Lenny's 2016 Trek South (2 Viewers)

[StitchesnFluff]

Great trip!
Bear in the garage for the trip home?

 

[Lenny HB]

Let's try and get to the bottom of these issues you're having.

Failing to plan = Planning to fail.

Stop trying to blame other people for your mistakes and Man Up

Planning! That would be taking it a bit far let's not get silly.
I owned up to the water disasters

 

[Lenny HB]

Is hunting bears still legal in Croatia!?
I think we read somewhere that they were supposed to hivdit up when they joined the EU

Think it is illegal doesn't usually stop poachers. Must be getting better as the youngest bear there was 3.

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[Lenny HB]

Conveniently bus stop outside the camper stop, 20min to Zadar. Walking from the bus station found a car park right outside the old city walls that had a separate area for camping cars 150kn/24hr, where we are is much nicer.

Guess where Robert.

Some people put solar panels anywhere.

More old rocks.

 

[Lenny HB]

Tuesdays lunch, Veal cutlets for me Lamp chops for Mi.

 

[Lenny HB]

Wednesday moved back up the coast to Starigrad as we wanted to do some walking in the Paklenica National Park before a weather front comes in. Spent the afternoon and night in the National parks Camper stop on the beach of course. The shower blocks must have been designed for or by Germans. Hooks for clothes outside the shower, glass doors on the shower and large permanently open entrance to the shower block.

Spent 7 hours today walking through the Velika Paklenia gorge.

Local transport.

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[Lenny HB]

Real man's coffee at the mountain lodge on the walk.

Spent the night half a mile down the road from last night Camping Igor, nice little place run by a lovely friendly lady and cheap 100kn inc. EHU & fast wifi.

 

[Lenny HB]

Heading south again to Makarska about 40 miles south of Split, Mi wants to walk up a mountain there.
Stopped on the way at another site on the beach tell it is out of season now only 3 others on site and electric out.

Trying out the new chestnut roasting pan.

 

[Lenny HB]

On the way south stopped off for a whistle stop tour of Trogir old town, nearly every building in the old town was a restaurant and never seen so many nice old buildings vandalised by fitting ATM’s in the ancient walls. Croatia must hold the record for number of ATM’ never seen so many cash points anywhere else.

Three dummies in a row (Mi said it not me)

Pomegranates growing.

Paupers lunch on a public bench.

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[Lenny HB]

Makarska is a beach holiday town, quite pleasant this time of year, expect it would be heaving in the summer. We thought we were going to be in for some bad weather rained all night sill raining in the morning so delayed the start of out walk. Weather cleared nicely but forecast not too good so packed wet weather gear.

Plan was to walk up to Vosac 4660 ft, late start didn’t help and got defeated by the steepness of the climb and the heat (so much for Croatia weather forecasts). By 3:30 we had reached 3000ft and decided to turn back so as to get off the mountain before dark, must be getting sensible in our old age (taken 66 years) we normally carry on and over excert ourselves and come down off the mountains in the dark.

Although the climb wasn’t that hard it was a relentless zig zag path up the mountain with no level sections at all.
We started from the camp site walking about a mile along the beach to the town centre, then from the harbour front it was uphill all the way. It was roads up to the village of Makar about a mile of very steep roads, Mi wanted to drive and park, pleased we didn’t very narrow road, tight hairpins on 1in3’s if we had I think the vans front tyres would have scrubbed themselves down to the canvas.

The clump of trees to the right by the beach is where we started our walk.

Lunch time.

Praying Mantis

The peak on the left was the one we were heading for, the top of the tree line to the right of the peak is as far as we made it.

 

[Robert Clark]

Are you enjoying Croatia?

 

[Lenny HB]

Yes, people very friendly pleasure driving with so few cars on the road scenery very similar to Greece.

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[Robert Clark]

Thought the food was better than Greece

 

[Lenny HB]

Meat and fish better but soggy roast veg with the contents of a salt mine has put us off eating out. Salt levels seem worse than Hungary & Poland.

 

[Robert Clark]

Meat and fish better but soggy roast veg with the contents of a salt mine has put us off eating out. Salt levels seem worse than Hungary & Poland.

We had very crunchy veggies with our fishy lunch today in Porutugal.
Grilled Sole with garlic butter sauce, boiled potatoes, fresh carrots and broccoli.

I just had a thought ????
Are men who prefer campsites more 'camp' than those who prefer to be wild ?

Just asking

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[moulin 87]

Meat and fish better but soggy roast veg with the contents of a salt mine has put us off eating out. Salt levels seem worse than Hungary & Poland.

Can't remember which restaurant it was last week when we were in Croatia but on the menu it stated they would reduce the salt levels if required as they recognise that their normal salt levels are higher than some prefer!!

 

[Lenny HB]

@Robert Clark, not another trip! Soon be a Carthago for sale with starship mileage, you are certainly getting good use out of it.
Had a nice meal in Germany on the way down fish with crunchy broccoli, cauliflower & carrots.

 

[Robert Clark]

@Robert Clark, not another trip! Soon be a Carthago for sale with starship mileage, you are certainly getting good use out of it.
Had a nice meal in Germany on the way down fish with crunchy broccoli, cauliflower & carrots.

Not sure I could go the the hassle of buying another van and having all the extras fitted, to be honest with you Lenny.
Only just got it how I want it - plus I'd never get back what I spent doing it up.

Anyway, how far south are you going?
You're not far from Greece

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[Lenny HB]

On the island of Brac tonight, probably get a ferry to Split tomorrow working our way back up. Want to spend a few days in Germany on the way back. Ferry home from Dieppe on the 22nd.

 

[Lenny HB]

Not sure I could go the the hassle of buying another van and having all the extras fitted, to be honest with you Lenny.
Only just got it how I want it - plus I'd never get back what I spent doing it up.

Mijhan said not sure I can face another van I won't see you for months . You will be messing about pulling it apart fitting all those bits to it. For me that is almost as much fun as using it.

 

[Robert Clark]

Have you ordered many extras on the new van?

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[Lenny HB]

Have you ordered many extras on the new van?

About €15k worth quite a few thrown in on the deal. i will fit solar panels, revesing cameras, inverter, TV, satellite dish & double din sat nav stereo myself.

 

[Lenny HB]

Tuesday took the ferry to the island of Brac, drove over to the south side of the island and parked up for lunch at Murvica. After lunch Mi says shall we walk down to the beach, that was fine but boy was it hard work walking back up the cliff.

Dam! Going to have to reverse off.

Landing the catch.

You can tell this is a busy road.

Bummer! I'm going to have to keep my kit on.

 

[Lenny HB]

We then proceed to explore the village a very odd place, the buildings are built up the hillside with only pedestrian access . They are a mixture of a few renovated building that are holiday apartments a few locals living in fairly run down buildings and the majority abandoned ruins.
Saw a sign to the Dragons Den we decided to investigate after an hour of climbing a steep hillside to around a 1000ft we gave up, footpath sign posts are not one of Croatia’s strong points, did get some great views.

Village High Street.

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[Lenny HB]

Found a site at Bol by the beach, only one other van there, signs gave prices May-Sept think it was closed. We were only a few metres from Zlatni rat, Croatia’s best beach, well if that’s their best I certainly don’t want to see their worst.
Had a bit of a fopar driving off the pitch, didn’t take a big enough arc for our longish wheelbase while trying to avoid the trees and the back wheel tried to climb up a foot high terrace with the front wheels spinning, not too bad but there was a armoured mains cable less than half inch below the dirt surface and the end of my exhaust pipe snagged it. Luckily while we were out walking a couple of other Germans arrived so with their help & their shovels we were free half an hour later.
Yes the site was closed a free night.

Note to self: Must get a shovel in the van, snow shovel not much use in that situation.

 

[Lenny HB]

Drove over the island to Pucise a beautiful harbour town this is the artea the famous white stone comes from that was used to build the White House. Managed to get an almost salt free lunch we shared a Pizza & Greek salad, I let Mi eat all the poison (cucumber). There is an interesting stone carving school one of only 3 in Europe, found out after we left you can have a tour.

Although you get these piles of rocks on the mainland far more here, they are where the woman cleared the land over the last couple of centuries to allow the planting of Olive, Almond trees and Sour Cherries.

 

[Lenny HB]

Then on to Supetar for the ferry to Split.
Split was a bit of a shock to the system, a couple of minutes after driving off the ferry we were on a 6 lane dual carriageway with cars flying everywhere not the laid back hardly a car in site Croatia we had been accustomed to.

Got woken up this morning at 4:00 am with the smoke alarm beeping telling me it's got a flat battery. Still recovering from shock at the price of a Lithium battery for it.

As we are at Camping Split (10 out of 10 on Lenny HB scorecard) we had to do Split. We were pleasantly surprised OK not much of the old town only really the Palace but after what some you have said was expecting the worst.
We did think it was worth a visit but not worth a special detour. As Mijhan read the Palace is a living monument.

Us wrinkles can do selfies as well.

Liked the campsite rules.

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[scousebird]

Managed to get an almost salt free lunch we shared a Pizza & Greek salad, I let Mi eat all the poison (cucumber).

€21

 

[Lenny HB]

€21

I keep telling you I'm not that rich.

 

[Lenny HB]

I'll put you out of your misery, 133kn (£15.60) inc 2 soft drinks, being good as we were driving.

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