We have left Croatia after spending a handful of days driving down the Dalmatian Coast. Pretty much all the cities we visited (Zadar, Split, Dubrovnik) had influences from Roman times, the Venetian Republic, or both. It was really cool to walk around the old towns in the tiny little passage ways filled with shops, buskers, and good smells. If I had to pick a comparison, I’d say that it was a lot like our time in Venice except these cities are: smaller, way better, and way more chill. The towns we visited were very touristy and were frequented by cruise ships. However, it wasn’t peak tourism season yet so there still weren’t a lot of people so we could easily find quite places to enjoy the views and the sights. I can only imagine what the places are like during peak tourism season, I could see it going from very awesome to very unenjoyable very quickly.
There is a lot to love about Croatia: Croatia in spring smells amazing; there’s a lot of different flowers blooming and flowering trees. The people are generally kind, polite, and helpful. The roads were great; it was super easy to get around in our rental car and the Croatian drivers were politely aggressive. Croatia is not a big country so all roads lead to somewhere awesome be it Roman ruins, waterfalls, mountains, beaches, or sea views. We used Airbnb exclusively for lodging in Croatia. The coolest part of the Airbnb experience was that every single host had some sort of homemade alcohol, baked food, or both, for us to try when we arrived. It was a neat experience and something we haven’t had anywhere else in the world.
We learned a lot about the Bosnian War during our travels. Both Jacquelyn and I were alive for the war but we didn’t really learn much. Prior to college I’m pretty sure I could not have picked Croatia off the map. It was really interesting to learn how the city of Dubrovnik sustained seven month long siege in the 90s and the very old walls built between 12th-17th centuries helped keep the local people safe. Around the country, there are still many signs of war littered about, from bunkers to derelict buildings.
We still had a lot of pizza and it was delicious. We also branched out and tried local Croatian food and were pleasantly surprised by the tastiness! That said, we probably had pizza for 80% of our meals just because it was so good. We haven’t had this good of pizza since we lived in New York so we tried to eat pizza whenever possible.
The only downside was that our time on the Dalmatian Coast was too short. Next time we’ll make sure to stay longer :).
Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.
