Today was a day with even less of a plan than usual, and very few ideas to guide us. After spending a night on a huge, boring and overpriced, but entirely empty campsite near Split, we just wanted to be somewhere nicer. However, as we’re reaching the southernmost tip of Croatia, we were running out of things to do. (Obviously we can meet the neighbors, we have thought of that).
I had found another National Park, Biokovo NP a bit further south and we figured we could follow the coast in that direction.
The coastline around Split is not the most exciting place to travel through. It’s too developed, but not in a positive way, and I wasn’t necessarily looking forward to spending much time there. Luckily the situation got better around Omis, a town located at the base of a valley, right where a beautiful river meets the sea. I got distracted by some signs and forgot about the coast. Instead I followed the river along a mostly empty road that snaked its way uphill. This tiny road brought us through some amazing scenery, and more or less on the top of a ridge, where there were a few small villages. There was one that was named Slime, and the child in me giggled at that. At the end of the series of signs we followed, we found a family-run business, which was a winery, a restaurant, a rafting agency, and a lot more. Most of all, it was a place where we could eat, and importantly, it was open! This might sound normal for a restaurant, but most of this country is closed and seemingly asleep between October and April. We’ve had some dead ends here and there, so every time we succeed, it’s a real pleasure.
Being close to sea, and close to a river, meant that the house specialities were freshly grilled fish. Today they served squid and trout – the latter of which the chef insisted he had caught himself. To be honest I couldn’t care less if he bought them or caught them. We took both options and they were delicious.
It’s interesting to have people cook especially for you, and fir you alone. There were no other customers, and there probably had not been any for a little while. The owner told us she had been closed between October and April, so she’d only just opened up again.
After dinner, she insisted on showing us a broad selection of everything she sold from her wine cellar (everything that involved olives, bee products, grape products or – oddly – knitting). They had prepared more booze tasters than I could drink. I think I disappointed her when I tasted only three out of fifteen tasters. She was a great saleswoman, as we still bought plenty of stuff. She was quite pushy 😂.
The rest of the afternoon was a relatively boring drive, which included a long streak of closed campsites, increasingly horrible weather. We have now arrived at a very cute little campsite, right on the shore. The weather sucks and it’s cold, but at least it’s beautiful here. I have no clue where this Biokovo NP entrance might be, but life’s good. Instead I might just try my luck with some fishing tomorrow… We’ll sea.
Robin Heinen 