Croatia
When I was a kid I had a classmate called Mario who came from Croatia and he spawned my interest for the country. We played football together and I loved the unique design of their national football team's shirts so I always cheered for them secondly to Sweden.
Fast forward the time about 20 years from that and I found an extremely cheap flight ticket to the country that I had always been interested in visiting. I had been very close to my girlfriend Felicia before, and I usually have one best friend instead of many friends, but now we had broken up even if it seemed like we were going to find back to each other soon. So who would I go to Croatia with, because I couldn't let this opportunity slip away? I thought it would be nice to get to know my drinking buddy Andreas more, it would be fun to find out if we could have a good time without the alcohol too. And to my surprise he was up for it and to Croatia we went!
Since the flight to Zadar on the coast of Croatia was so cheap we put some extra money into the boutique hostel called Forum where we would have one of their best rooms each with sea view. After checking in I got up to my room and went inside and saw nothing, because a gigantic church was in the way, while Andreas had a room further down the corridor with the sea view I had expected. This was a disaster for me since I am a view junkie and I can sit and stare at the ocean for hours and just enjoying life. Thankfully I could switch room and I got the sea view that I had wanted and it was the best room I had ever enjoyed. It was beautifully designed and the view was to die for, I could have just stayed there all the trip and it would still have been the best trip in Europe I've ever been to.
Thankfully we didn't stay in our rooms though, and we got to see the beauty of the small city of Zadar. I didn't mind knowing I was walking in the Swedish football player Zlatan's footsteps since he often visits Zadar, since he has relatives in a nearby village. We climbed the clock tower even though I get dizzy from heights, I drank the best beer I ever had since it tasted like Fanta Lemon and we listened to the sea organ. We also enjoyed that the prices of alcohol are reasonable and that they don't charge you extra for enjoying your drink with a spectacular view, which they do in Sweden. I loved that even though the city is so small that you can walk around Zadar in an hour, it still has lots of unique features like Greetings To The Sun to make it something extra. It's a monument to the constant sun and it lightens up the night with its show of light.
On the second day Andreas suggested that we should rent a car and go to the national park Krka to see the waterfalls, and I couldn't be much happier. This is exactly what I want to do on my trips, I want to explore the country and to see as much as I can, since most likely I will never go there again because of my mission to try and see all countries in the world. When we had reached the city of Skradin by car we had to go on a boat to go to the waterfalls and this is what life should be like everyday. Sitting down on the floor in the back of a boat with the Croatian flag flying in the wind while the beautiful landscape is passing us by in a slow tempo.
Andreas sunbathing on the boat
When we got back to the car again we thought we might as well eat dinner in Skradin and we fell for the tourist trap of a girl asking us if we wanted to go somewhere to eat. We followed her through many small roads that seemed to be leading nowhere and suddenly we were at the restaurant that she had praised all the way there. It was nothing spectacular about the restaurant except for one thing, the time it took to deliver Andreas pancakes. I think we waited nearly an hour before he got them and when they were delivered they were cold. Maybe they were very busy in the kitchen, since they had 2 more guests than us. This pancake story has since gotten its own life, Andreas tells people the story and it builds up for something spectacular at the end or why else would he tell the story? And then the end comes and it was no point at all to the story, and I just love to see everyones face after they have been listening for so long and got bored on the way but still they hope for the end to give the story some meaning. And it's just "the pancakes were cold, can you believe it?".
It had been forbidden to swim by the waterfalls so I jumped in the water at the beginning of the river instead in Skradin, since I saw no warning signs there. The water was extremely cold but Andreas talked me into take a swim to get some nice pictures. This would leave me sick for two weeks after I got home, so I hope the pictures was worth it.
The people of Croatia seemed very nice and friendly and they didn't mind speaking to strangers like us. They all wanted to leave Zadar because they couldn't get jobs but other than that they seemed happy and always up for a good laugh. Some of the outdoor bars and shops were left unattended at night so if you wanted to you could steal everything in it, but no one did, and that just says something about the people there. The national dish seemed to be pizza with ketchup so I wouldn't recommend to go there if you're on a diet.
Even though we got to know each other in a sober way for once it didn't mean we didn't party too. We got so drunk that we let a stray dog lead us the way to where we would go next, until we got tired of it, because he seemed to always be on his way somewhere and he never stopped. Then we tried some Croatian phrases on a girl that stood outside a restaurant and wanted us to go in and eat. We had already eaten, pizza of course, and instead we said stuff like good morning, even though it was at night, and that she had beautiful eyes. Those were the phrases the hostel thought we needed to know. We went into a bar and started talking with two girls and one of them was so annoying while the other was mostly quiet. We asked the annoying one for a new Croatian phrase and we asked her to write it down but of course no one had a pen. Suddenly a guy from Belgium raised a pen from his pocket and now he was a part of our gang just because of that. We went back to the girl that stood outside the restaurant and I told her the new phrase and she wasn't happy at all. We had been fooled by the annoying girl at the bar, and she had written down some really nasty stuff instead of what she said she would write down. After this it would always be awkward to pass the girl outside of the restaurant while walking around town, even though we had explained what had happened.
We went into a bar called Red Light because I had never been to Amsterdam and I thought maybe this will be the closest I will ever come. It was a regular bar though so don't get me wrong. We met three Croatian girls inside and we had a blast with them until Andreas started to tell the pancake story, and then tried to tell it again, and again. We met up with the Belgian pen guy from before and he joined us and the three girls at a new bar until they closed early, like at midnight or something because of the law. Then the owners of that bar opened a secret bar for us in an alley so we could sneak in and party on. Andreas pancakes story had made the girls lose interest in talking with us, but they made a new friend in the guy from Belgium.
The next day we sat outside at a café, and I thought I was extremely hungover but actually it was the first day of me being sick from swimming in Skradin. Suddenly someone waved a pen from a table right across ours but 10 meters away. It was the guy from Belgium from the night before and we just laughed.
* Best things about Croatia – I love everything about it, I will always cherish this trip and I would love to see more of it, definitely my favourite country in Europe
* Most mediocre thing about Croatia – I love when a city thinks outside of the box like the example of the sea organ, but when the random notes that the sea plays mostly sounds annoying it's hard to just enjoy it without thinking it's an experiment gone wrong
* Worst things about Croatia – extremely cold waters even though it's hot in the air, and why put ketchup on a pizza?
Best countries in the world according to the nerd (will be updated with every post):
1. Croatia
2. Andorra
3. Cyprus
4. Greece
5. Italy
6. Iceland
7. Denmark
8. Ireland
9. Belgium
10. Estonia
11. Kosovo
12. Finland
13. France
14. Bulgaria
15. China
16. Bosnia And Herzegovina
17. Albania
Fast forward the time about 20 years from that and I found an extremely cheap flight ticket to the country that I had always been interested in visiting. I had been very close to my girlfriend Felicia before, and I usually have one best friend instead of many friends, but now we had broken up even if it seemed like we were going to find back to each other soon. So who would I go to Croatia with, because I couldn't let this opportunity slip away? I thought it would be nice to get to know my drinking buddy Andreas more, it would be fun to find out if we could have a good time without the alcohol too. And to my surprise he was up for it and to Croatia we went!
Since the flight to Zadar on the coast of Croatia was so cheap we put some extra money into the boutique hostel called Forum where we would have one of their best rooms each with sea view. After checking in I got up to my room and went inside and saw nothing, because a gigantic church was in the way, while Andreas had a room further down the corridor with the sea view I had expected. This was a disaster for me since I am a view junkie and I can sit and stare at the ocean for hours and just enjoying life. Thankfully I could switch room and I got the sea view that I had wanted and it was the best room I had ever enjoyed. It was beautifully designed and the view was to die for, I could have just stayed there all the trip and it would still have been the best trip in Europe I've ever been to.
Thankfully we didn't stay in our rooms though, and we got to see the beauty of the small city of Zadar. I didn't mind knowing I was walking in the Swedish football player Zlatan's footsteps since he often visits Zadar, since he has relatives in a nearby village. We climbed the clock tower even though I get dizzy from heights, I drank the best beer I ever had since it tasted like Fanta Lemon and we listened to the sea organ. We also enjoyed that the prices of alcohol are reasonable and that they don't charge you extra for enjoying your drink with a spectacular view, which they do in Sweden. I loved that even though the city is so small that you can walk around Zadar in an hour, it still has lots of unique features like Greetings To The Sun to make it something extra. It's a monument to the constant sun and it lightens up the night with its show of light.
Andreas doing his disco moves at Greetings To The Sun
On the second day Andreas suggested that we should rent a car and go to the national park Krka to see the waterfalls, and I couldn't be much happier. This is exactly what I want to do on my trips, I want to explore the country and to see as much as I can, since most likely I will never go there again because of my mission to try and see all countries in the world. When we had reached the city of Skradin by car we had to go on a boat to go to the waterfalls and this is what life should be like everyday. Sitting down on the floor in the back of a boat with the Croatian flag flying in the wind while the beautiful landscape is passing us by in a slow tempo.
Andreas sunbathing on the boat
Krka was amazing until I found a warning sign for snakes lurking about, then I was afraid of every tree that surrounded the path of wooden planks that we walked.
When we got back to the car again we thought we might as well eat dinner in Skradin and we fell for the tourist trap of a girl asking us if we wanted to go somewhere to eat. We followed her through many small roads that seemed to be leading nowhere and suddenly we were at the restaurant that she had praised all the way there. It was nothing spectacular about the restaurant except for one thing, the time it took to deliver Andreas pancakes. I think we waited nearly an hour before he got them and when they were delivered they were cold. Maybe they were very busy in the kitchen, since they had 2 more guests than us. This pancake story has since gotten its own life, Andreas tells people the story and it builds up for something spectacular at the end or why else would he tell the story? And then the end comes and it was no point at all to the story, and I just love to see everyones face after they have been listening for so long and got bored on the way but still they hope for the end to give the story some meaning. And it's just "the pancakes were cold, can you believe it?".
It had been forbidden to swim by the waterfalls so I jumped in the water at the beginning of the river instead in Skradin, since I saw no warning signs there. The water was extremely cold but Andreas talked me into take a swim to get some nice pictures. This would leave me sick for two weeks after I got home, so I hope the pictures was worth it.
Me acting as the world's tallest dwarf
The people of Croatia seemed very nice and friendly and they didn't mind speaking to strangers like us. They all wanted to leave Zadar because they couldn't get jobs but other than that they seemed happy and always up for a good laugh. Some of the outdoor bars and shops were left unattended at night so if you wanted to you could steal everything in it, but no one did, and that just says something about the people there. The national dish seemed to be pizza with ketchup so I wouldn't recommend to go there if you're on a diet.
Even though we got to know each other in a sober way for once it didn't mean we didn't party too. We got so drunk that we let a stray dog lead us the way to where we would go next, until we got tired of it, because he seemed to always be on his way somewhere and he never stopped. Then we tried some Croatian phrases on a girl that stood outside a restaurant and wanted us to go in and eat. We had already eaten, pizza of course, and instead we said stuff like good morning, even though it was at night, and that she had beautiful eyes. Those were the phrases the hostel thought we needed to know. We went into a bar and started talking with two girls and one of them was so annoying while the other was mostly quiet. We asked the annoying one for a new Croatian phrase and we asked her to write it down but of course no one had a pen. Suddenly a guy from Belgium raised a pen from his pocket and now he was a part of our gang just because of that. We went back to the girl that stood outside the restaurant and I told her the new phrase and she wasn't happy at all. We had been fooled by the annoying girl at the bar, and she had written down some really nasty stuff instead of what she said she would write down. After this it would always be awkward to pass the girl outside of the restaurant while walking around town, even though we had explained what had happened.
We went into a bar called Red Light because I had never been to Amsterdam and I thought maybe this will be the closest I will ever come. It was a regular bar though so don't get me wrong. We met three Croatian girls inside and we had a blast with them until Andreas started to tell the pancake story, and then tried to tell it again, and again. We met up with the Belgian pen guy from before and he joined us and the three girls at a new bar until they closed early, like at midnight or something because of the law. Then the owners of that bar opened a secret bar for us in an alley so we could sneak in and party on. Andreas pancakes story had made the girls lose interest in talking with us, but they made a new friend in the guy from Belgium.
The next day we sat outside at a café, and I thought I was extremely hungover but actually it was the first day of me being sick from swimming in Skradin. Suddenly someone waved a pen from a table right across ours but 10 meters away. It was the guy from Belgium from the night before and we just laughed.
* Best things about Croatia – I love everything about it, I will always cherish this trip and I would love to see more of it, definitely my favourite country in Europe
* Most mediocre thing about Croatia – I love when a city thinks outside of the box like the example of the sea organ, but when the random notes that the sea plays mostly sounds annoying it's hard to just enjoy it without thinking it's an experiment gone wrong
* Worst things about Croatia – extremely cold waters even though it's hot in the air, and why put ketchup on a pizza?
Best countries in the world according to the nerd (will be updated with every post):
1. Croatia
2. Andorra
3. Cyprus
4. Greece
5. Italy
6. Iceland
7. Denmark
8. Ireland
9. Belgium
10. Estonia
11. Kosovo
12. Finland
13. France
14. Bulgaria
15. China
16. Bosnia And Herzegovina
17. Albania
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