Slovenia & Croatia

Walking across the border

If you like beautiful landscapes, friendly people, and cheap prices, go to Slovenia.

To get from Venice to Ljubljana via train, you usually have to walk between two stations - so we walked across the border between Italy and Slovenia, a slightly surreal experience! There was absolutely no one around at the border. As soon as we were across we started to notice stark differences between the other, very western-european countries, and Slovenia. There were no electronic timetables at the station, you just walked across the tracks to get to your platform, and there was no typical tourist-town English written everywhere. 

Looking like a proper traveller

Brilliant

We navigated our way to Ljubljana by asking for help from the station staff. One of the good things about Slovenia is that a lot of people do speak English, and they are very willing to help! Joe and I both spent the majority of the train journey across the country with our heads hanging out of the windows taking in the landscape. Snow-capped mountains, lush green forests, clear blue rivers running along valleys.. We even waved to some workers on the track who all grinned and waved back. 

Breakfast in Ljubljana..

Ljubljana, for a capital city, was so small! It was where we discovered the wonder of Hofer (Aldi) for its cheap-ness, and quick cooking food ideas. We had one full day in the city, which we spent wandering the markets, crossing the many bridges, watching musicians, and then trekking up a hill to visit the castle. For tea we cooked a spaghetti bolognese - you really do crave vegetables after a while! We picked up some mince meat from Hofer very cheap, but had no idea what animal it had come from... I do hear that horse is popular in Slovenia..

Our day of departing the hostel was a complete nightmare day. Joe plugged his memory card from his camera into the computer in the hostel and somehow all of his photos got wiped. He was devastated - the photos from half of our trip had disappeared (and he has one of those proper professional cameras, too). Then we got our clothes out of the tumble dryer and found that they'd all shrunk. 

Lake Bled

We were headed to Lake Bled to relax a bit, and decided to take our total number of nights there up to three, just to have some much-needed down time. The hostel we stayed in was absolutely lovely - the best one of the trip by far. It had a very homely feel, was clean and tidy, there were wooden beds and floorboards.. and it wasn't expensive, although it felt like they could have charged a lot more than they did! They had free bikes to borrow, and free washing machines to use. We were given a map with lots of recommended walks and bike routes. There was also a shop right over the road, literally ten seconds away. Every day for lunch we had 'gondola rolls' which we split and put pepperoni and cheese inside.. mmmm. 

Rowing across Lake Bled

The weather was iffy in Bled - we got caught out on a walk round the lake and absolutely drenched! We also cycled round the lake, rented a boat and rowed around the lake and to the island in the middle. We spent an afternoon cycling along the Radovna river, through the Triglav National Park. It was so steep to get up to the start of the path, but the rest of the route was fine - we stopped off to paddle in an ice-cold clear river, and also to read a sign about "The Legend of the Fat Stone" haha - I love translations. On our way back home we raced to beat the rain! The cycle was so beautiful, you could see the mountains and rivers, forests.. Oh, I miss Slovenia.

The other brilliant thing about Slovenia was how cheap the beer (pivo) and vodka was...

CROATIA! We hadn't been sure if we would have the time to get to Croatia but we did! The train line in the country isn't brilliant - most people rely on driving or buses, so we could only really get to Split (in the south). We stayed for a night in the capital city of Zagreb, which we were told wasn't much to look at aside from the nightlife. Our hostel was incredibly empty, but we did get cheese and ham toasties cooked for us and coffee brewed in the morning, which was very nice :) 

Ralph the female tortoise

The train journey down to Split took ages, most of the day. It was frustrating as well, knowing we'd have to make the exact same journey on the way back. We found our way to our hostel, rang the bell, and heard, "If your name is not Joe, do not come in!" followed by laughing. And so began the wonder that is Josko. He bore an uncanny resemblance to Adam Sandler, presented us with shots of homemade rakija (very strong!), bought in 20 doughnuts for breakfast every morning, and owned a female tortoise called Ralph who lived in the yard. He went out of his way to make sure everyone was having a good time. He left the alcohol on the side for anyone to help themselves, and he recognised us on the street after spending just one night there. 

In Split, we explored the Old Town, visited the beach every day, sat on benches by the port and watched the world go by, and stared at the ton of stray cats who lived on the roundabout. On the way out of Split, we missed the train to Zagreb in the morning and so had to book seats on the overnight one. It was 22 euros each to reserve a bed, or 1 euro to reserve a seat.. You can guess what we did, and it was not the best night's sleep I've ever had! We cheered ourselves up with a feast, however, buying three massive loaves of bread. We got into Zagreb at 6.30am, spent our remaining kuna on orange juice and croissants, and then boarded the train to Vienna!

Where we slept for a night..

Things we learnt:
1. Slovenia is beautiful. 
2. Slovenia and Croatia were pretty cheap to visit.
3. Be careful when putting your memory card into a strange computer! (Also, do not format it, as you can recover the photos when back home!)
4. Build some down-time into your trip where you are away from big cities.
5. Tortoises will eat anything.

Italia!

So, after our disaster with the south of France, we headed to Italy. En route to Pisa we had a couple of hours in Ventimiglia, a beautiful quiet town on the seafront where we watched surfers and explored the market. 

Leaning Tower of Pisa

We arrived in Pisa at night, and Joe was the first to spot the Tower - it was surreal seeing it with your own eyes! Our hostel was right by the tower which was incredible, although the lack of a kitchen proved difficult. We shared a room with four other people - two of which were very grumpy and only cheered up after having sex - unfortunately for us we walked into the room as they were under the duvet, and it was pretty obvious what they'd been doing. Joe couldn't sleep due to 'snorey girl' - she was SO LOUD. 



During our day in Pisa we just wandered the streets, followed the river, and had a picnic lunch in our hostel. We also did our first hand-wash which was.. interesting. It took about 40 minutes, and nothing smelled particularly clean afterwards. After collecting some free tickets to explore the cathedral, we split up to have a photo competition - whoever could get the most 'leaning tourist' photos in ten minutes won.

Picnic Lunch in Pisa

When packing up to leave the hostel, my bag felt curiously light - and then Joe realised he'd left half my clothes outside drying still! We grabbed them and then got on the train to Rome.

Colosseum

Rome was.. Rome. It was much more 'London-y' than anywhere we'd been so far - a huge city with so many tourists. We stayed in one of the only hostels left and it was rather awful. The beds gave us bites, and it was like sleeping in a hospital ward. Also, there was no kitchen, so we had to eat a lot of microwaved rice. Yet again we had a rubbish experience with Mr & Mrs Faustus in our dorm, who hogged the one bathroom constantly. I must admit that I did get Rage.
We walked to the Spanish Steps where we met Immy & Ryan (two friends from college) who happened to be in Rome at the same time as us! We bought Colosseum passes cheaply and quickly at Palatino Hill, and then explored the Roman ruins. The colosseum was so impressive, and much more intact than I had thought it would be. We sneakily tagged onto a guided tour led by a man who reminded me of Spencer from Criminal Minds. Joe bought tea bags and I bought iced tea to cheer us up for the next two nights at the horrible hostel. 

Inside St Peters Basilica

The next day we got the metro to the Vatican and tried to get in. Unfortunately, the Pope gives his address on Wednesdays, so the place was a crammed madness. After at least two hours, we sardined our way through security and got in. It was worth the wait! Not only did we see the Pope himself (and the Popemobile), the St Peters Basilica was incredible. The Sistine Chapel etc cost 18 euros each to get into, so, being the poor people we are, we didn't do that. 

We wandered more streets, exploring Rome on foot, and then visited the Trevi Fountain, which is beautiful. It's a tradition to throw a coin in over your shoulder, and Joe and I did so, albeit with a 1cent coin each! 

Throwing a coin into Trevi Fountain

Naples was our next stop! In the Lonely Planet guidebook, Naples is described as 'raucous, hell-broth, dirty, loud, anarchic.." And all those things are true. People say you either love or hate Naples - also true. We both agreed that the only reason we'd really go back would be for the pizza. However, by the end of our stay there we had sort of grown attached to the place. There is nowhere quite like it - walking out in front of cars and expecting them to stop, clinging onto your bag because there literally are pickpockets everywhere. We even haggled the price of a bag down without meaning to. And the pizza. Oh, man. So cheap, and so good. We went to a place that had featured on Heston Blumenthal's programme, and it was delicious, and only cost about 15 euros! We also visited Egg Castle, which was really cool! I felt like I was in Fort Boyard.

Mount Vesuvius

We spent a day visiting Pompeii. No one tells you just how much there is to see there! Nothing is very well sign-posted, and there are loads of stray dogs - I really wanted to bring one home with me.

Caught in the rain!

VENICE was next. We stayed in Venice Mestre - outside the main part people think of as 'Venice' in a hotel (!) but still in a dorm- a three-bed dorm?! The best part about being in a hotel was that our beds were made for us, AND the free massive breakfast! Also, it was only a quick and cheap bus journey to get in and out of Venice itself! In Venice, we spent the day wandering the streets, eating ice cream and pizza, and taking lots of photos of canals and bridges. It is a lovely, serene place that you can get utterly lost in.

Beautiful Venice

On our last morning in Venice, we packed up ready to leave, then went down for breakfast. It got to the time when we needed to leave to catch our train, but we were both still munching away. Obviously given the choice between catching our train and eating more food.. we stayed to eat. Luckily we actually made the train anyway!

Things we learnt:
1. People have sex in dorm rooms, even if other people are in said dorm room.
2. If your bag feels unusually light, you've probably forgotten something.
3. Get Colosseum tickets at Palatino Hill to avoid the queues, and bring your passport if you're an EU resident to get a discount.
4. Don't visit the Vatican on a Wednesday.
5. Always take full advantage of the free breakfast.

That concludes Italy - the land of surprisingly polite people, cheap pizza, and an easy train reservation system. In my next post, I'll update on Slovenia and Croatia!

Europe!

Hello! 

I haven't updated this for a while, because things have been pretty busy! I am currently in Bled, Slovenia, and don't want to make this a hugely long post and hog the hostel's computer, but I do want to give a quick update as to my time in Europe so far.


Joe and I set out for our Interrail trip on the 19th of May from East Midlands airport. The Ryanair flight was an experience - they try to sell you things every ten seconds of flight time. We landed in Barcelona and set off finding our hostel! Barcelona was pretty good - we had three days there which was definitely enough time there, but we were sad to leave our hostel - HelloBCN was brilliant, central, cheap, clean, secure and friendly. Man, it was kind of bad to start off our trip with such a great hostel because in comparison everywhere else had a lot to live up to! In Barcelona we visited La Sagrada Familia -  a huge cathedral that's been under construction for like 200 years or something and isn't due to be finished until 2080, we ate chorizo, drank San Miguel, walked along the beach, and climbed up a huge hill to a fort.

Leaving Barcelona we had our first Interrail experience with our very first train trips. We stopped en route to the station to buy fartons - these delicious doughnut-y pastry things - and therefore missed our train to Montpellier. We were stuck with no more train times, and when we looked at later trains they were all booked up or we had to pay a huge reservation fee. After having a bit of a panic, we asked at the information desk and spoke to a very helpful man who even printed out the next train times for us and told us that we wouldn't need to pay a fee. We hung around the station, bought a huge bottle of water that we christened 'the whopper', and then got on our first interrail train!

Our hostel in Montpellier was pretty disappointing compared to HelloBCN. We stayed in the HI hostel, the only one in Montpellier, which meant I had to buy a HI card to be able to stay there. For only €11 it's worth it, because I've used it a couple of times since in places that you can only stay in if you have one. Despite booking a dorm room, we were given our own room with two beds in, which was brilliant because we could just dump all our stuff on the floor without worrying about being messy and getting in other people's way. We spent that afternoon/evening exploring Montpellier - the sun was glorious and the buildings there are beautiful. Unfortunately, the hostel only had a microwave so we were a bit stuck for food to do - ended up having lasagne that was horrible. 


We then moved onto Nimes, which we loved! The hostel we stayed in was another HI one, and we decided to camp, as they had a facility where they provided a tent and blankets etc and you could camp in the little wooded area by the hostel. It was a fair trek from the station/town to the hostel, and involved a lot of hills (I don't like hills, especially not with a big backpack), but it was  a lovely little place. I used my French with the hostel lady which was good, and we dumped our stuff and then explored Nimes. It's just so beautiful. We sat down on a quiet little street at a cafe and had drinks - the atmosphere was lovely. That night, however, was not. We were SO COLD. Literally freezing. Neither of us got very much sleep, and we kept falling down 'the abyss'  - the cold gap between our air beds.

There was no check out time for campers at the hostel, so we decided to make the most of that by visiting Pont du Gard that morning. We got on a bus there, and paid to get in, which wasn't too expensive. Unfrotunately we were both in pretty bad moods due to the horrible night before, and also only had just over an hour there before the bus back to Nimes. You didn't really need much longer there, it's not like there's tons to do. We got off the bus and then raced up the hills to our hostel, grabbed our bags and raced back down to the train station. The train we got was supposed to get us in at 11pm, which was pretty awful. Still, we had booked a night at Nice, so we knew we had somewhere to stay. Unfortunately, our train was held up while we were on it. We didn't arrive in Nice until about 1.30am, and then had to phone the hostel for directions. Joe tried, because I was in a terrible mood and had slept for most of the delayed part if the train journey, but the man only spoke French so I had a go. We eventually found our hostel and checked in - I managed to communicate fine with the man which was a good feeling to end the pants day! We crashed into bed at about 3am, and decided we'd just ask in the morning about booking an extra night or two so that we could actually see Nice/Monaco/Cannes. Why had we ever thought just one night there would be enough? In the morning though, things got even more pants. Our hostel (which seemed lovely, even at 3am) and all hostels in the surrounding area were completely booked up. Why? The Monaco Grand Prix, happening that weekend. Woops, we missed that one!

We were pretty fed up that we weren't going to get to see Nice at all, or Cannes or Monaco - which would have been even more awesome to see while the Grand Prix was on - but we regrouped and decided to leave France behind and go to Italy instead. The beauty of a flexible interrail pass, hey?! We booked for two nights at Pisa to recover and chill out for a little bit, also realising that we needed to slow down our pace a bit, and then we set off that day, having spent a grand total of just three nights in France.

Things we learnt:

1. Always have directions from the station to your hostel.
2. Use the Deutsche bahn website. It is all you will ever need.
3. Get the next train's times, just in case you miss yours.
4. Book hostels with kitchens - it's harder than it sounds to do without.
5. If you want a day somewhere, you need to book two nights there.

I will continue with our adventures in Italy in the next post!

Last week in Australia

Baywatch.. or something.

I now have one week left in Australia. That’s right – ONE WEEK. What is this madness? I have had a brilliant time the past fortnight since being back from Sydney, and so here’s what I’ve been up to!

I’ve done a few swim tours, including a surprise one on my last official day volunteering at the DDC. It was the best swim tour I’ve been on, too! I swam alongside a male dolphin for about ten minutes straight – he was swimming synchronised with me, turning when I turned etc – it’s such an amazing experience swimming underwater with a dolphin that close. I also had a swim where I was surrounded by four adult dolphins which was cool too!

Selina & Me

The other awesome thing that happened – you remember I said goodbye to Selina, who was heading up North? Well, last week I was at the DDC, and I felt two hands on my shoulders. YES it was Selina back! I jumped on her and we had the most enormously squeezy hug – the other people there looked incredibly confused. She was back in Bunbury for a few more days, and so that was a brilliant surprise!

Feeding kangeroos

Selina, Christine, and I visited Big Swamp Wildlife Park, where you could feed and cuddle kangeroos and birds. The kangeroos are the most adorable things, and the birds land in your hair and try to eat everything.

Barrage of birds

The three of us also went on a little road trip with Ferne and Matthias to the Black Diamond Lakes. Spent the afternoon swimming and jumping off logs, then headed back to Christine’s house for tea, cards, and didgeridoo playing (Selina’s determination is admirable).

Skill, hey?

On Selina’s last night (her real last night, this time!) we had a bbq on Koombana beach – I introduced everyone to bbq’d bananas with chocolate in the middle, which was much loved!

Black Diamond Lakes

I spent Tuesday in Busselton with Mandy visiting the underwater observatory and eating far too much food. Yesterday I went to Kaitlin’s eighteenth birthday party where I painted a ceramic penguin, and had my last Macca’s (sob). Went on another swim tour today, and then swimming at Back Beach with Dylan – waves were pretty darn crazy! Tomorrow I’m going to Gnomesville with Ferne and the family, and I’m going kayaking with her sometime before I leave!

Guess who's in that Louie the Dolphin costume... yes, that's me.

It’s a strange feeling, leaving Australia and everything here behind. The May family have become my second family, and not seeing them every day will be so weird. The friends I’ve made here are from all over the world, so I suppose at least I have a good excuse to travel! I’m excited about everything that lies ahead of me. Seeing Joe, my family, and friends again, and then backpacking around Europe (official start date 19^th May!). And then, after a summer of bbq’s and nights out, road trips and ice cream, camping and beaches (albeit slightly colder than those here!), I’ll be going off to University! So although one adventure is nearly over – debatable if it can ever be ‘over’, I’ve made friends for life here – there are many more adventures just waiting to begin.