Adventures in the 'Pest: Croatia

You know how I love asking “if you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?” Well, I think my answer is Croatia.

The characters...

Jackie "I took defensive driving classes in Long Island" Appel

Alex "I recently got a package with tootsie pops in the mail" Bochicchio

Calin "What have I gotten myself into" Ratis

The original plan was to spend Friday night in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia but we accidentally booked the room for August, not July. Oops. That is why we ended up arriving at the villa in Medulin around 12:30 AM Saturday morning.

We went to the beach in nearby Pula the next morning. I had a hint of how amazing the coastline was driving in the dark the night before but was not prepared for how gorgeous the beach was in daylight.

Most beaches in Croatia are rocky (and I have two new scars to prove it), which makes the already crystal clear water seem even cleaner. No matter how far I swam out from shore, I could always see the bottom. And by swimming, I mean floating.

Most men here wear speedos; some don't even do that.

That afternoon we explored Pula, which is less than 200 km from Venice and home to a bunch of Roman ruins. I was a bit nostalgic for Latin class & crazy Mrs. Ryder. Or maybe I just was nostalgic for doodling with glitter pens and the good old Cornelians - Cornelius, Aurelia, Marcus, Cornelia, and Uncle Titus with the pink slippers. You didn't think I would remember the characters from our middle school Latin book, did you?! I also can say "the cart fell in the ditch" in about 1000 tenses.

The best part of the trip was Saturday night when the owners (an Italian woman & Hungarian man) of the villa cooked us an incredible Croatian dinner complete with wine from the woman's family's vineyard and the strongest grappa I have ever tasted. We communicated using a mixture of Spanish (similiar to Italian), Hungarian (Calin is fluent) and English (the man knew English; the woman didn't). The funny thing was we all understood one another perfectly.