Day 21 - Thursday 2nd June

It had been raining overnight and so the tables on the terrace were wet. It was still cloudy with occasional showers. Therefore everyone was having breakfast inside and we did the same.

Our tour guide and driver, Jacob (Davor's business partner), was waiting for us when we checked out of the hotel just before 9am. He was driving a black Hyundai mini-bus and so there was plenty of room for our luggage and more legroom than we had yesterday.

The plan for today was for Jacob to take us to the Plitvice Lakes National Park and then to Zadar, a town on the Dalmatian coast, where we would be staying the night.

Jacob took us south on the motorway and then on rural roads. Along the way we stopped briefly at a town called Karlovac (?). Apparently this is the town where the civil war started in the 1990s and they have a small open-air museum on the side of the road showing a bombed building, tanks, aircraft, etc.

Next we stopped at another little town, Rastoke, that has a series of streams between the houses that end in waterfalls into the river. It is known as "little Plitvice" because of the resemblance to the much larger national park about 10km away.

The Plitvice Lakes National Park is the top tourist attraction in Croatia and so it is well patronised. It consists of more than sixty lakes on various levels with countless waterfalls. The lakes are a beautiful blue colour.

There were bus loads of tour groups and school excursion groups. Suzy and I wore our rain jackets whereas Jacob took a large umbrella. He offered us an umbrella too but said he didn't think we'd need one - this didn't turn out to be an accurate forecast.

We thought that we'd just be seeing the lakes from the distance but this was definitely not the case. The paths lead you down the hill and then next to lakes and across waterways and waterfalls with a combination of dirt paths and boardwalks.

Initially we walked for about 30 minutes along the lower lakes and then up a gentle slope to the upper lakes where we caught a ferry across one of the lakes. By the time we got to the ferry, the light showers had changed to steady rain and so an umbrella would have been handy. Although the ferry had a roof, the breeze was blowing the rain in from the open sides.

We walked around the top lakes for about 40 minutes. Normally, Jacob takes people past more of the upper lakes but today he cut it short because of the weather. One advantage of the upper lakes is that they are less crowded.

It is easy to see why the lakes are such a popular tourist attraction. They are beautiful lakes in a beautiful natural setting. I'm sure they'd be even better on a bright sunny day.

There is a cafe back at the entrance to the park and so we had a quick lunch there before continuing our journey to Zadar. We reached our hotel at about 5pm. Jacob then had to drive all the way home to Zagreb. Tomorrow night he plans to drive back to another coastal town call Split where there is an international soccer match tomorrow night between Croatia and Georgia. We are due to be in Split tomorrow night too.

Zadar is in a beautiful setting on a peninsula in the Mediterranean sea. Our hotel is called the Bastion because it is built in the remains of a fortress that is part of the ancient Roman city wall. In fact, Jacob drove us to the hotel on a road that is on top of the old wall.

After settling into the hotel, we set off for a walk around the town. At the end of the peninsula, there is an open plaza next to the sea. On one side of the plaza is the sea organ. This consists of a series of cavities and pipes in the stonework structure of the wharf and steps that somehow creates organ-like music with the movement of the waves and the breeze.

We continued to stroll down the wide promenade next to the sea. In the centre of the peninsula, there is a forum area where they have preserved the ancient Roman ruins including a cathedral and churches.

At the end of the promenade, there is a marina and a restaurant, Fosa, where we had dinner at about 7pm. The restaurant is next to the marina overlooking the sea and you enter through a portal in the old Roman wall. The setting was amazing. The service was brilliant and the food and wine were excellent.

Zadar is famous for its beautiful sunsets and so we had timed our dinner so we could be in the right place to enjoy it. First we walked to the end of the jetty near the restaurant at about 8:15. Although there were a few clouds on the horizon, these only helped to make the sunset even more colourful. We strolled back along the promenade as we watched the sun setting over the Mediterranean Sea.

Ice cream shops seem to be very popular in Croatia and so we made a detour back into the town to buy ice cream cones to finish off our dinner. These shops always have a wide selection of enticing flavours in an elaborate display cabinet.

By the time we reached the sea organ at the end of the peninsula, it was already quite dark. Next to the sea organ, there is a large circular area of glass (the Sun Salutation) about 20m in diameter. Under the glass, there are coloured lights that change in swirling patterns to mimic the changes in the sounds of the sea organ. An enjoyable end to the evening and a long day.