Sunday, 22 May, 2016 – Trogir to Blagaj, Bosnia

We are to depart Croatia for a trip of three countries in 2 days, all through the former Yugoslavia. We tow our bags back through the cobblestone streets but this time are helped by the Hotel owner.

We drive to Bosnia. There is a long, slow queue at the border which we just have to put up with. Our first stop is the Brkic winery which is making biodynamic wines with the Bosnian grapes Blatina (red) and Zilavka (white). There we meet Alma, our guide, who acts as a translater for the Winery owner who conducts a small tour for us.

The owner, with translation from Alma, explains his theories of wine making which include bio dynamic growing and harvesting and the use of only Bosnia native grapes to be different from the rest. His most famous wine is called the Moonwalker, a white.

We go upstairs for a lunch, provided by Alma, and wine tasting.

We tried 5 of his wines: (2) Greda (3) Moonwalker (4) Plava Greda (Red). After lunch we depart the winery with Alma.

We have to drive a fair way to get there. We serpentine down from a high plateau to the valley of the river Buna. We take a short cut that does not work out as there is a motor race on and at the road where one enters is a gridlock situation from all four directions. It is not helped by the van in front of us who insists to drive into the road when there is no possible way to get into it. Eventually, an attendant comes out does some arm waving to break up the jam. The Buna river is well up on its normal level and is quite fast running.

We drop off Alma at her home and then proceed into Blagaj. Again there are narrow streets, lots of people everywhere, there are market stalls all along the other side of the street. We set down and Hotel staff help bring the suitcases to the Hotel and then to our rooms. There is a loud prayer song outside at 5:00 PM, we are on the Muslim side of the river, the other side is Christian.

We are to have dinner at Alma’s house. Julie decides to walk there, of course. Some photos before we got there.

We are quite late in arriving because while all but one of us are waiting downstairs to take off, one of the guests could not find her key. We eventually take off but in the mean time Julie has seen the final preparation of the meal. It is lamb, but not done on the spit as it was not big enough.

We finally arrive and are greeted by Alma and her husband Ermin, who is also a guide and driver. The rest of the group take a tour down to the river in their back yard.

Ermin serves us some of his homemade fruit Brandy. There are two – Plum and Kumquat, I prefered the Plum. There is also wine and Boris and I each brought a bottle but we did not get around to opening either of them. Dinnaer is served.

The lamb was quite special, Julie thought that it was around 6 months old. I did not do it justice.

They were really nice people so I asked them to write down a bit about themselves so here is some of it.

Alma Elezovic
Ermin Elezovic
Dog – Bonnie
Mostar Bosnia and Herzegovina
We are in Blagaj
River Buna in Blagaj

Good food, good people, good drink, good environment – a great night. We head back to our Hotel.

Saturday, 21 May, 2016 – Trogir to Split and back

Wake up and the weather is quite beautiful which is largely how it remains for the rest of the trip. However, my day does not start out real great as the breakfast in the Hotel does not suit me and then I get a cold shower. Nevermind.

The first activity of the day is a tour around Trogir. I pass on that so the following photos are from Julie.

Jule comes back and because the breakfast was so ordinary and the weather so great we decide to have a brunch at the seaside, one of a hundred restaurants.

Back to the Hotel and the whole group loads into the van to go to another coasatl town – Split. But first on the way, we stop by a winery high in the hills. We are met part way up the hill by the owner and follow him first into the grape vines.

There is a major plaque in the ground up at the top.

The owner tells us about the location as being nearly perfect with slopes facing the southern sun, wind to blow away pests and birds, no fear of frost, etc. The root stock is Italian which protects against phyloxera. The only issue is that there is no water, or rather it is too expensive to put in a link to water and there have been recent draught conditions for the vines.

We then walk down the hill to the winery, which is not a winery as such as the grapes are processed, matured and bottled elsewhere. But inside is a nice tasting room type set-up.

The owner’s friend has prepared some impressive snacks but I am too full from the late health food so I pass.

It was a great visit and we depart to go to Split.

We finally arrive in Split. Yet another seaside town with lots of tourists,cars and troubles parking although Andrew manages to find a parking spot very close by. The guide is the same one that the guys had in Trogir

I again declined and settled into the cafe in the background there. At that point, my phone stopped working entirely for the rest of the day, acting as if it was out of power – it should not have been. Anyway, all the photos from the rest of the day are from Julie.

The group returns from the tour but there is still quite a time before the dinner booking. I had moved from the cafe to a bench across the way and was joined by Jan and Hugh with Julie buzzing around the outside.

We go to the restaurant, back in the bowels of the city. The main part of the restaurant was booked out for 30 Koreans so they asked us to go to the smaller wine bar part, of course it was great.

We are started with an Olive Oil tasting.

Then food was delivered.

There is then the longish drive back to Trogir and crash for the rest of the night.

Wednesday – 18 May, 2016 Villany to Pag Island

Yes, today we are to leave Hungary after a great 8 days there. We will be back at the end of our cruise in August next year. We check out of our hotel, a snap before we go.

There is a lot of driving today, about 8.5 hours with a couple of stops. We load up and take off. When we reach the Border of Croatia, a sullen faced young customs officer causes us substantial delays, looking around and then taking our passports to a private room for over 20 minutes. She then hands them to a senior officer who takes them into another private room for a period. All up, over 30 minutes to go from one EU country to another. Good thing no one else wanted to cross at the same time.

After a toilet stop and than after more driving we stop for a lunch break at a roadhouse. This is the highlight meal of the trip – NOT. I don’t want to harp too much on it but gee whiz.

One of the pieces of veal was 100% gristle. One more photo:

One of the ladies at the shop was making strudel.

Not as bad as the veal but still not very good. We start off again and complete the long, long drive. Our destination is Pag Island. Our Hotel is kind of in the middle of nowhere but very good.

We are then given a tour of the winery in the basement below.

We are given a taste of a couple of the wines.

Notice the two barrels at the front. I find a very large pipette, Hugh calls a “cheat”, and Boris and then Hugh try extracts from the barrel, the first white which Boris especially likes. We are then shown to our dinner table which is outside on the patio. Perhaps a bit cold for Julie but it was nice. The food is from a menu from Anthony Bourdain’s “No Reservations”.

That was Lamb Tripe. It stunk, I could not face it. Others who did considered it truly revolting. Anthony, what were you thinking.