I cannot believe it's taken nearly a month to write this, but in September I got to go on, thanks to Donut, one of the coolest vacations of my life - a week of sailing around the islands of Croatia.
Off I went, armed with way too many clothes, no real idea of what we were doing, and enough sea sickness medication to supply a navy. First stop on this trip, however, was a company party at which Donut's band was playing. We turn off what I would already consider to be a side road, and start making our way down a dirt road into the woods. Due partly, I believe, to a long conversation with Steph and Steve about the various ways our partners could bump us off and make it look accidental, I started to worry a little that this was it. Donut was taking me into the deep woods, where some terrible fate would befall me and I would be left as an appetizer for wild boars. No one would look for me, because everyone would think that I was on some fabulous yacht in the Adriatic with no cell phone reception. And by the time they did look, nothing would be left (due to the boars). The perfect crime. (I think it's fairly obvious why Law & Order isn't knocking down my door asking me to ghostwrite any episodes.)
This, of course, is ridiculous. Donut has never been anything less than wonderful, and it's much more likely that I would have been offed being trampled to death by one of his drunk colleagues moshing around the cabin we finally ended up at than being eaten by wild pigs. So after an hour or so of being bumped and groped by some very intoxicated IT guys, we were on our merry way. Still alive.
After an incredibly long car ride, in which I'm sorry to say I was the worst co-captain ever as all I did was sleep and hog the back seat, we arrived in Split. It was hot, it was sunny, it was fabulous!
Donut playing with his new toy.
Boats, boats, boats!
From Split, we headed off for a trip around the islands. Here's a general idea of the route:
Highlights include...
- Seafood!!! Living in a landlocked country sucks sometimes, mostly because I had gotten too used to a pescetarian type of diet (okay, with plenty of taylor ham and chicken fingers thrown in) in NJ, so it's been a bit of an adjustment. However, a week where I could gorge on calamari and clams and mussels and fish and langoustine was fantastic! nomnomnom
- The sunshine! Perfect weather every single day, except for a midnight storm where the rain dripped through our cabin window imitating something akin to Chinese water torture.
- Ocean! Perfect temp for swimming. Very salty. Full of fishies.
- The company! Everyone was really lovely and I had a blast with them, even though we could not understand each other, and I'm afraid any Czech I did pick up is largely inappropriate. ;)
- The sites! It seemed like everywhere we stopped was more beautiful than the next. Here's some...
The adorable little town of Vrborska
The Blue Cave! Like a smurf!
Komiza, Vis
Komiza, Vis
Ahoj Hvar! How crazy is that view!
So nice, you have to see it twice!
Donut and I, having hiked up to the castle. And then me in prison. Womp womp.
Split - this city is crazy. Marble streets! What?!?
- Doing super fun things, like hoisting myself up to the top of that sail.
That little blob at the top of the mast is moi.
- Being on the type of vacation where every couple minutes you think, "Woah. I'm doing this. I will never forget this." So Donut, thank you again for giving me such an amazing experience. xx
- No seasickness!
- A tan. Thank goodness, was looking a bit ill before we left.
- The showers at Split Marina. Okay, I know this sounds ridiculous. But after living in an apartment with approximately 7 minutes of hot water, and then a week on a boat showering with a handheld spout while simultaneously straddling the toilet and slamming elbows into the walls, I cannot tell you how amazingly luxurious it was to have unlimited hot water. It's been years since I've gotten to enjoy a 20 minute shower, and I was going to take advantage of every possible second. So I did. :)
Low Points:
- Not catching this giant tuna. In our defense, we thought it was a shark who seemed very uninterested in our hot dogs anyway, and I'm not sure how we would have captured it short of jumping overboard and wrestling it. Still, when I think of all that sashimi, I cry a little.
- The wine. Bleh. Not impressed.
- Despite not actually getting seasick, it was a pretty close call one day. After the storm, the waves were intense, and I was in my life jacket clinging to whatever I could grab for dear life, trying to stay on the ship, keep my eyes on the horizon, and not throw up and die for the whole morning. It may have been one of the worst feelings of all time.
Here you can observe me keeping my mouth shut and my eyes on the distance, focusing very hard on not dying.
- Feeling a bit useless. Not a new feeling - quite common here actually. Want to scream and say I can do things! I'm not this hopeless! I just can't understand what you want me to do! But mostly, I got over that and went back to reading and working on my tan. :)
- That it ended. Booooooooo, permanent vacations totally need to be a thing.
Thanks again xx
Next up is the misadventures of Shannon and myself as we try to see historic, important things, and a weekend of culture in Prague. But for now, I've got other things to do, like 240356728392 hours of videos to watch for this Intro to Ops Management course that Donut and I signed up for through www.coursera.org. And trying to remind myself why I signed up for it in the first place! (Just kidding. It's very good for personal growth and looks lovely on a resume, and all mature, responsible adult things like that. But homework blows.)
