one week in croatia & slowenia • our last days on the road

the last two countries on the road were already familiar to us: croatia & slowenia. i remeber spending several summer holidays there as kid just swimming & playing all day long. this time though we entered croatia from the south which literally gave us a 18o degree difference of a view. i felt like i was driving through a whole new world even though i thought i would recognize the croatian vibe somehow. i guess things change .. they do .. everywhere & always. it wasn’t a bad thing though: it showed me once again that there is no fixed image or attitude .. there doesn’t have to be. it made me realize again that opening up to my surrounding was the only way to get a real feeling for it & not projecting my own expectations on something i thought i would already know. first i was confused then i was relived & curious on what was expecting us. we first stopped in `dubrovnik´ to check out the city to smell the salty air & to get a feeling for the kind of new country :)) we moved on further north & drove along the peninsula starting from `ston´ up until we reached `zuljana´ a cute fisher village far away from the big turism hotspots. we stayed there at the camp site `vucine´ & could set up our tent literally at the beach in a little bay with an amazing warm water lots of fish & not too many people around. the perfect spot to go snorkeling right away & that is what we did of course. we sam in sun slept a little in our tent with a good view over the bay & then prepared a yummy summer salad with our camping equipment: life felt so easy then !! the sun set while we were watching the red carpet of sunrays lying down on the sea & in this moment there was nothing else on my mind than simply the sun & us facing each other trough the wide open space. the next day we took the ferry from `trpanj´ to `ploce´ to avoid the border between croatia & bosnia which would have meant another few hours to wait for controls just to leave again after one hour. the ferry was a great alternative to that: super quick & easy & not too expensive at all. from `ploce´ we went on to `makarska´ where we stopped for a little beach break. we bought some food hiked along the seaside & eventually arrived the hidden `nugal beach´ where we had a nice little picnic (only disturbed by some bees who were keen on our hummus lol) & went swimming in the wonderful blue bay. only one more hour to drive up north & we arrived at our place to stay for the night which was the `autocamp sirena´ which someone recommended to us & where we got a super nice camp site for our little tent above the beach. the last time sleeping in our tent on the trip !! but also we were ready for a real bed again :)) we visited the `krka waterfalls´ & stayed in a cozy airbnb nearby in `sibenik´ before we headed all north towards the border to slowenia. there we stopped in `ljubiljana´ to visit this beautiful city i had never been to before .. it kind of reminded me a little bit of amsterdam so yes i quite liked it !! the last night of our roadtrip was a special one .. because we spent it in a windmill lol. a small little windmill in the middle of an apple orchard outside of `ljubiljana´. we did a vegan barbecue in the evening & watched the sun set & felt happy & grateful for all we had come to experience through our little roadtrip !! thank you polo for taking us all the way.