My trip began on the night of the 11th with a late train ride into Gatwick Airport where I spent the night in order to catch my flight at 0555 the next morning. I met up with Dan, Matt, and Eric at the airport. We arrived into Split pretty early and were not expecting anyone else to arrive until later in the day so we had the whole day to explore. We dropped our bags at the hotel and then walked about 1 km along the beach to find somewhere for lunch. I had a traditional food called cevapi - it was very tasty! We sort of got lost on our way back to the hotel, but we found it eventually.
After a quick swim, we decided to get a cab into Split and spend the evening there and get dinner.
The next day we gathered the 13 who had arrived and headed to the marina. The boats would not be getting there until 5pm so we had the whole day to hang out and buy supplies for the boat. Since most of the group hadn't seen Split yet, we caught a bus into town.
The boats arrived and we met our two 20-year-old Swedish captains, Simon and Tim. Both of them ended up being awesome guys and we had a lot of fun with them. Simon reminded us of a lost boy from Peter Pan. He has blonde dreads and from the stories he tells you can tell he likes to have fun. Tim was the captain on my boat and had some sick dance moves he would break out during our numerous dance parties throughout the trip.
That night we set sail and anchored in a natural harbor near the island of Brac and the town of Milna.
The next day we headed for the island of Vis and the city of Komiza. We got into port pretty early because Simon and Tim were worried it would fill up, which meant we had the whole day to explore. The city was pretty small, but old and beautiful. Hila, Alex, and I went for a walk and spent some time just hanging out at the beach. When I got back, I got to hop on the back of a scooter with Reggie and climb the island's mountainous interior to watch the sunset.
The third day was our busiest day. The first stop was a place called Blue Cave. We crammed into our small inflatable boats and headed for this tiny cave entrance in a huge rock face. The inside was amazing. Light came into the cave under the water so the water inside the cave was bright blue while he rest of the cave was dark. We even went for a short swim inside.
The next stop was a place Simon calls Green Cave. The cave was a crescent shaped opening in another large rock face. Some of the guys and Kristen decided to jump of the top of the cave into the water. The drop was at least 10 meters and some of them did it more than once!
The third stop was a beautiful little cove where the guys again jumped from a ridiculously high cliff. The rest of us swam to the beach and hung out.
That night we stayed in a natural harbor near Scedro.
The next day we headed to Korcula Island and its capital city by the same name. We visited the beach and got henna tattoos. I got a turtle on my foot.
The next day we visited Hvar Island and its capital ciy by the same name. The town was an upscale resort catering to a lot of wealthy tourists. It was beautiful with a castle high above the city. Tyler, Alex, Hila and I rented bikes and took off on a two hour bike ride. We spent over an hour climbing a rode up to one of the highest points on the island. We rarely had a flat patch or a downhill section so it was a good workout. It took us about 5 minutes to get back down to were we stated (if that tells you how steep it was) - no pedaling required, just a lot of breaking to prevent yourself from going off the side of a cliff. That night was the only night it rained the whole trip so we spent the evening playing cards on the boat.
The next day we got some great sailing and anchored in a natural harbor off Bol on the island of Brac. We were just off a beautiful long beach. I decided to check out the furthest part of the beach and spent some time alone just swimming and reading. I met up with the others later on and we started sunning on the beach. However, we were soon encouraged to ride "the banana." 7 of us donned helmets and life jackets and hopped on a huge inflated object and were towed behind a boat. It was pretty fun - I think we wiped out and got back on three times.
The next night we anchored in a beautiful natural harbor near Milna. Lots of swimming.
Our last night we decided to pull back into the marina due to expected high winds and people like myself who had an early flight the next morning. We decided to visit the town of Trogir for dinner. We had a wonderful meal of seafood and grilled meat. A few of us decided to go back to the boat early (early being 2am), but couldn't find a taxi. We were soon informed by one of the locals that the taxi drivers were asleep and wouldn't be around till 6am. We got lucky and happened upon a hotel where the night shift manager offered to give us a ride for a reasonable fee.
The next morning I left early to catch my flight and was back in Cambridge by 3pm. It was cloudy and cold when I got back - the exact opposite of Croatia. The weather was in the 80's all week. We were able to swim off the boat whenever we felt like it. Sometimes the boat didn't even have to stop - we just were towed along behind on a rope. We also had two dolphin sitings during the week. If I got a chance I'd definitely go back.
