like balsamic vinegar. It wasn’t bad, but she said she loves it poured over vanilla ice cream and I wouldn’t do that. Clay had the trout and it was a large serving of fish fillets with potatoes. He said he thought the half and half trout the other night was a lot better. I had the meat. I didn’t like most of it. There were turkey roll things, a white link sausage, a slice of a large round sausage, a pile of carroty sauerkraut, a pile of mashed potatoes, and a cottage cheese dumpling roll thing. I ate a little of everything and all of one of the turkey rolls and then switched plates with Clay. He probably really wanted to order mine anyway, but I thought we should spread the risk again. Dessert was mysterious. Gabriella told us it would be apple strudel with vanilla ice cream but the consensus was that we thought we were served bread pudding with lime ice cream. There was music and dancing between courses and then a forced participation big finale after dessert. We were all ready to get up leave without the conga line anyway. As I say, I don’t like these things.

Tomorrow at 9am the bus leaves Bled for Zagreb for our last 2 nights in the Westin there and a city visit to Ljubljana on the way. The weather is predicted to be bad with heavy rain for at least the next 2 days. I hope this rain is also falling somewhere where it can float our river boats! This is a hard way to travel and we need some relaxation! Good night.

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To Bled, Slovenia

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

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It was another short night last night. We have had some really busy and long days and been up late and going early. I have to say that today we signed up for 2 optional excursions tomorrow so while Thursday could have been a restful day, it won’t be for us. We’re keeping our fingers crossed that the river cruising portion will be easier and more restful.

Anyway, back to today. It started out much cooler this morning. So far, everywhere we have been it has been surprisingly warm. The local guides have all commented on the high temperatures and cloudless skies and how summer is lasting so long this year. (Except for the day it poured in the morning in Dubrovnik and was windy the next morning when we departed.) Anyway, today the pattern broke. It was cooler and cloudier. Late this afternoon it started raining and it poured all early evening. The temperature dropped from 21C to 9C over the course of the afternoon and evening. The high tomorrow is not expected to exceed 17C. That will be in the upper 60sF. It is supposed to keep raining until about 9am. We hope so we booked the full day tomorrow. So, I guess fall has arrived with a vengeance at long last. I am hoping that part of the temperature drop is that we are in the mountains again. We are also hoping that this rain we’re getting is somehow making its way to the Danube so we can sail when we get there in October! Assuming we can find a way to get between Zagreb, Croatia and Budapest, Hungary which we did not foresee being a problem months ago when we booked all this!

Today we had another early start. We had breakfast and got bags out and checked out and on the bus for 8am departure. We have a full day ahead on our way to 2 nights in Slovenia, the last country on our tour of ex-Yugoslav republics. We drove for about 2 hours to get to our morning stop on the coast in Senj. We had one quick photo stop from the mountain top overlooking the Adriatic Sea before driving down there. We had about a half hour stop in a scenic little seaside town with an old stone fort standing over it. We went into a café and ordered drinks and used the restrooms before wandering and getting some more photos. We drove about another 2 hours to Opatija for lunch. It was raining by then. Opatija is a much larger seaside town still in Croatia. We were on our own for lunch. Since it was raining hard, we walked to the first place with available covered open-air seating that we found. They served pizza so we sat. It was the quickest service we’ve had in a restaurant here. We shared another good pizza and then we shared Nutella crepes. It was 96 kuna for the meal with drinks. It was perfect. We walked back to the bus through a park along the seashore since it had stopped raining for a while. It was a pretty town. Next stop, not long after we set off again was the border between Croatia and Slovenia. According to Gabriella, the border crossings are becoming unpredictable in the face of the immigration crisis in Europe right now.  We did not take long to get out of Croatia or into Slovenia, but according to Gabriella they were being much more thorough than usual. An officer came onboard the bus in each place and check each of us and stamped our documents with us in our seats. The Slovenian guard was armed and that is the first time we’ve seen that since we got here. But, there were no lines this time and it went pretty quickly all things considered. Of course, we still have to get back into Croatia to finish this trip on schedule. So, now we are in a new country, Slovenia. We had to drive about an hour I think to get to our first destination, the Postojna caves. It was really crowded just like the lakes yesterday. You’d hate to be here in August! There were probably dozens of tours buses. But, they were set up to move large numbers of visitors. You get a timed ticket and then you join the line for your language. Gabriella had told us to expect 70 people in our group but I suspect it was closer to 100. They take you through only a fraction of this giant cave system. You travel over 5 km of caverns. There are a series of small electric trains on tracks for the first 2 km in and back out, the rest is a paved and sloping and curving and crossing pathway. The lights all went out as we reached the furthest and deepest point! It is supposed to be a fun surprise. Geez! We both nearly panicked until the lights came back on. I turned on the flashlight I have on my purse immediately but still without that train running, I figured it would take us overnight and into the next day to all walk out of there! Good news, it was just a little joke so we could see how totally dark it is underground. I think we already got that memo. It was really incredible and we were both thinking, Poor Carlsbad Caverns, as we walked through. I don’t know how the 2 actually compare, but even though Carlsbad has a cafeteria at the bottom they don’t have a train and this one seemed larger. It was spectacular. We were in there for about an hour of walking and however long the quite exciting train rides were. The trains went faster than we had expected and at a constant underground temperature of 9C, it was a chilly ride. Since it had been raining heavily all day, it was also raining inside the cave!

It was at least another hour drive in heavy traffic and heavy rain (on the freeway this time!) to get to the Park Hotel in Bled. Our home for the next 2 nights is on Lake Bled. We finally scored view rooms! We are on the 2^nd floor in 221 overlooking Lake Bled and Bled Castle above it. We have a balcony! The hotel must be huge though since we arrived in the dark and in pouring rain, we haven’t seen it outside. Gabriella advised that the rooms were again in need of refurbishment but it looks good to us. It is a good sized room and clean. Dinner tonight was included and since the same dozens of tour buses that we at the caves seem to have all arrived here at the same time, the Park Hotel is doing a great job. For sure the same Gate One group that we have seen everywhere every day since Tirana is still with us here. They still seem as unhappy with their group! We got lucky. Our group is not so bad! Dinner was crowded and frenetic and a little poorly organized but we all got fed and the food was varied and tasty. Gabriella had advised us to make sure to have the barley soup tonight and the barley coffee in the morning and to cross the way to the hotel’s terrace café overlooking the lake for their signature Bled Cream Cake. But, there was no barley soup tonight! We see about the other recommendations later I guess. I had hoped it might be on our buffet dinner dessert display tonight and it might have been but there were no labels and too many things on it to try our way through hoping one was it. Clay feels certain since they sell it especially that they wouldn’t offer it on the buffet. We just don’t know. Well, once again I am up past my bedtime with this. At least I can sleep in until 7am tomorrow. The bus doesn’t leave until 9:30am for our included tour of Bled Castle. Hopefully the rain will have stopped for the day by then. I plan to wear socks tomorrow for the first time since we got here!

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To Plitvice Lakes, Croatia

Tuesday, September 22. 2015

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Clay was up several times during the night checking the time. I guess I should have shopped for a local plug nightlight for the remainder of the trip. If I bring one, there are no 110 outlets in the bathrooms. If I don’t there usually are. I didn’t bring one this time and we have sorely missed it. The other thing was that the AC blew right on our heads. I was afraid of it making us sick, so I turned it off, then it got too hot. Lastly, what is up with the bed making in the Balkans? They put a sheet or duvet cover or duvet in cover over the bed. They don’t tuck it in at the foot of the bed so you can just keep pulling the cover up under your chin and it gets higher and higher up from the foot of the bed. Well, mostly that is what Clay keeps doing. Anyway. I might be a little sleep-deprived and cranky now. Where’s that moody wind today to take the blame?

It is cooler today. I think in the low to mid 70sF and not a cloud in the sky and a slight intermittent breeze. We set off early after some seating assignment difficulties. The back row of 4 is unassigned. Gabriella will not assign it as see thinks it undesirable and we have enough seats without it. One couple has claimed it and say they are opting out of enforced rotation. That worked yesterday, but today before they got there a woman who had graduated to the seat directly behind the driver came back and claimed the back row. She said she either had food poisoning or a stomach flu and did not want to be vomit behind Valentino and wanted to lie down. The couple who had claimed the 4 seats wouldn’t give them up and neither would the sick woman. We are 3 rows in front of this today. This also messed up the rotation for some of the other people on the left side. The recalcitrant dug in their heels and Gabriella couldn’t budge them and when she realized it was past time to leave, she gave up. Eventually, the man of the back row couple went up to a single woman with an empty seat beside her (where we sat above the back door yesterday) and asked her to move her bag so he could sit there. She shared her row with him the rest of the day. Geez.

We drove about 40 minutes or so around the bay at Split to get to Trogir, our first stop of the day.  We did not have a local guide here. The old town that we visited is on a very small island connected by a very small short bride. We left the bus at the bus station and walked with Gabriella. We did not use the headsets we just had to cluster around her to hear her. She led us to an old church with an especially ornate entry arch and talked about it before telling us to come back in our free half-hour for photos. She walked us out to the tiny waterfront and to the other end of the island with an old stone fort. I don’t know what she did later as we left for free time. We wandered back through the little alleys and found the mainland side of the island again and found the church to get the photo. Then we made our way back to the bus without ever finding the 7 kunas pay toilets as advertised. Since all the others have cost 4 kunas, we thought these must be special but who knows. We got back in the bus and drove to Skradin for a snack and bathroom break. This is a tucked away little port town inland past a big bridge and around a corner. It was very scenic and there was a big parking lot with shops, cafes, restaurants and most importantly restrooms at the extensive overlooks.

We drove on through much less scenic country and much less densely populated into the mountains. Gabriella used this hour and a half or so to give us a condensed history of humanity and conflict in the Balkan Peninsula from the first recorded Illyrian tribes to the present. I confess to dozing off several times and Clay tells me I missed a huge flock of sheep, some other livestock and a bus full of soldiers that we passed. We stopped around 1:15pm at a highway restaurant/hotel/attraction in Korenica. It was a self-service cafeteria type place that was serving several bus loads with no problem. There were restrooms and finally an animal park out back. They had penned deer, small goats, a wild boar and sow, a Shetland pony or 2 and 2 big brown bears. I guess they used to have a lot of wildlife around here because at the restaurant and the hotel there were lots of taxidermied bears and other animals. We have hardly even seen any birds and only a few squirrels but none in Croatia. Plenty of seagulls, but I am talking about in the mountains.

Our hotel was less than a half hour drive further in the Plitvice Lakes National Park, Hotel Jezero. We got in around 2:30pm and had to leave on the bus again at 3:30pm. Our luggage arrived shortly before we had to go. We drove about 10-15 minutes to entrance 1 of the park. Gabriella bought our tickets there and we met our local guide. Plitvice Lakes is a UNESCO world heritage site. It is a natural set of 16 tiered lakes fed by 2 rivers. Half this formation is limestone and half is dolomite. It is unique. We walked down to the lowest of the 16 lakes, to the bottom of the tallest waterfalls. Then we started walking up along dirt, stone and rough boardwalk paths. The water was crystal clear and full of fish. (Clay is having trout for dinner! Really.) The entire walk was about 2 hours. We had a 20 minute break with bathrooms at the boat landing. We didn’t walk the biggest lake but took a 100-passenger electric boat to the other end of it. There we got off and climbed 215 stairs to get back to the hotel. Some people only walked to the big falls overlook and then could take what was called a canyon walk for about  an hour to an electric tram ride back to the bus stop were we started at entrance one and then catch a shuttle bus back to the Jezero Hotel at entrance 2. I guess some people did that. Some just stayed at the hotel in the first place. So we saw 4 of the lakes.

The Jezero Hotel is what Gabriella considers our worst hotel of the tour. Built in the 1950’s, she said it is old and tired and all original with no further investments made in it though it should be renovated at the end of this season. She says though that it is the only hotel of this size in the park and therefore all the tour groups use it. I think it is fine. It is dated obviously, but it is comfortable and clean. It is more conveniently located than that Dubrovnik hotel and has more character. It doesn’t have the character of the last woods resort we stayed in though. It is adequate and a good location.

Dinner is included tonight.  We drive to some restaurant on the bus and we have a band. I ordered the veal and Clay the trout. I need to skip a meal and I’d really like to skip this one. But, I’m going in about 15 minutes.

Back from dinner. It wasn’t bad! I actually tasted the veal and I didn’t like it or finish it, but it was tasty. They served appetizers, soup, salad, main, dessert and coffee or tea. There were 3 musician/singers and people were really into it as they strolled from room to room. They played American folk songs, country and 70’s rock. I think they played a couple of local songs, but who knows as they weren’t in English. It was a bit of a drive. It was, I think, in another town of Grabovac. The restaurant was called Turist Grabovac.

It is past my bedtime and we have another early start and long day tomorrow. Bus touring is not for people needing a restful vacation. It reminds me of one of Gabriella’s Montenegrin sayings. Rest during the day so you can get some sleep at night.

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To Split, Croatia

Monday, September 21, 2015

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It seemed like a short night last night. I don’t know why. Our side of the hotel was quite quiet. Evidently, those with the sea view also had a bar open with loud music til after midnight. Poor things. The good news was that a large percentage of the hotel’s guests must have left on Sunday because breakfast was quite civilized this morning. We put our luggage out at 10 of 7am and went to breakfast. We came back and brushed our teeth and used the restroom and by 8:12am were walking out to checkout and be on the bus by 8:30am. Our bags were still there. We assumed we had been skipped somehow on luggage pickup and just took them out to the bus. No one else’s bags had been picked up either. Gabriella blamed the wind. We could see that it was very windy outside and still not as hot as it has been. It is still warm. I am still wearing sandals. But it is not hot. Anyway, there were waiters outside this morning taking down the terrace furniture and rolling up awnings like it was a hurricane or something. Now, it was windy. I won’t take anything away from that but it was not severe weather. Anyway, Gabriella told us it is a famous wind in the area. They call it the moody wind or the Yugo wind. She said since ancient times through to Tito’s time that for example crimes committed during this wind are not punished as severely because it affects people. I guess just people who live here because we didn’t feel anything different. Interesting though. So we were a little delayed at the bus setting out. It was another spectacular, world class drive. We followed the coast along the Adriatic Sea north to Split. We had a few adventures on the way. For example, there is about a 20-kilometer section that is in Bosnia-Herzegovina. We had to stop and get our passports stamped. A guy came onboard and walked through checking and stamping passports. We haven’t gotten a single passport stamp yet on this trip that has anything recognizable to the place. Anyway, about 5 minutes later we had a stop in Neum at a hotel/restaurant/toilet/shop. So, a bonus country! Gabriella says the part we were in is Herzegovina. A little while later we crossed a river and then drove inland for a while because there is a kind of delta where the road is not on the coast. We had a photo stop there overlooking the Bacina Lakes. They were scenic but also very interesting because they are crypto-depression lakes. That means they are deeper than sea level which because of the karst geology means that the water at the bottom is brackish and mullet live in there. We stopped in a pretty little coastal town called Makarska for an hour or so for lunch. Clay and I went to a place about a block from where the bus dropped us. It was right across from the harbor front so we had a great view. We weren’t all that hungry so we just shared a pizza. The pizzas have all been good. Clay had a beer and I had a Coke Zero with ice! I wanted the sour cherry crepes for dessert that was what I saw on the menu that made me pick this place whose name escapes me. But, Clay asked for the check, paid it and set out away from the bus. He made a beeline to an ice cream stand, so that was dessert. Then he kept going the same way until he found the one ATM in town with a line. I didn’t realize he was looking for an ATM because we had walked by one right outside the bus. Anyway. Back on the bus for another few hours to Split. We are staying at the Atrium Hotel. It is right beside a large modern shopping mall. It is supposed to be a short walk to old town, but they drove us there on the bus and it took about 10 minutes. We checked right in and got a sea view room (a little piece in the distance!) on the 7^th floor. It is a nice room. We had about 30 minutes to drop our hand luggage and use the restrooms and then we left for our Split city tour. We really only had a guided tour of Diocletian’s Palace. Diocletian was the last pagan Roman Empire Emperor.  He was born about 5 miles from here.  He is the only Roman Emperor to retire from his post. He planned it and built this huge palace as his retirement village/home. He did live out the end of his life and died and was entombed here. After he died, people left and poor people squatted there for centuries. In the 14 and 15 hundreds rich people started building inside there and now those buildings are also preserved. It was all quite unexpected, unique and amazing. They have filmed a lot of Game of Thrones here in Croatia and specifically in Diocletian’s Palace. Our local guide today told us that Spain had offered the production 2 million dollars to move production there next season, so it is gone from here now. It is too bad we are only here for a half day. I doubt we have done justice to Split. We walked over to the mall during our free time to get me a replacement toothbrush since the switch broke on my last powered travel toothbrush. I like this new one better. We’ll see how it lasts.

Dinner was included at the hotel tonight. It was at 8pm! It has been a long day. It was a set menu so we had to order this morning. I ordered beef with gnocchi and Clay ordered vegetarian because he didn’t want salmon. Vegetarian was fried cheese and risotto. He didn’t want that either. I switched with him, but he didn’t want the beef either because it was covered in a local sauce of some kind that was kind of sweet. They served a minestrone type soup. Clay ate both bowls. They served some kind of salad that I didn’t touch and he ate his. They served some weird dessert with 3 layers that neither of us could identify but we mostly ate it. Now it is past our bedtimes.

We have our earliest start tomorrow for what Gabriella calls our most physically demanding day. We have breakfast from 6am to 8am. Bags out at 7:15am. Bus leaves at 8am. We go to Trogir in the morning. We stop somewhere for free time for lunch. In the afternoon, we arrive at Plitvice Lakes and spend about 3-4 hours hiking 4 of the 16 terraced lakes. She says it is over 200 steps back to the hotel at the end of hours of walking. She didn’t specify if it was up or down the stairs! I can’t imagine that it will be more strenuous than the Dubrovnik city walls walk, but I’ll let you know tomorrow.

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Dubrovnik, Croatia

Sunday, September 20, 2015

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Clay was up before the alarm again and woke me at 6am. We were at breakfast at 7am. As the guy behind us on the bus this morning put it, he had to fight for breakfast. Kompas gets serious points off from me for putting us at this distant mega-hotel for 2 nights in Dubrovnik. And the guy that said it has an Adriatic view with a balcony! We have a view of another wing of the hotel with 3 stories of balconies that are all looking into our windows about 20 feet away. I don’t think he can imagine how disappointed and unhappy I am about Lacroma Hotel! The bus was loaded and left for our morning Dubrovnik tour at 8:15am as scheduled. Gabriella told us last night that she was going to note where we are sitting this morning and we must rotate clockwise 2 seats every day we get on the bus thereafter. We’ll see how this goes. Our first stop was south of the old city to get a photo of it in its entirety. The bus stopped about a block from where you could actually take a photo and after we all unloaded 2 more buses parked in front of ours and everyone had to get past those buses and their passengers to get a photo. This was what prompted the fighting for breakfast comment since he had to fight for a photo as well. I have no idea what that was about. To be sure they always do the same thing and they had to know. Anyway…

We drove about another 2 km past that spot to get to a roundabout to drive back to the old walled city for our walking tour. It is cooler and windier today but it hasn’t started raining yet. We got dropped at the bus stop and saw where to get the number 6 bus back to the Lacroma this afternoon/evening for 15 kuna each. That is a bit over $2pp. It sounds easy enough. Our guide today was Zoran. He was 23 and a soldier during the 1991-1995. Dubrovnik was destroyed for the 2^nd time in its history then. We did see a missile hole they left in the Franciscan Monastery when they rebuilt it and one other corner that has not been restored but the city walls are back intact. He pointed out that the Croat soldiers were armed only with pistols or rocks and were not allowed in Dubrovnik in uniform so the shelling was strictly of civilians. It is hard to imagine. So by the time we entered the Pile Gate it was raining.  I learned that the flimsy windbreaker I brought as an outer layer this trip is not waterproof. I didn’t want to use an umbrella in a crowd of 38 people for the very reason that I had people’s umbrella hitting and poking me as well as they’d stand close and let their umbrellas just dump water on me. No point to my thoughts of courtesy to others. The good news is that it was not cold so it didn’t matter that I was soaked to the skin. When the sun came back out in the afternoon, it was clearly the back end of a cold front since it was not near 100F today but closer to 80F. Without the breeze it was still brutal in the sun again today though. We visited the Rector’s Palace last after walking a big loop inside the walls. This is a UNESCO World Heritage site so evidently they were pretty strictly controlled on rebuilding and it shows. It looks amazing. It reminded us both a lot of Sarlat. After the tour ended around 11am, we went in search of lunch. We weren’t that hungry yet, but figured a dry place to sit inside while we waited for clearing (or not) and time to decide how to proceed with the day. We were appalled by the prices and the heavy food on menus. According to Zoran there are only 800 inhabitants remaining in the walled city. Every building is now either a bank, a shop or a bar/restaurant or a church. He says locals almost never go there and it exists as a tourist attraction only now. So, there were tons of expensive restaurants. Also the menus were heavy on seafood. For some reason in Kotor, Gabriella had advised to avoid the seafood and she didn’t say anything about it here so we didn’t know if the warning had carried up the coast. We finally found a sandwich place. I don’t have a receipt from there so I don’t know the name but it had buffet in the name. I don’t know why. It was a tiny place with a very limited menu. We shared a Dalmatian platter of salad, bread, oil cured cheese and local ham like prosciutto. Clay had a beer and I had a Coke Zero. We got mostly dried out and by the time we left the sun was out. So, it was decided we wouldn’t take the 2pm tour bus back to Lacroma Hotel, but stay in town. The 2 things we had been advised to do here were walk the city walls (900 steps) and ride the cable cars to the top of the mountain over Dubrovnik for the view below. Neither of these things was advised in the rain and lightning, so once it cleared we were back on track. We started with some delicious ice cream cones.

They were not cheap. Then we found our way back to what Zoran had pointed out as the lowest/fewest stairs point to get up on the city walls. It costs 100 kuna pp to get up there and you have to have your ticket to get scanned at one more point after entering at least. After that we came back down and did some shopping and some scouting for dinner on our way to the other side of the walled city and a gate out to get to the lower cable car station. It was 108 kuna pp for roundtrip tickets. Both of these are flat out money makers. We know there must be dozens of tour groups in town today and we saw at least one cruise ship docked. There were loads of people and they were all doing the same things! Lots of crowds and long lines. We like the views from up there though. We didn’t realize that if you want to visit the remains of the fort up there that you need to buy a combination ticket at the bottom, so we skipped the fort. It houses a photographic exhibit of the 1991-1995 war and Clay didn’t want to see that anyway. We came back down around 4pm. Around 4pm -4:30pm, we picked Ragusa 2 as our dinner spot. They had outdoor seating that felt comfortable and she talked to us about the menu as we were looking at it. We were about half way down a steep hill and it was a good place to take a break. Plus the steak with peppercorn sauce I had noticed 2 corners down the alley was 40 kuna cheaper here. I got that for 140 kuna plus a 1 liter pitcher of tap water with ice cubes! It was very exciting. This is the first ice we’ve seen since Gatwick Airport. Clay got a big draft beer and a sea bass dinner. It was good. My peppercorn sauce was fiery hot and we still can’t figure that out! I had some nice twice fried fries with it. It was 320 kuna for the meal. Even though we sat down pretty early for dinner, it was after 5pm before we ate so while we usually eat an early dinner this wasn’t too early. They also brought us each a glass with 2 ice cubes and about 2 fingers of chilled raki after we ordered along with a bread basket and olive oil with garlic and red chili peppers in it. Clay really enjoyed the raki and now he just needs to find an ice source to enjoy the small bottle he bought in Kruje Albania!

We thought about having dessert somewhere else but after sitting without ordering I decided I’d rather just take the 6 bus back rather than spend another hour sitting outdoors. Clay got another ice cream cone and we left Old Dubrovnik. Bus 6 runs every 10 to 15 minutes. By the time nearly everyone in line had squeezed into every available inch of space on that bus, we left as the next one approached and probably came along behind us almost empty! We did spot the big parking lot full of tour buses behind oleander bushes as instructed and exited with most of the other people left onboard. Zoran had told us that there was only 1 stop past ours and then bus 6 headed back to Pile Gate so we couldn’t miss our stop either coming or going. He was right.

We got back around 6pm. It looked like behind the hotel on the Adriatic view side there might be a good view of sunset. So we went out and spent about a 30 hour looking for a good place to sit and view it. We didn’t find one and came on back after sunset. We did not go down to the beach. The literature in the room says it is 250 meter walk from our hotel to another neighboring hotel where we have complimentary privileges but you couldn’t see it from here and there were a lot of stairs to get down there and back so we stayed put. Plus the sun was setting behind an offshore island so higher would be a better view than sea level. We couldn’t get higher so we stayed put.

A final comment on toilets. I know people always want to know. Toilets have gotten consistently better in each country. They have also gotten more expensive. The only free toilets we are finding now are in restaurants or museums. In Albania, where some were frightful they were also all free to use. I’ll end here. Tomorrow breakfast is at 7am again. Bags out at 7:45am. Bus leaves at 8:30am. We drive to Split for one night. We should be there sometime in the afternoon. There will be a lunch stop at some point near where we cross into and out of Bosnia-Herzegovina for about 20 minutes of our drive. It seems that Dubrovnik is only connected to the rest of Croatia by the sea. Interesting. We ate dinner last night with a couple who had toured there already and had crossed through the same place to get here to meet us. They said they did not get passports stamped there though they all had to show them as a border guard walked through the bus. Oh well, the stamps we’ve gotten so far have all been illegible and we’ll never know where we got them anytime we look through them in the future anyway.

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To Dubrovnik, Croatia

Saturday, September 19, 2015

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We were up at 6am again today. It was the first time that the alarms Clay set went off. I think he has been up earlier every other day and I think this was the first day that the alarms actually worked. I think he was up 2 or 3 times during the night resetting the Surface which won’t stay on all night and the other tablet was so quiet it would never have woken us up anyway.  Oh, well. Breakfast was at 7am and the buffet was an absolute nightmare. Gate One was leaving a half hour before us and the restaurant should have asked the other groups to start a half hour later but since they didn’t everyone showed up at the 7am opening and fought it out. The coffee area was particularly vicious. Had we realized that at 7:45am there would be no line at all, everything on the buffet would have been replenished and there would only be about 8 people in the room, I think we’d have all been willing to wait!

It was another spectacular driving day. We set out back down the Moraca River Canyon road to Podgorica then on to Cetinje, the historic capital. We were there to visit the last royal house museum. It was very nicely restored and refurnished with the former royal family’s possessions as it was before they went into exile. We were supposed to have a local guide here. Yesterday’s guide, Zorka, declined to talk at all about Montenegrin history as she assured us our guide today would overwhelm us with it. Or not. Gabriella walked us through the house museum and told us about what we were seeing, but I would say overall the day was a little short on history. We had about 30 minutes of free time to walk around. We walked up to the square and the pedestrian area then across the street to look at the outsides of a monastery, another former palace and the former royal chapel. It is terribly hot. Near 100F.

We rode on towards the coast and eventually left the mountains, then the foothills and finally rounded a corner to a view of the Adriatic Sea. We were on our way to Kotor. First, we had a photo stop at Budva. It was like Naples Bay without the volcano. The bus dropped us right at the harbor and the Sea Gate to the old walled city. (Ponant’s Le Lyrial was docked right there!)Gabriella walked us through the Sea Gate and provided us with Old Town maps and advice on what to see and where to go and where to eat. She issued another slow service advisory, but we found it much quicker than last time in Albania. We shared a pizza and Clay had a salad and a Nikosicko Beer. I about $2 for a tiny slightly chilled bottle of water. The food was good and we did get to spend an hour indoors in air conditioning and smoke. The smokers weren’t sitting out there under the canopies and misters! We were already so wet from sweat that I don’t think getting wet from the fan-blown misting would help at all. The food was good and less than $20. Afterwards we walked over to Gabriella’s favorite sweet shop, Forza, and got 2 2-scoop ice cream cones that were delicious for 4 Euros! Then we had less than 30 minutes to wander and get back to the bus. It was so hot! We did a short quick circuit of the lowest section of the walled old city of Kotor. They have a lot of churches. It would have been nice to have more time and a cooler day to walk up at least part of the high part. It was crazy to see the walled city going almost straight up a vertical mountain wall from the sea (which is apparently a bay of a fjord!).  It made me think of Minas Tirith from Middle Earth! The whole sea side drive was very scenic and again in many places reminded of the Amalfi Coast drive.

Back on the bus and we drove for over an hour before we made a truck stop to use the restrooms before we got to the border since we might be there for a while. Once we reached a manned checkpoint we went right through. That was to leave Montenegro. We drove for at least a couple of miles before we reached the Croatian entry point at their border. I don’t know what was up with the no-man’s land in between.  At the Croatian check point, we were there for a while. We got behind an ordinary transit bus and it had come from Albania through Montenegro. Gabriella said those buses are really being thoroughly checked now because of the immigrant crisis in Europe. So there were about 8 tour buses waiting and that bus was being emptied of people and luggage. Eventually, another line was opened and busses drove past us to get first in line there, so we slipped even further back. From there it was about an hour drive to get to our hotel Lacroma. It is out on a peninsula with a bunch of other new beach resort/spa/conference type facilities far from the old walled city of Dubrovnik that I am sure we all came for. It is supposed to thunderstorm tomorrow so no one will be enjoying the beach here. We have a walking tour in the morning and the rest of the day free. There was an afternoon/evening optional tour that we had planned to take with a Dubrovnik harbor cruise and dinner at the beach overlooking old town, but that has been cancelled due to the inclement weather forecast. My only hope is that it pours in Germany, Austria, Hungary, etc. so we have enough water to float river boats in a few weeks! So, we are miles from the old city of tourist attractions and it is supposed to storm but at least it is supposed to be cooler and we have been told there is a public bus that we can take back to the hotel after our 1-2 hour walking tour so we can choose to spend the day out and get back for 2 Euros each. We’ll see.

Tonight we gained 22 people. Now instead of a group of 16 we have a group of 38. Most of them have been touring together already through Sarajevo and Bosnia. We booked through Celtic Tours for example, but at the welcome cocktails and information greeting meeting at 7pm, Gabriella read off a list of at least 8 different tour companies that had sold this tour offered by Kompas Travel. I am not sure how that works because one she mentioned was CIE and when I called them (because we had used them before and would like to again) they told me they didn’t offer it. But, now I think he must have meant the whole thing that we’re doing because at least some of the 8 people who flew in to begin today must have been on CIE. Anyway, now we have a really large group for the rest of the tour! We weren’t expecting that.

Dinner tonight was included and at the hotel. This place is huge and feels like a convention center hotel with a giant food court. There must be about a dozen tour groups here tonight based on the tour group’s signs by the elevators like ours is. I think they all had dinner tonight here! Gabriella had told us that when we have included dinners that they always include water, coffee and tea and if we don’t get it to ask for it. So, last night we had to ask and even though it was the same exact bottle that was placed on our table gratis the previous night, the waitress billed us for it. I had to get up and go get Gabriella to get it removed from our bill. Tonight, water was already set on our tables and then Gabriella came around and told each table that beer and wine were included. She failed to mention to the newcomers what she had told us, when beer and wine are included you can ask for sodas or something else non-alcoholic instead. I told the newcomers that. 2 of them wanted Cokes and Clay and another man wanted beer. The first waitress that came wouldn’t take our drink orders because we didn’t have drink tickets. I went and found Gabriella and she said she’d sort it out. More than half the meal was over before another waitress came over and offered red or white wine. She said no sodas, no beer, nothing or red or white. So, our table of 6 ordered 3 whites, 1 red and 2 nothing. When Gabriella came by during dessert to see how it was going, I told her about the drinks. I hate complaining but this was 3 included drink problem reports from me in 2 nights. That seems excessive! In a matter of minutes, a manager came over and offered juice or soda to the folks who wanted Cokes. The tickets waitress came a few minutes behind him to offer them soda and finally right after the Cokes were delivered the waitress who refused their first orders came back to apologize. That is all well and good but better service would have handled it more courteously and professionally in the first place without all the confrontation and complaints and need for apologies!

It is past my bedtime now and we have another early morning. So I’ll end here.

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National parks of Montenegro

Friday, September 18, 2015

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We had an earlier start today, but it put us an hour ahead of the big Gate One group all day, so it was worth it. Breakfast was a buffet at 7am. There were no eggs cooked to order here, but it was fine. We didn't get much sleep last night for howling dogs! We reckon we've only seen about 16 dogs since we landed in Tirana on Tuesday and there were probably 18 dogs howling all night all over the tiny town of Kolasin!

We were in the bus rolling by 8am. Gabriella has started our rotating seats so Clay and I grabbed the right front today. That was our turn. I think it was a good day for it because we had a long day in the bus and it was another cliff-hanging road with lots of hairpin turns, switchbacks and tunnels. Today we were in Tara Canyon driving alongside the Tara River. It is supposed to be the 2^nd deepest river canyon after Colorado. We learned that Montenegro has a population of about 650,000 people. Montenegro was the last country formed from the splintering of former Yugoslavia in 2006. We had our first stop for a 30 hour lake side walk (if we wanted) at a National Park Biogradska Gora. It was the first national park in Europe declared right after Yellowstone. Then we drove to Durdevica Bridge spanning the Tara River Canyon along with a couple of ziplines. We had another half hour there to visit souvenir stalls, walk the bridge, take photos or go to a café for a drink and the view. We did all that. The bridge is famous for the architect of it blowing it up in WWII to prevent an invasion. It is rebuilt now. We had lunch in the Durmitor National Park. It was salad, a potato based moussaka and the local fried bread. Our final stop of the day was still in Durmitor (where we drove most of the day) at Black Lake. We had over an hour here. It was a long hot walk just to get to the lake which was very low water due to the long hot dry summer they’ve been having. So, I just parked it on a bench and enjoyed the view and the breeze in the shade while Clay walked about a ¼ of the walk around and back. I had a view of the highest peak in Montenegro and I could really feel the altitude where I sat. I guess now I understand what Gabriella meant when she said that Montenegro has no plain. It is really mountainous!

Dinner tonight is at 7pm at the buffet restaurant again. Breakfast in the morning tomorrow is 7am. Bags out at 7:45am. Bus departs at 8am. We should have our last hot day of the summer tomorrow according to local forecasts. It was over 100F down at the coast today and that is where we are headed tomorrow for our hottest day yet. Sunday a cold front is coming through with the threat of thunderstorms and rain. So, good for them as they say they haven’t had measurable rain since July and good for us that it won’t be quite so hot, but hopefully we won’t get too wet. We have another full day on our way to Dubrovnik, Croatia. We will drive back the way we came (!) to Podgorica (the capital, formerly Titograd) then on to Cetinje (formerly the capital). We will have a local guide for a museum visit there. Then another thrilling drive down the deepest fjord in Southern Europe to Kotor. In Kotor, an old walled city, we will have free time to get lunch. Then drive across the border to Croatia and our hotel for the next 2 nights in Dubrovnik. This is where we will have a 2^nd welcome meeting and pick up 20 or 22 new tour participants that will overwhelm our little 16 person group.

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To Montenegro

Thursday, September 17, 2015

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Breakfast buffet started at 6:30am and bags out by 8:15am and the bus left at 9am. We drove just about one hour before our first stop along the road at a truck stop kind of place. They had about 2-4 toilet/bidet stalls if you can call them that. They were squatters. A ceramic hole in the floor with ridged foot wells. Clay said the men’s room was clean and dry. Not so the women’s. There was no soap or paper products and the Gate One bus with a large group that is either always just ahead of us or passing us and gotten there first. There was solid stuff protruding out of the floor hole along with paper and the paper bin was overflowing and there was toilet paper in the bidet bowl. The floor ridges of the squatter were filled with urine. The most horrifying thing was that Gabriella had told us she would only stop at nice bathrooms! As Clay pointed out to me, the men’s room would have qualified as nice. He blamed the Gate One passengers when I described the women’s room condition. About 11:15am, we stopped in the town of Shkodra. We had 2 hours of free time here. The bus dropped us near a couple of pedestrian streets that had banks, jewelry stores, cell phone stores and bars and restaurants. She advised that service was very slow in this town and prices were low so it was a good place to get Euros (the Montenegrin currency) and have lunch. She advised us to look for the San Francisco or the Colosseo Hotel. We went to the San Francisco. It was indeed slow and inexpensive. We sat on the upstairs terrace in the shade with a view of the street. That was nice. It took about 20 minutes for a draft beer and a Coke Zero to come. Then he confirmed what we had ordered so he could give it to the kitchen! He told us when we ordered that Clay’s oven broiled lake carp would take about a half hour to prepare and we said ok because we figured we still had an hour and 45 minutes. My pizza came about 12:30pm and Clay’s fish cam about 15 minutes later. The bus was leaving at 1:15pm. When he brought Clay’s fish, I asked for the check. Clay’s dish was carp from the local Lake Skodra. It was cut into large cubes and covered in a chunky spicy tomato sauce and baked. It was full of bones. The tab totaled $17.64USD or 14.92 Euros or 1940.00 in whatever the local currency really ought to be. The waiter worried that we tried to eat too fast to enjoy it. He may have been right, but he let us sit there for a half hour before he put the order into the kitchen, so whose fault was that. At least they all spoke English there. We found few other people in Montenegro today that spoke English, unlike Albania! Other than lunch, we had no other time here. Clay did get an ice cream cone for 30 Euro cents while I dashed up and down the block looking for a souvenir shop since I had lost my Albanian patch. There were none.

We drove for some time in view of or alongside Lake Skodra today. It is very low now so did not seem too impressive. It is the largest lake on the Balkan peninsula. We crossed the border from Albania into Montenegro alongside the lake. It took a while to get out and then get through the herd of free range goats that live between the 2 border checkpoints. The good news was that unlike clearing a tour bus into the USA, they let us stay aboard the bus and Gabriella took our passports in on each side. We have stamps from Albania and Montenegro now that have no meaningful information on them other than the dates. Very disappointing!

We drove about another 2 hours before another potty stop. This one was inside the Moraca Canyon. It was a wide spot along the cliffside and consisted of a row of quite nice toilets lined up along the cliff rim. It was a little scary to think about that in there! I will say that so far all toilets have been free and that cannot be said of the northern former Soviet bloc states we visited earlier this summer. We had 30 minutes there as there was a café and a snack stall. Clay bought a bunch of locally produced dried figs. He thinks he gave himself the runs. They were 6 Euros. His big fish lunch was probably the same amount. We drove about another hour before our final stop before the hotel for the night. We had less than 30 minutes to tour the Moraca Orthodox Monastery. There has probably been a church there for over 800 years. It is not clear how old the present structures are but the style is from the Ottoman Empire occupation. It was interesting and impressive. The real impression of the day for me though was not mentioned in the tour literature for today and that was the road, E65. It ranks up there with the Amalfi Coast, the coastal road to Hana in Hawaii or a couple of the roads we drove last year in Utah and Wyoming. It was even more exciting than the mountain road we zigzagged up yesterday! It was crazy scenic with a blue and green river at the bottom. This is the Balkan Alps or the end of them. I think Gabriella said we are at over 3000 feet elevation at Bianca Resort & Spa in Kolasin.

We arrived again just behind the Gate One bus with its giant group. (We will be sad when we go from 16 to the big group we’ll have when we add 22 people in Dubrovnik!) After they got cleared out of the lobby, Gabriella was still on her phone and having a dire discussion with a bunch of folks now behind the desk. She came over and updated us that the Kompas Tour company had sent 2 emails regarding our reservation and they had only opened the attachment on one of them so they did not have our guest list and had not assigned us rooms. She was more unhappy than us right now. She came back and said that everyone in our group would be upgraded to a suite from a standard room for the 2 nights at no charge. It is nice to have the space. The town of Kolasin and the exterior of the hotel seem a bit bleak. The inside of the hotel is very National Park style raw wood and it is huge or seems like it rambles forever. We are on the 4^th floor and I don’t actually know how many floors there are. There is no air conditioning! It is still hot here even at the higher elevation. I think it has been hovering around a high of 90F since we arrived. Clay is glad he decided to leave home in shorts!

Dinner tonight was included as are all 3 meals tomorrow. I don’t expect there is anywhere else to eat here in Kolasin so that is probably why. Dinner tonight was a buffet. It was varied but I didn’t really like anything I picked. I don’t think Clay did either but we each ate a plate of cold and hot food, some fried breads and some desserts with a liter bottle of water. I did some hand laundry since we have 2 nights and a free standing shower and a tub where I can string my laundry line. (The last 2 nights’ hotel had a laundry line in the shower stall! Go figure.) We have an earlier start with a full day tour of the Durmitor National Park tomorrow, so it is bed time!

One last note. Our group has luggage porterage included but Gate One does not for those keeping score. 

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