Rita Speaks

 

Rita regally sitting on her Throne in Korcula

I have been gone now for more than five weeks. Oh where to start? As always I had a wonderful time with my parents in early September. The weather was so beautiful; we gardened, pickled, picked plums, made pies and had lots of “Deutschland food” as Geoff would call it. Heavenly, it seems that food is very important to me. When it was time to reunite with Geoff in London, I was very excited. Of course seeing him after two week but also I was looking forward to Holly and Rob’s wedding at Great Fosters, just outside of London. It was a picture perfect day for a wedding, a wonderful ceremony and certainly a memorable highlight of our trip.

But now we were about to start our “adventure”. When we begin the planning of a trip, I take a lot of time selecting accommodations, create our itinerary, time frame and routing. Never had “surprises” before, but this was to change. Just before the trip started we had a couple of “surprises”.  We were informed that the apartment in Split was no longer available.  OK – well, better to know now and find something else, which we did. I then contacted the owner of the place in Dubrovnik to finalize payment and he said “sure you can pay but I made a mistake, you will have to move places once while you are here”. Of course we did not want to do that, so we found another place and started a long process of getting our deposit payment back. That all happened before we even started the journey….but what’s a trip without some kinks?? Leaving my E-Book on the plane from London to Venice when we changed planes in Munich did not make me very happy (that’s something that happens to Geoff….not ME!!). Arriving in Venice and being told that our apartment had a water problem and we could not get into it before the next afternoon, I guess we had our share of “kinks” by then. But our luck turned around the next day.  My E-Book was found at Munich Airport and mailed to my parents (I like to call that German efficiency), we moved into our beautiful place on the fourth floor in Venice and we were happy. Being on the fourth floor in an old building means narrow, twisting staircases and no elevator - I guess I love being on “top”!!! We selected quite a few of those “penthouse style” places and each time, while Geoff lugged the bags up I had to promise to pack lighter next time (ha, but how??) Leaving Vancouver in late August, I had no idea how to pack for this trip. I should buy while on the go, sounds like a nice idea now. Luckily it’s been much warmer and sunnier than I had imagined.  All my sweaters and long pants are still waiting for their chance to be worn, but we love this weather. Temperatures are quite perfect around 25-28C and all this with a lot less tourists. High season is July and August, that’s also when it’s very hot and humid.

We have been so impressed with Croatia; it’s very clean and sophisticated. We are doing a lot of walking and especially in Rovinj, Split, Hvar, Korcula and Dubrovnik the smell of the Pine trees are so intense and lovely.  Another smell, not so lovely, is from all the cigarettes people are smoking here which surprises us. I talked about how much I like eating, we had some lovely fresh fish dinners, pasta dishes and the pizza here is very good (but who wants to eat Pizza three times a week?). The prices are still affordable though. Two cappuccinos were about 3 Euros in Split, a bit more in Hvar and Dubrovnik. We find the food options in restaurants a bit unusual for our taste buds. Even buying food at local markets and grocery stores gives me a bit of a challenge; thank God Geoff is not a picky eater and is happy with Salads, Wine & Cheese. I did have to promise him a Lamb Shank dinner after getting back to Vancouver. Geoff did a great job researching the local wines and which ones to buy, we have not been disappointed.

Our trip is nearing its end, as always we are looking forward to going home, being with our family and friends. BUT time and again it’s reinforced that we love this kind of traveling and exploring. In our minds we know we will be back for more soon.

 

Rita sitting on the ramparts of Hvar Fortress with Hvar Harbor below