“The warmth of a perfect day can do more for the soul than a hundred plans ever could.”
At last…A sunny day! After a quick “breakfast of champions”, we broke camp and schlepped our gear down to the landing and loaded the kayaks.
We continued to follow the coastline of Korcula. (The view below is toward the Pelješac Peninsula).
As it turns out, our camp the night before wasn’t that far from the town of Korcula -which we’d seen when we did the bike tour. This church was on the outskirts of Korcula.
Dejan thought that the group might want to take a quick shore break for a walk through the old city before we continued on. We landed on a strip of beach right next to the old town. As we landed, the man that had camped with us stopped to say hello. He’d ridden along the shore, while we paddled. He’d been chilling out at a cafe before we arrived.
I took the opportunity to find a pharmacy and buy a new pair of reading glasses. I’d discovered that the ones I had were broken the night before when I put them on to read my book and one of the lenses popped out. Since we’d been to Korcula already, I did that while Mike kept an eye on the kayaks.
As we left Korcula, we saw a familiar view of the town from the water.
We continued around the point just beyond the left tower in the picture above and ended up encountering a discourteous boater. There are some islands just offshore beyond the docks on that side and people get to them by hiring water taxis. We noticed a taxi-boat pulling away from the dock and kept our eye on him. We were in the lead and our group, which was also watching him, created a space for him to get through behind us -but he kept creeping up to get in front of us. Once he got fairly close, he suddenly gunned his motor and took off across the water. That threw up a huge wake, which could have actually flipped the kayak if we didn’t have some experience with waves like that. Mike had “sea rage” and I joked that maybe the guy didn’t understand English and we should have gotten the phone number of the taxi and given it to Dejan so he could call them and swear at them in Croatian!
After that excitement, we saw that the ferry going across to the Pelješac Peninsula was leaving its dock. We positioned ourselves to be well out of its path.
When it passed, we continued to the island, called Badjia, that you can see behind the ferry in the picture. We were making good time, so Dejan guided us the long way around it to our lunch stop.
The shore pretty much looked the same all the way around.
We landed on another rocky stretch of “beach” near a pier (where the boat taxis dropped off passengers).
Badija Island is a popular day trip from Korcula. There is a trail around the island that takes 45 minutes to walk. It is mostly forested and has a population of Fallow deer -which is a medium sized deer native to Europe and Asia. The deer are lighter in color, which is roughly the definition of “fallow” -which is an archaic English word. The deer are quite domesticated and will interact with people. We didn’t see them, unfortunately.
The area where we landed is hard to describe. We sat mostly on a low wide wall to eat our lunch. There was an abundance of trash everywhere, which made me wonder (again) if the local people are generally litterbugs…or if things hadn’t been tidied up yet for the tourist season?
There was also a lot of concrete, but no clear indication of why. An internet search tells me that in the 1950’s the Yugoslavian Army used the island as a military outpost and government recreation area. The concrete was poured to create walkways and places for people to enjoy sitting and sunbathing by the shore. Since the “beach” is nothing but rocks, I guess the concrete provides a better surface (although hard) to set your beach things out on.
As we left, Dejan said we’d paddle down to view the monastery. Monastery? I hadn’t noticed it down the shore while we ate. (To be fair, it was a bit far off from where we were).
In 1394, the city of Korcula decided to donate the island to the Franciscans of Bosnia. They began building their monastery shortly after. In 1477, the cloister was completed. In the 1600’s the Holy Cross chapel was finished. Further additions were made through the years. As mentioned above, in the 1950’s the Yugoslavian government took over the island (which was basically achieved by evicting the Franciscans). In 2003, the new Croatian government returned the island to the Franciscans. Since then, they have been working to restore and preserve the monastery.
Of course, various photos needed to be taken.
After that we were on the home stretch to our camp for the night. On the way, we passed a small town along the shore.
Our camp for the night was in a small village called Lumbarda. We landed on a teeny strip of beach in the middle of town.
Our campground was a short walk away ( a block or so past the truck you can see in the picture).
Mike starting to set up our tent.
Like everywhere in this region, Lumbarda has a long, complicated history. In modern times, it is a tourist center – various tours and excursions leave from there. The people there are also fishermen, wine growers and stone cutters. Lumbarda’s famous wine is called Grk. Don’t ask me how to pronounce it!
That evening, Dejan announced that the group would be going out to dinner at a restaurant instead of him cooking for us. As we walked through town, we saw this statue.
The restaurant the group picked overlooked the water. I thought this cabinet in the entry area was amazing.
99.999% of the menu was fish, which I don’t eat. One of the specials was a dish that was meant to be shared by two people. The other two people on the tour decided they’d split it. They wanted to ask a couple of questions about it before they ordered it. The waitress said she could show them the exact fish they’d be eating… (before cooking).
While we were waiting for our food, we noticed a small boat approaching the restaurant’s deck. There was a young boy and a man in it. When they got closer, the boy held up a plastic grocery style bag that was flapping like crazy. They were selling a fish to the restaurant.
Mike ordered sea bass. There were basically only two non-fish things on the menu that I’d eat. I had pasta.
On the way back to our camp, we passed our kayaks at the beach.
“Everything has to come to an end, sometime.” –L. Frank Baum, The Marvelous Land of Oz
Last day of paddling.
The next morning, everything was damp at camp. Since it was the last day of paddling, Dejan wanted everything dry before we packed it away. That took a while. Luckily, we didn’t have very far to go on the last day.
We did our last “stuffed turkey” kayak packing of the trip.
Our destination for the day was the town of Orebić -which meant another crossing back over to the Pelješac peninsula. Our route was dotted with several small islands.
Our only shore break was on a small island about halfway across. It was a “party island”. There was a restaurant/bar, lounger rentals and other amenities for people wanting to “go to the beach” for the day. It hadn’t opened up yet for the season.
I’ve never seen white/silver foliage with flowers before.
I found a spot where I could climb up some rocks for a small view.
One side of the bar/restaurant had a nice view of Orebić, our destination.
Once we got back on the water, it seemed like we were approaching the town in no time at all. As it turns out, we’d been to Orebić on our bike trip. It was the day that we’d had to bundle up because of the weather and it is the town we rode through where the ferry had unloaded, making us share the road with a lot of traffic. I didn’t realize it then that that ferry had arrived from Korcula. Yesterday, we saw the Korcula/Orebić ferry in action -sort of like a full circle moment.
Once we’d landed, Dejan had to call a taxi to catch a ride back to the campground we’d left the van at and then come back to pick us up.
Mike took a bunch of sketchy photos of me while I was sitting on the wall after we landed. This is one of the better ones. I only look like I’m regretting my life choices… ha ha… It was actually a fun adventure for me.
While Dejan was gone, the others wanted to go find coffee, so we walked with them. Lucky for us -the coffee was at a small cafe that also had gelato!
Dejan was already back when we returned to the kayaks. It was time to load up and return to Split. While the guys were getting the boats up and tied down, I was busy cleaning the windows on the van in case we could get some pictures on the way back.
Elsa, the other woman on the tour ended up sitting on the side of the van with the best views. She shared this one with me because I didn’t get any good photos.
It was a long drive (several hours) back to Split. Dejan suggested stopping at a winery as a “rest stop” along the way. We’re not wine people, but I did enjoy seeing the winery.
When we arrived, I thought it looked somewhat unassuming.
Walking into the front entrance led us to a very nice bar and seating area. Dejan pointed us down some stairs to the basement area. Nothing from what we’d seen above ground indicated how large the basement area seemed.
There were areas for barrel and bottled wine storage, as well as several differently decorated areas where wine tastings could be hosted for larger groups.
After our short visit, we hopped back in the van for the rest of the drive to Split. Once we arrived there, the van sort of had to double park -so there was a whirlwind rush to get our luggage and say quick goodbyes. In a blink of an eye -we all went our separate ways (except me and Mike, of course…we were actually still talking to each other at that point…hah).
All in all, I liked our kayak tour. There are some things that I, personally, had small issues with (like the tandem!) …but those were more about personal preference than anything. The experience of being out on the water, camping along the way and seeing some really beautiful sights was everything I was hoping for when we signed up for the tour.
Our last stop in Croatia is next: The city of Trogir
When Mike took this picture of me at the winery, he didn’t notice that I was tilted over as if I had enthusiastically participated in the wine tasting… Didn’t. I just tend to be un-photogenic.