“Where” I ask “is Hvar?”

Hop on this boat and

go south to the island of Hvar.

And we’re there!

Literally up 200 stairs to our home.

Passing pomegranate trees. “Is this heaven?”

Our terrace for the next 2 nights. Should have stayed right here for the entire time!

Walk this beautiful path along the water.

Find a swimming area.

Ahhh! A bit chilly and not easy to walk into due to the slippery rocks, but no complaints here!

Much needed rest after lugging our things up all those steps. This is their idea of a pebbly beach. Felt more like rocks to us! Wonder what these people would think if they saw our beaches!

Agave everywhere. If you look closely, it has lots of stringy things on the leaves.

And the nuns here make these pieces from that agave string!

Best breakfast of the entire holiday!

Sooo good!

With a beautiful view of the “street” and this 15th century sistern.

Snippets of Split

Some places we stayed didn’t include breakfast so we found this little corner of the town.

I just liked this – thought I’d share.

Nice arches.

We walked up this path away from town

for this nice view of Split.

Cool shot of old vs new.

Klapa singers in the vestibule of the palace.

This hole was above the singers. Used to be a dome back in the day.

This black sphinx is the only one of Diocletian’s collection of 13 that is still intact.

At noon the “emperor” welcomed everyone to the palace.

Walking along the Riva – a path next to the harbor.

At night the square was filled with music and everyone enjoying themselves.

I could tell you who sculpted this and the name of the piece but I overheard a tour guide saying “looks like a he’s taking a selfie!” Funny…

Who knew? Not me!

Split has some of the best Roman ruins this side of Italy. In the fourth century A.D., the Roman Emperor, Diocletian (245-313 A.D.) wanted to retire in his native Dalmatia, so he built a huge palace here. The complex took 11 years to complete and roughly 2,000 slaves died in the process. Eventually, the palace was abandoned. Then locals, fleeing seventh century Slavic invaders, moved in and made themselves at home, and a medieval town sprouted from the rubble of the old palace.

This is a drawing of the old palace and Murph is pointing to our home for the next 3 days.

One of the four gates for entering the palace.

The octagonal building was Diocletian’s mausoleum until the Christians he persecuted turned it into a cathedral. Now the smallest cathedral in Christendom.

Typical street scene.

Nice arches & windows.

Entrance to our place – thru the doorway and up a couple of flights.

Our room, complete with Roman walls.

And a tiny kitchen with tiny ice cubes in the tiny freezer. ICE!!!

This is not just another sexy pic of me – trying to illustrate how high the steps were when we climbed up the bell tower.

KRKA National Park – Croatia

All this hiking and stair climbing is making me very strong!

Different park, different waterfalls

and so beautiful!

Right!?!

A little geology.

More water!

A bit of history!

Rivendell to Pandora

If you’ve seen the movie Avatar, I think you’ll understand why we think this place was the inspiration behind Pandora.

Plitvice (PLEET veet seh) Lakes National Park. These were the tallest in the park at 250 ft.

Lakes were a beautiful turquoise.

Just in case you’ve forgotten us.

Could not believe how clear the water was!

Water rushing under and around staircases and boardwalks.

Love these reflections

Beautiful

Waterfalls like this everywhere!

Sixteen lakes connected by hundreds of falls.

Even climbed up to a cool and drippy cave.

Walked 20K (12 miles) the first day and loved every minute.

So simple

More to Rovinj than St Euphemia

Nice view of the old town.

Boat yard we walked by a lot. Cool to watch them restore these old boats.

Amazingly relaxed dogs, often laying in doorways. Cute!

Typical street scene with shiny marble walkways.

So Venetian (right Casey & Shyla?).

Biked around the Golden Cape, just outside of town.

Went on a sunset cruise

for beautiful views like this.

Kiddies & Kitties of Croatia

https://murphysonthemove.com/2018/09/11/kiddies-kitties-of-croatia/

How to tackle an ice cream cone

Ummm…

NO!

In the buff and at the seashore😉

A little history & a bit of terror

This is St Euphemia Church, one of the main sites in Rovinj Croatia – where we are visiting.

Euphemia stands atop the Venetian style bell tower and acts as a weather vane. If she is facing the sea the sailors know they’ll have a good day and if she’s facing the town – not so much!

St Euphemia, age 15, was a martyr in the year 300.

Story goes that she washed up on the shores of Rovinj in this sargaphogus 500 years later. Thus the name of the church.

We decided to go up the bell tower for views of the surrounding area.

192 terrifying stairs!

At the top there was this hole that we could look through to see this crazy staircase.

Built in 1754 – very scary climbing up AND going down!