Mazie

A few more…

A little study of waves and a staircase.

Smallest street in the world!

Jamie visits Klis Fortress.

• Picture 11: Quaint street just outside of the city center at dusk.
• Picture 12: Treats, including an eclair mommy went crazy over, at the Cookie Lab bakery.
• Picture 13: Taken from the Substructures of Diocletian’s Palace.
• Picture 14: Cuz why not?
• Picture 15: We not-so-sneakily-sneaked onto this ruins rooftop and there were really pretty flowers.
• Picture 16: Yeah, classy, I know
• Picture 17: Possibly my favorite phot of the entire trip in some strange way. I noticed these ladies taking a gelato selfie and the scene was just calling my camera.

Don’t worry, there are many more to come :) I have hundreds I could post… What I am going to include in this blog post (partly for my own sanity as I should really be going to bed right now) are some of my favorite photos from Split, our first destination. We arrived early Sunday morning and stayed for two nights, exploring mountains, farms, bakeries, gelato, shops, parks, and quaint streets. Split is really unique as it is constructed within ancient ruins (truly mind-bogglingly ancient), meaning people have been working and sleeping and chatting in these same buildings and on these same streets for well over a thousand years.

A little bit about the pictures…

• Pictures 1 and 2: Cheese burek from Bobis. We swear there had to be at least 762 Bobis locations in Split, but honestly they’re justified because it was insanely delicious.
• Picture 3: A really cool section of Diocletian’s Palace. For perspective, this is something you come across casually when walking down the street.
• Picture 4: Me posing by the harbor :)
• Picture 5: More ruins, aka the city.
• Picture 6: Isn’t this the most adorable kitty I’m in love
• Picture 7: Another cat. There were lots of them everywhere in Croatia!
• Picture 8: No explanation needed. Same goes for this website hehe
• Picture 9: Cool mural! You would never have been able to get this picture in the summer because there would be five hundred people posing and messing up your picture.
• Picture 10: The farthest reaches of Marjan Hill. This photo was snapped after we climbed a path that could’ve entered a “steepest path” competition and won, if such a thing existed.

• 4:00 Tammy wakes up to finish packing and getting ready
• 4:20 Sitting on the bed time- basically goodbye :(
• 4:35 Leave the Airbnb and lug suitcase back up the steps
• 4:40 Tammy meets her ride to the airport in the middle of the highway. Mazie wails and screams and cries but can do nothing to stop the car driving away. Final goodbye through the car window 😢
• 5:00 Mazie returns to the Airbnb and tries to fall back asleep but is very sad.
• 7:00 Mazie wakes up for the second time and gets ready to leave.
• 7:30 Goodbye Airbnb, for real! Mazie catches an Uber to the airport and has an educational conversation with the driver.

Mazie —> BCN (9:50)

Tammy —> AMS (6:30) four hour layover, MSP (12:45)

Well, I wouldn’t want to bore you with five hundred bullet points about boarding planes and taking off and landing, so I guess this is the end of the log :( What an amazing adventure in Croatia- we had a really, really great time! Thanks for keeping up to date with our trip and a huge thanks to Tammy/mommy for planning it all! Hvala!

• 6:00 Tammy wakes up
• 8:30 Mazie wakes up.
• 8:55 Walk to the bus stop to get picked up for our ATV adventure. Another Lindt chocolate bar for breakfast 😊
• 9:00 Drive out of town to where the ATVs are. Get helmets, choose our vehicle, and get acquainted with driving it.
• 9:30 The rest of the tour shows up- 100% American college guys, probably a sports team.
• 9:50-12:30 We’re on the road! We switch drivers: Tammy (flat roads) —> Mazie (flat roads, medium rocks and bumps, lots of mud) —> Tammy (Terrifying, INSANE patches of rock, mud, gravel) —> Mazie (flat roads and gravel back down). Stopped for beautiful panoramic views.
• 12:45 Drive back to the Old Town area. Dropped off near Airbnb, so stop in for water and another bite of chocolate.
• 1:00 Walk to Old Town
• 1:15 Burek- possibly Mazie’s favorite of the trip- for lunch. We found another bakery selling the pizza shaped one!
• 1:30 Gelato at Peppino’s. Both Tammy and Mazie indulge in the Peppino’s Maxi King flavor- hazelnuts, nougat, salted caramel 😋
• 1:45 Really quick stop in a museum. They have another dungeon.
• 1:56 Buy tickets for the Lokrum Island ferry, then literally jump on board as the ferry is pulling out of the dock.
• 2:00 Ferry ride!
• 2:15-5:30 Explore Lokrum Island. It’s a nature preserve with a stunning coastline, peacocks, and hidden natural features. It used to also have bunnies.
  • Walked around the fort (another fort!)
  • Walked the coastline
  • Blueberry juice at a café on the island
  • Peacocks are amusing and make such interesting noises
  • Wander through the Botanical Gardens
  • See the “Dead Sea”
  • Rush back through the forest to catch the 5:30 ferry
• 5:40 Board the ferry. Turns out it was late and that’s the only reason we made it on!
• 5:50 Back on the mainland. Walk to dinner
• 6:00 Dinner at Art Restaurant Renaissance. We shared sporki makaruli, sea bass, bread, and tiramisu (surprised?). The outdoor ambience with live music was lovely and felt like we were two mice in Ratatouille sitting in an Italian alleyway.
• 7:45 Second gelato of the day at aROMA Gelato. Mazie got peanut butter and Tammy got more salted caramel.
• 8:00 Final evening wandering around town. Bittersweet.
• 8:30 Head back to Airbnb
• 8:45 Stop at a bakery to buy one last round of burek for tomorrow morning.
• 9:00 Pack, pack, pack. Listen to Marco Polos on the couch.
• 10:00 Tammy goes to sleep
• 12:00 Mazie goes to sleep.

• 6:00 Tammy wakes up
• 8:00 Mazie wakes up, pack
• 8:20 Tammy walks to buy a spinach burek and Lindt chocolate bar for breakfast (don’t judge, it was good).
• 8:55 Check out of Airbnb and walk down the pier to meet our ferry to Dubrovnik!
• 9:06 Board the ferry
• 9:10 Ferry leaves. We make several stops at islands along the way, but it is a smooth and pretty ride.
• 12:30 Arrive in Dubrovnik. Uber from port to Airbnb just outside the Old City.
• 12:45 Another puzzle to figure out exactly where the Airbnb is, but we meet our host and check in without too much confusion. It is a beautiful, modern place with an amazing view of the sea.
• 1:15 Leave to explore the Old City. Walk down five million stairs to get there. Beautiful water views.
• 2:00 Chicken burek from Holy Burek. Very popular place.
• 2:15 Buy special Dubrovnik passes granting us access to the city walls, museums, and free public transport.
• 2:30 Walk the Old City walls! Gorgeous panoramic views from what felt like very high above the old city. It is really cool that the entirety of the wall is still intact.
• 3:30 Back into the Old City
• 3:35 Gelato stop at Molõ. Tammy had the salted caramel and Mazie tried dark chocolate orange, which she managed to get all over her fingers.
• 3:45 40 minute walk out of the city to escape room.
• 4:30 “Legends of Dubrovnik” at Puzzle Punks. Fun room! Reference my blog post or the Escaping Things website for more details :)
• 5:30 Narrow escape, walk back to the Old Town.
• 6:15 Explore
• 6:45 Take refuge in a tiny art museum because we are cold and it’s windy outside.
• 7:00 Dinner at Local Peka- our first time trying Croatian Peka, and it was homemade family style. We both LOVED the bread and olive oil, Mazie enjoyed the Peka meat, Tammy enjoyed the Peka potatoes. We smuggled our leftover bread out with us, it was that good😏.
• 8:30 Wander back to Airbnb. Walk back up the five million steps we descended earlier.
• 10:00 One last episode of Never Have I Ever.
• 10:30 Goodnight!
• 1:30 Mazie goes to bed- whoops :)

• 3:20 Wake up, pack up, say goodbyes. Have a safe journey home Jamie/dad and Tyler!
• 3:45 Meet our Uber outside the apartment. Wonderful driver, got to know him a little bit!
• 4:15 Arrive at airport. Line to check luggage
• 4:45 Security and walk to gate. Mazie gives the airport an early morning Bridge Over Troubled Water concert at a piano along the way.
• 5:45 Board the plane. We were almost the last to board (out of choice)
• 6:15 Take off!!
• 8:15 Landing!!
• 8:45 Collect luggage and take a very overpriced taxi to the Split city center
• 9:00 Drag luggage across very bumpy cobblestones to the Airbnb to check in. We had to give it a few tries before we found the right door :)
• 9:30 Climbed the secret ladder in our apartment to the old palace walls. We walked along the entire stretch of wall!
• 10:00 Walk around Split for a bit! We saw a nice park with Easter eggs, the Adriatic Sea, Froggyland, and the palace ruins on which the current city is built.
• 11:00 Pastries from Bobis. We tried two versions of cheese Burek- one was warm and rolled, the other cold and pizza shaped, and despite being cold, the pizza one was absolutely amazing!
• 11:30 Make our way to the edge of the city for our olive oil experience!
• 12:00 Meet Marian and he drives us to his farm in the mountains. We pick up Jason along the way- a hitchhiker that Marian met yesterday and blossoming friendship.
• 12:00-4:00 Tour Marian’s sustainable farm, learn a ton about olive oil and wine production notably. Two learnings that stood out: Balsamic is made from aged figs, and almonds and peaches share 85% of their DNA! Apparently there are almonds inside peach pits…? We enjoyed a charcuterie board of dried meats, cheese, and dried fruit all made by hand at the end.
• 4:00 Marian drives us back to the city center.
• 4:30 Explore, walk the windy streets, accidentally hike part of the way up Marjan hill.
• 6:30 Pit stop at Airbnb.
• 6:45 Walk to dinner at Pizzeria Portas. This will be our first and last pizza experience on this trip cause Tammy’s stomach is currently not liking pizza. The pizza itself (and olive oil) was amazing though!
• 8:00 Back to Airbnb for the night.
• 10:00 Goodnight!