Split - Good Call, Ladybird!

So, the saga continues. Cue epic movie music. Although you know what happens, basically - it's not as if I was lost in the Croatian wilderness and never heard from again, much as I would have liked to escape the work that awaited me back in Norwich. Before my return to England, however, there were a few, sunkissed days of adventure left in Croatia.

We reached Split, which is about a four-hour busride from Dubrovnik, in the early afternoon. The drive followed the coastline the entire way - we drove along cliffsides overlooking the gorgeous Adriatic Sea, surrounded by blue hills, for four straight hours, only stopping for a border check as we passed through Bosnia and Herzegovina. Yeah, life is difficult.

Split is more bustling than Dubrovnik is - it's a very busy port city, and there are ferries in and out all over the place. Dubrovnik's old city was also clearly marked by the city walls and by the peninsula that it stands on. Split is more of a rambling city, and the old city blurs into modern streets and buildings. What's really neat about Split's old city, however, is that it is all more or less built in the ruins of Diocletian's palace. For anyone not up on their Ancient Roman history (I mean, who isn't?), Diocletian was emperor of Rome from 284-305, when he abdicated the throne, basically because his reforms were very unpopular. He retired to the Dalmation Coast, so the Ancient Romans knew that Croatia was a top-notch holiday destination. Vendors sell souvenirs and crafts in the palace's subterranean passages now, which is just wicked cool.


Here's a look across the harbor at Split - the steeple that you can see is the belltower of St. Domnius, which we climbed for gorgeous views of the city.


This is a close-up of St. Domnius (or part of it - sometimes I like to pretend that I can take artistic photographs). You can see the Roman-inspired architecture.


It was two days before Easter, so there was an installation of the Last Supper in the square outside of St. Domnius.


Looking over Split from the top of the belltower - do you see why I keep going on about how gorgeous Croatia is? The entire Dalmation Coast is a postcard!


View out over the harbor - the massive boats with the unprounceable name are the same as the ferry that we took from Bari to Dubrovnik. But seriously, can you imagine living here and seeing this every day? I wonder if people ever start to take it for granted? I certainly hope not.


Looking up the rickety staircase of the St. Domnius belltower - as terrified as they make me, I seem to have a habit of finding Europe's more questionable staircases. This one had massively steep steps and very low ceilings, as I found when I cracked my head on a brick. That was fun.


This is not Merlin, as I had sincerely hoped that it was. Just take a moment to think about how absolutely bad-ass Split would be if it was home to a giant statue of Merlin. I know, right? Instead, this is Gregory of Nin, who introduced religious services in Croatian in 926.


We woke up very early in order to catch the 6:15 a.m. ferry from Split to nearby Brač Island, and were lucky enough to watch the day dawn over Split. There's nothing quite like being on the water in the early morning, when it's still cold enough to see your breath, and seeing the sun start to peek over purple hills, bathing everything in a rosy-golden light.


After a harrowing taxi ride over the winding, hilly road (there's only one) that cuts across Brač, we arrived at the beautiful little town of Bol. Check out the glittering action on the water here.


We picked our way over some fairly treacherous ground in search of Zlatni Rat, or the Golden Cape, a beautiful, hidden gem of a beach in Bol. There were some very sharp rocks, and we had some very unhappy feet afterwards!


The Golden Cape itself more than made up for our rather painful trek there - a white, pebbly beach on a peninsula surrounded by gorgeous, clear, aquamarine waters. It was incredibly, incredibly beautiful, and we had it entirely to ourselves. Never did I ever imagine myself lying in the sun on an island in the Adriatic Sea, worrying about absolutely nothing but just being. It was amazing.

Finding our cab to get back to the port on the other side of the island proved to be a bit of a kerfuffle, and our driver quite literally flew over the mountain roads. She was a champion, and we made our ferry back to Split right on time. After a relaxed lunch (everything about Croatia was relaxed. It was wonderful.) and one last gelato run, we parted ways - Sarah B. and I headed to Zadar, a bit farther north, while other Sarah and Caitlin left for Zagreb, Croatia's capital, which is in the north-west part of the country. We'd booked different flights back to London the next day, so we had officially reached the end of our adventuring together. What a trip it was.

Croatia taught me a lot of things about travelling. I definitely saw the advantages to waking up and getting an early start in the morning. That has always been my preferred method, anyway, but after watching three Croatian sunrises, I was absolutely convinced. The morning is a beautiful time - it's so quiet and calm because most of the world is still in bed, and you feel a certain sense of community with those few souls who are up and about with you. And the sunrise itself - the transition from purply-grey to the pale oranges and pinks that proceed the sunrise, and then watching the first rays of liquid gold light crest over the Croatian hills - there is nothing like it.

I also learned to relax in Croatia. Coming from tourist Italy, where everyone was rushing and jostling on the pavement and where people talked quickly and loudly, Croatia was quite literally a breath of fresh air. We spent a large chunk of our first morning in Dubrovnik sitting in the sun at a cafe, drinking cappuccinos, and it was absolutely wonderful. We had vague plans of what we wanted to do, but we weren't terribly worried about following them, and we didn't have to rush from one site to another in order to get everything in like we did in Italy. Not that I didn't enjoy Italy - I absolutely loved it. But our time in Croatia was purely for enjoyment. And we were much more flexible. Everything in Italy had to go exactly to plan - train times, museum entrances, what have you. In Croatia we realized that sitting by the water all evening with a bottle of wine was perfectly acceptable. In fact, it was absolutely fantastic. We were going to try to get to Plitvice Lakes National Park on our last day, which would have been stunningly beautiful but would require several hours on a bus, and we decided that going to Brač was just much more feasible. Am I disappointed that we didn't get to see the natiional park? Absolutely. But I also had an amazing time at Brač, and I don't regret the decision for an instant. Besides, now I have a reason to go back to Croatia and explore its beauty even more. And I am definitely okay with that.

Jazz Hands for Dubrovnik! And, oh, America

So my plan to finish upating my blog before the term finished in England clearly failed. Ah well. Just pretend I'm still there - that's what I'm doing.

Anyway, Croatia. It's one of those places that I never, ever imagined myself going, in large part because I had never really heard of it before I came to England. My flatmate and Travel Yoda, Laura, had visited Croatia before we started uni, however, and she absolutely loved it. Her photos were enough to convince me that it might be worth checking out. And oh, was it ever.

It has only been in the past few years that Croatia has started to become a tourist destination. This meant, in my experience at least, that there were far fewer people than we saw in Italy and that the pace of life was much more relaxed. Granted, I was in very busy, very tourist-centered areas of Italy, so I cannot generalise for the entire country. But going from Naples to Dubrovnik was akin to going from New York City to the Maine shoreline. Just much warmer. And since Croatia is relatively undiscovered as of yet, the people there are incredibly friendly, I imagine because they haven't been so inundated with tourists that they want to scream (or they could do what Londoners do, which is just walk extremely fast while looking directly ahead, attempting to ignore and/or run over tourists who have stopped to consult a map or who just aren't walking quickly enough) and because they know that they need to entice tourists to spend money in order to build up that industry. In Italy people were generally fairly grouchy (except Giovanni and Pasquale, obviously), I think because they know that you're going to spend your money anyway, so they don't have to be nice. In Croatia, however, the majority of the people we interacted with were so friendly and welcoming. Maybe it's just because they live in the most gorgeous place on the planet, so they're happy. I would be.

Why has Croatia remained an undiscovered gem? It has had an extremely turbulent history, so the region (neighbouring countries include Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia, to give you some idea) was not stable enough to support a tourist industry until very recently. Croatia was settled by the Croats as far back as the seventh century, and it has been part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and, following World War II, the socialist Second Yugoslavia. Croatia only declared independence in 1991, but war with the Yugoslav National Army ensued. The Croatian War of Independence lasted until 1995, when Croatia was victorious, but the area was caught up in regional controversies over the treatment of ethnic Serbs and the actions of the armies on both sides. Thus, it is only recently that people have started to venture to Croatia on holiday. As word gets out, however, I think that this will change, because Croatia's Dalmation Coast has to be one of the most beautiful places in the entire world. I'll stop talking and just show you, shall I?


We took an overnight ferry from Bari, Italy to Dubrovnik, which is on the southern tip of Croatia. The ferry was an adventure in and of itself - I'll just say that Italy made England look like the Land of Efficiency that day. And we didn't shell out cash for proper cabins, so we slept in the bar, which was all kinds of uncomfortable, but makes for a good story. I woke up around half five in the morning to see this, the sun rising over Croatia. It was impossibly beautiful.


This is the view from the side of the highway - not even kidding. The sun literally sparkles on the Adriatic Sea, which is a gorgeous shade of teal, and the water is so clear that you can see all the say to the bottom. It's unreal.


After a gelato break, we climbed the city walls, which completely enclose Old Dubrovnik and lead to some of the most spectacular views that you can imagine. This is the view looking over the city toward the Old Port.


Travel buddies enjoying the sun and the breathtaking views. We all got sunburned up there!


The bells of St. Nicholas Church.


The Old Port - just look at the colour of the water. It's really like that, I promise.


I'm sitting on my couch now wondering, "Why on earth did I ever, ever leave this city????"


Absolutely one of the best days that I can ever remember - great friends, beautiful weather, amazing sights - does it get any better?


After a long day of gelato and taking in beautiful vista after beautiful vista, it's good to sit and dangle your feet in the Adriatic Sea while watching the sun set.

So yes, that was our first day in Croatia, and it was absolutely spectacular. We got an amazing sea food dinner in the city and then caught a free concert given by a travelling orchestra from Antwerp, Belgium. This was especially cool for me because I played in Antwerp when I was travelling with USYE, so it felt like an exchange of sorts. And they played "Lord of the Rings." I mean, come on now. This day could not have gotten any better. The next morning we bid adieu to Dubrovnik and boarded a bus to Split, which meant that we more or less drove a large part of the Dalmation Coast, and it was all breathtakingly beautiful, even from a bus window. More on that in my next post, however.

In other news, I've been back in the States for nine days now, and they have been the longest nine days of my life. Suffice to say that it has not been easy - the transition from Britain to small-town New England is not a kind one, and the Atlantic Ocean seems much bigger from this side than it did while I was in Norwich. It's going to be a "character-building" summer, I think. I'll try to write something more reflective when I've finished blogging about Croatia, and honestly I think that I'm still too upset and frustrated to do it properly at the moment, anyway. So instead of boring you with my current emotional turmoil (which was expected, but that doesn't make it easier), I will leave you with someone else's words, someone much wiser than myself. I found this poem last night when I was going through a particularly rough stretch, and it was perfect. It is a poem by Rumi, a thirteenth-century Afghan poet, who is just incredible.

The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

The Adventure Continues

Hello, dear readers,

How are things? Good? Excellent. I'm still here, in case you were wondering. I just finished my exams yesterday, so massive sigh of relief on that front. I never have to worry about my Victorian Britain module again! That class is a great example of the differences in higher education between Britain and the United States. At home, we meet for class several times a week and discuss weekly readings that are (usually) linked into a cohesive whole that covers several aspects and/or perspectives of the topic that the class concerns. In Britain, the system is much more independent. Classes meet once or twice a week - for my history class we had one hour of lecture and one hour of seminar each week, and I found that there was no sense of continuity from week to week and no attempt to connect topics. Instead of assigning particular articles or what have you for our seminars, our instructor gave us a massive bibliography that it was our responsibility to go through and teach ourselves the topics. Consequently, I didn't learn anything about Victorian Britain until about three weeks ago when I started revising for our exam. Fun times. I'm not a huge fan of this system, just because I don't think that it's as effective for learning purposes, but it certainly teaches a measure of responsibility and independence that can be absent from the American system. Typical British inefficiency for you, though (I stopped being annoyed a long time ago; now I just find it amusing): the exam period lasts for six weeks. At home, I'm used to having about six days, including reading days. I don't know why it's so spread out here, but it seems like a colossal waste of time and resources, as faculty have to be paid, student residences have to be lit, housekeeping staff have to be paid... I don't know. Mind you, I'm not complaining, as it has given me more time to enjoy being in England, but staying on for five weeks to take my one exam does seem a bit ridiculous.

Anyway, onto the more exciting bits of life, basically those parts that don't involve taking tests. If I recall correctly, I was in the middle of detailing my Easter holiday adventures (referring to it as "spring break" will get you strange looks here). Well, after Pasquale sent us off with what I'm sure were lovely and eloquent wishes for good travels expressed beautifully and incomprehensibly in Italian, we got our train from Rome to Naples, which was a complete change of pace.


Naples is absolutely crazy - it's loud, gritty, colourful, teeming with humanity - people don't stop for tourists here. It's not a tourist city - people live here and have their everyday lives here, which means that it doesn't necessarily have the touristy façade that cities such as Rome or Venice have. Just compare the views of Renaissance churches in Florence or Venice to this one in Naples - there is a marked difference. In its own way, though, Naples is beautiful. Although you literally take your life in your hands every time that you cross the street. I don't know if I could stay here for any length of time, but I actually liked Naples. I know, shocking - me, the girl who nearly had a panic attack in Times Square because of the masses of people and who couldn't wait to leave London for the same reason. Just for the record, I love London more and more the longer I'm here, and I think that I could possibly live there someday. What has this year done to me?


Our main reason for going to Naples was to hit Pompeii, which is about a thirty-minute train ride from Naples. So I visited Pompeii with two archeology majors... So. Much. Archeology. So everyone knows the story - Pompeii was a rather swanky city in the Roman Empire, and then WHOOM! Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 A.D., burying Pompeii under several metres of ash and effectively preserving it intact for hundreds of years until it was discovered in 1749, apparently by accident. Can you imagine just stumbling across something like that? "Oh hey guys, I just went for a swim and I think that I found Atlantis..." Geez.


The Temple of Apollo.


This is a collection of some of the artifacts that archeologists have unearthed in Pompeii, which has still not been fully excavated, not by a long shot. You can see one of the plaster castes of a body lying on the table there. It was a bit unsettling to see that.


For some reason I never considered that Pompeii is a city, which means that it's big, that you need a map to navigate it, and that it will take you all day to see it, although after a few hours all of the houses kind of start to blend together. It was broken up slightly by a group of Obnoxious American Tourists complaining, "This doesn't look like the Doctor Who episode..." Oh boy.


Here I am giving a dramatic poetry reading in the smaller theatre - the tourists in the background were obviously enraptured. Pompeii was quite big on entertainment - there was this theatre, a much larger theatre right next door, gladiator games, an amphitheatre, and don't even get me started on the brothels. Sarah and Caitlin didn't believe me that Pompeii was famous for being a fairly free and easy place until we got to the National Museum the next day and saw the "Cabinet of Secrets" that holds all of the pornographic artifacts from Pompeii. Fun fact: penises were considered symbols of good fortune in Pompeii, ergo they appear in lots and lots of decorations. Sorry, digression.


The House of the Faun, one of the most iconic spots in Pompeii. This house belonged to a very wealthy family and contains the famous Alexander Mosaic. I was quite bothered by the fact that the faun in question is not actually half goat. I believe that this negates his faun status.


The Alexander Mosaic, hanging in the National Museum, which we visited the next day (this was an incredibly educational trip, if I do say so myself). It's assumed that the main figure is Alexander the Great, hence the name. Clever, right?


There's Mount Vesuvius just lurking in the background, looking all innocent...


There were some amazingly well-preserved frescoes and floor mosaics in Pompeii. This is the Dionysus fresco from the House of Mysteries, which I may have referred to as the Department of Mysteries all day. Don't worry, dear readers, that has not changed this year - if there is a Harry Potter reference to be made, I will find it and make it. I was also extremely archeology-ed out by the time that we got here, so that may have been a contributing factor.

That more or less finishes our jaunt through Italy! The day after we did Pompeii we somehow managed to navigate the cramped, terrifyingly busy streets of Naples to find the National Museum using only the horrible, horrible map in my Europe guide. I'm pretty sure that whoever created that map invented some streets, because we certainly couldn't find them. It was an adventure. But we made it back to the train station and got on our way to Bari, on the other side of the country. There we met my faithful travel buddy Sarah (I know, another one), who had just flown in from her own adventures in Amsterdam, and we embarked on a ferry for Dubrovnik, Croatia! That will certainly get its own blog, as it has to be the most beautiful, incredible place that I have ever seen in my entire life. Oh my.

All that's left for me to do now is wrap things up in Norwich - I head back to the States in four days. I cannot believe that this year has come to an end. It has been the most incredible experience of my life, and I think that I'm still in denial that it's coming to a close. Now is not the time to be sad, however - there will be plenty of time for that when I'm at home being unemployed. Right now I am going to wring every drop of enjoyment from these next four days that I possibly can - carpe diem!