We each took turns planning different sections of this trip, I was in charge of Norway, Traverse was in charge of Croatia. With our busy life before, he really wanted to be near the beach and not move. Just be for a while, and so he found a place to rent on the island of Brac. It will be our home for a month, during which most of the time his parents will be visiting.
Brac is a short (just over an hour) ferry ride from Split, and our little town is another 5 miles or so from the ferry terminal. I really enjoyed Split, it was exciting and beautiful, but it also felt strained. I attributed it to a cultural change from Norway. There everyone has a more extensive personal bubble, in Split everyone was everywhere and honestly everyone seemed annoyed. You want to pay by credit card - big sigh; you don’t have a smaller bill for the ice-cream, big sigh, your kids just built a big sand castle - the teenage kids will run smash it if they want to play soccer there. (Ok quick side point on that - the girls were amazing with this one, instead of getting annoyed they quietly resisted. They built ankle spraining trenches along the walls of their fort, so if the big kids wanted to run toward their fortress, they had to do at their own risk. The younger kids noticed and hit behind the protection of the landmine fort, and our girls and their following toddler companions won out in the war over beach space as the teenage soccer players moved on to the water to play handball like everyone else leaving the little ones sand castle peace.)
I read “Chasing a Croatian Girl” to understand culturally better the difference, but then we got to Brac, and people smiled and answered a simple question, and I came to believe it must just be the difference between living and working a town overrun with tourist at the end of the busy season vs. the space and quiet of the island life.
Everywhere you go in this town there are grapes ready for harvests, olives sagging on trees and pomegranates bursting at the edges. A few nights ago as we were walking home, everything smelled like wine, and we realized it was literally flowing down the street. We later figured out they were cleaning wine barrels, but it just added to the mystery and appeal to this beautiful town. We are looking forward to our month in a new home on the Adriatic.
Enjoying our front “deck”
I can’t get enough of the view out of the upstairs bathroom. I clearly did not grow up around the ocean as I can’t believe the colors!
Our ferry to Brac. More of what I think of when I think “ferry” than the Hurtengrutin.
Loving the small old streets in town.
I have a feeling I will be taking a lot of pictures of these birds on our deck.
Little one made me dinner - fresh tomatoes with feta and flax seeds. She took a picture of it and it only added to its greatness.
Traverse going for a swim from our deck.
Ripe grapes in the setting sun.
Everyone is getting ready for the harvest.
Grapes getting ready to go in - at the beach later that day we saw a guy wash about 50 of these bags in the sea.
On a run out of town I came across this other small town. It reminded me of Nepal with the open cooking flames. Here a women was twisting meat on a stick and you could hear people singing in the hillside vineyards.
Beach after beach along the coast each with their own beauty.
More beauty at the end of the day.
Oh sweet girls, where will the future take you?