Über das Ziel hinausgeschossen // Sitzung 16

The next session dealt with Split and Dubrovnik. I arrived in Split by train with a one-hour delay. After about 5 minutes, I was politely offered some grass. But I politely declined as I just wanted to go to the hostel. This time, the hostel was located on the second floor of a residential building and relatively small. So it was a different kind of hostel. There was no chill-out lounge or bar, just a kind of apartment with shared rooms. I had 2 days in Split and on the second day, I took a bus to Dubrovnik in the afternoon. But more on that later.

On the first day in Split, I did some sightseeing. There isn't much to see in Split, but the ruins of an old Roman palace and the cathedral with the bell tower were worth a visit. To be honest, there wasn't much else in Split. But I had a Croatian Döner, which was really delicious. It was a Cevapcici with Ajvar, onions, and cream cheese in flatbread. Of course, there are also regular Döners in Croatia, but I cheekily titled it that way. In the evening of the first day, I went out partying with 3 Englishmen and 2 Swedish girls. Unfortunately, things got out of hand a bit because I'm not used to drinking much anymore, so I felt like a corpse the next day. And I also had a blackout for about 4 hours😅 Yes, I drank too much, but I don't remember how it happened... But the people I met at the hostel were really nice.

So the next day was a horror, as mentioned before. I had to check out at 10 am and the bus was only at 3 pm. And since I was incapable of doing anything and quite tired, I simply lay down on the grass near the bus station and spent time there. Having a hangover without a bed and food nearby is a different experience...

The bus ride to Dubrovnik wasn't pleasant either. I didn't feel sick, but I hate traveling by bus and it was also delayed by a pleasant 1.5 hours. There are also border controls because you have to drive through Bosnia. It's incredibly annoying. And shortly before the border, the highway ends and doesn't start again afterwards. So it's quite a hassle from there. Well, when I finally arrived in Dubrovnik, I went to the hostel and went to sleep. It was a really annoying day, but of course, it was my own fault.

The next day in Dubrovnik, I regained my will to live and visited the old town. I really wanted to go there because it's an important filming location for the series Game of Thrones, but unfortunately, it wasn't as beautiful as I expected. In Dubrovnik itself, there isn't much else to see. There was the infamous city wall: the landmark of the city, which you could walk along, and a few churches and museums. But nothing besides the city wall was really worth it... Well, in the evening, I had a pizza which wasn't that good. For lunch, I had lasagna, which was also not impressive. Dubrovnik is really expensive compared to Croatia...

The next day, I spent the whole day at the beach because there was nothing left to visit. The sea in Croatia looks really beautiful, but unfortunately, there are often only stone/concrete beaches.

In the evening, I went to another restaurant and had a meat platter. It was amazing, but a lot. I almost couldn't finish it 😔.

The hostel was decent, but remote and expensive. But it's Dubrovnik, after all. Another negative point is that so far in every Croatian hostel, you wake up around 7-8 am because apparently they don't have shutters or thick curtains.

I want to mention one thing that made me extremely angry and I lost about 40€. The stupid ATMs suggest converting euros into kunas directly when you want to withdraw money. So far, so good. However, the exchange rate is ridiculously low and you lose a lot of money if you agree to it. The ATMs try to push you to do it and you have to deny it a thousand times if you don't want that stupid direct conversion. Outrageous! And I, being a naive person, only realized it on my third attempt to withdraw money...

Next up are the national parks!