KRKA National Park

Today we ventured out to the KRKA National Park (a gold star for anyone who knows how to say it.. we still don’t know).  The rain had started up again after we finished our breakfast of coffee and jam on bread.  Being prepared with rain gear, a walk around the national park (which featured some waterfalls, rivers and traditional mill buildings) was going to be a good option for the day.

The national park had some excellent boardwalks and reconstructed working mill buildings, and traditional weaving displays. The mill was particularly impressive with two huge mill stones crushing corn that fed into a hole in the top of the stone to make flour.  The top stone spun around, driven by the power of the river flowing below.  

Krka was one of the highlights of Croatia for both of us.

Boardwalks

Millstone driven by the river below

Freshwater fish

Waterfalls

Baby swans

Boardwalks

Lookout over Roski Slap (waterfalls the locals call the 'necklaces')

Split, Trogir and Vodice - The rain arrives

After visiting the impressive old town area of Dubrovnik the question went begging - could Croatian cities possibly foot it with the Italian cities we had just seen?  As we travelled up through Croatia we quickly found that the mainland towns and cities were lacking a certain charm and interest for a tourist which Italy had so easily provided. 

We had our first patch of bad weather in Split with some torrential rain.  We hadn’t had any rain up to this point.  Given the weather we pulled the pin on a trip out to Hvar and headed on up the coast hoping the weather would clear. 

Split waterfront promenade

Old town of Split

An hour out of Split we stopped in Trogir a small coastal village of 12,000 people.  The town was set within medieval walls with a wide seaside promenade. The rain continued to fall, but undeterred we set out for a coffee and a look around the town.

Coffee out of the rain in Trogir

Pitched up camp in Vodice on the coast, the sun was shining and the camping gear drying.  The camp ground was dominated by retired Germans in campervans and felt very much like a seaside retirement home. Whilst we left the camp for the day to explore the area it looked like very few of the other camper left the camp ground i.e. our neighbour was sitting in the same place in the same chair when we returned.

The waterfront of Vodice had a number of new restaurants and cafes being constructed.  The owners were obviously aiming to open before the peak summer tourist period begins in July.

Vodice marina waterfront

Dubrovnik, Croatia

Our first stop in Croatia was Dubrovnik.  We took the 9 hour overnight ferry from Bari in Italy.  After our experience with Greek Island ferries, we thought we'd sleep on the deck couches.  But when we got on we realised Croatia has wisened up to people doing this and had put little dividers between the seats.  So it turned out to be an average nights sleep.

When we arrived in Dubrovnik, we decided to stay at a guesthouse for a break from camping.  The place we picked (Brunsko) was great - the host's daughter-in-law guided us up the steep narrow street to get into their garage which we could never have navigated by ourselves.  

From the guest house it was an easy 20 minute walk to "Old Town", the main attraction here.  These photos are all from the City Walls.  We walked right round the walls, which gave us some amazing views.   All the roofs were bright orange terracotta and looked brand new  (- a lot probably replaced after the 1991 bombing).

Matera cave houses, Italy

After a bit of trip planning the decision was made to traverse Italy to catch a ferry from Bari on the east coast of Italy to Dubrovnik in Croatia. On the way we stopped off at a place called Matera, which has become famous for its cave houses or "Sassi".  Mel Gibson's movie - "passion of the christ" was also filmed here... Although Mel isn't really the star he used to be.   Half the population of Matera once lived in the caves until the 1950's.  Now most of the sassi are abandoned because they are cold and unlivable for modern society.

Cave houses (Sassi) in Matera

Matera

Old boarded up cave houses

Streets of Matera

Exploring the streets

New town centre

Bank of Napoli building

Amalfi Coast - narrow winding roads

From Sorrento we drove south along the Amalfi coast. This is the main holiday hotspot for the itailian people and also for elderly english people, with many cruise ships calling in. The roads were some of the windiest and narrow of our travels so far.  We met a fuel tanker and numerous buses on blind corners, the big vehicles calling the shots we had to back up 50 odd metres each time to let them through.  Parking was near non existent and best way to visit the small towns would clearly be by bus. The scenery along the drive was superb with houses climbing up the coast cliff landscapes.  We failed to find anywhere to park around Positano, but managed to find one in Amalfi town for lunch and a wander around.

Coastal lookout along Amalfi 

Lots of lemons

Amalfi main street

Massive oversized lemons

Limoncello shops in Amalfi - home of Limoncello

Ravello

Ravello town centre

Pompeii

Whilst staying in Sorrento we caught the local train to Pompeii for the day. 

Roman baths

Baths

Streets of Pompei.  The large stones at the bottom of photo were for pedestrians to cross the road without getting their feet wet.   The roads were flooded with water everyday to clean them.

Road at ground level

Mount Vesuvius in the background.  Before the eruption it had a cone formation. 

Naples, Sorrento and the Island of Capri

From Rome we ventured further south towards Napoli (Naples).  A 2.5 hour drive from Rome, Katherine jumped in the saddle for the final hour and a half into Naples.  We soon found out that even though Naples has a population of near 1 million, their main road into the city consisted of - uneven cobble stones, no lanes, shared by cars, trains, scooters and trucks in a "survival of the fittest" fashion. The first fail from our trusty tomtom also guided us down an impossibly narrow street, with cars coming both ways, attracting the interest of a police man who told us to hurry up and move on.. as "it was dangerous" yep it actually was.  


Managed to find a "garage" park where we nervously gave over the car keys for the car to be parked in a sardine type basement. We set out on foot (sigh of relief) in search of Napoli's famous pizza and a whizz around the waterfront which appeared to be "under construction" and was a bit of a mess. Some ruins had clearly been found and as we all know this will slow a construction job up. 


Found a pizza place, it was unfortunately not as good as other pizza we have sampled in Italy. Back into the car, Kat quickly jumped in the passenger seat and off to Sorrento.

Castel Nuovo

Napoli harbour marina

Mt Vesuvius in the distance, driving around the gulf of Naples coast

The first day in Sorrento we caught a ferry out to the Island of Capri.  Super touristy but some amazing vistas, a novel chairlift and lots of steep stairs.  We bused up to the top and decided to try walking back down to the port.  590m of stairs later we arrived at the port, kat in wedge heels even!  


We had read about the Grotta Azzura (Blue Grotto) which is a cave formation at the north end of the island, which can be entered by row boat.  The cave has an amazing blue illumination.  But, the day we arrived the sea was too rough and the cave opening was blocked by waves crashing in.

Waves crashing into the supposed entrance to the Blue Grotta

Chairlift to the highest point on the island, novelty plus.

View from the top

Self pic

View from the top

On our way down

Camouflaged lizard we found on the way down from the lookout

View out over the Port

Ferry heading for the Italian mainland

Colourful dingys on the waterfront