Croatia

I honestly didn’t leave Croatia with a real good sense of the place. There is tons of amazing stuff that I could have explored from all the recent fighting in the Balkans. I did see buildings that had been bombed and walls with bullet holes in them, but I didn’t learn as much as I should have.

After a week in Egypt, we had two really rough days at sea, and then five days in Turkey, followed by two more rough days at sea before we got to Croatia. I just didn’t have the time or energy to do the research that I needed to.

I had a wonderful time in Croatia though, really enjoyed sailing through the islands, and thoroughly enjoyed the beauty of the place.

As far as Croatian culture, I didn’t pick up a whole lot. It was a lot like America in that people don’t smile and mind their own business. People weren’t interested to talk to us at all. There did seem to be a lot of café culture. The cafes were always filled with people socializing. It definitely has a European feel to the place.

I think that a very significant part of Croatia’s economy is based on tourism. Almost every other Croatian person I talked to started their sentence with “Well, during tourist season…” After the summer, the place seems to close up. Keep in mind that this is was just in the southern coastal region. I have no idea what it is like in the capital Zagreb or elsewhere up north.

The Green Peace’s “Rainbow Warrior” was docked in Dubrovnik the week that we were there. These guys are about has hardcore as hippies can get. They drive their little boat in between whales and the whaling boats that are shooting huge grenade loaded harpoons at them. Pretty Cool!

Borat

Our last day in Dubrovnik we caught the last showing of the Borat movie. It was pretty funny, but I really wasn’t sure if I was ready to go home after seeing it. The scenes with the college kids talking about slaves and the old cowboy guy talking about Muslims were pretty unbelievable. I remember Tyler looking over and saying “Do we really live there?”

Sacha Cohen is a pretty smart guy. It is just amazing that the Americans in the movie are ignorant enough to believe that a character like Borat could be real. They actually believe that there are places in the world where people drink horse urine, lock retarded people in cages, have sex with their sisters, and wash their faces in the toilet. I mean the Borat character is really funny, but the joke is not on Kazakhstan, it’s on America.

Back to Dubrovnik

The morning we sailed back we had some wonderful scenery with sunbeams pouring through the clouds. I think the picture of Aaron sleeping on the last morning sums up our trip pretty well.

Crank Calling the mv Explorer

Being on a little boat for long periods of time, we had to find ways to entertain ourselves. We would do stuff like tie our arms together and try to escape, make peanut butter out of peanuts, and drink copious amounts of alcohol. Between the six of us we drank over one hundred beers in two nights.

The night we were docked on Sipan, we noticed the radio mounted on the wall in the cabin. We were feeling pretty good and were eager to harass somebody. Of course we had to crank call our ship docked in Dubrovnik. Danelle was worried about losing her job, and claimed no responsibility what-so-ever.

Ivan instructed us on the proper protocol for contacting another ship, and got us on the proper channel for the area. Aaron was able to get the mv Explorer on the line. Bingo! After picking a new channel, we were talking with somebody official sounding in the bridge. He asked the name of our ship. “This is the Facial Disgracial” responded Aaron. I would love to see the place in the logs where they recorded the time and place that they were contacted by the “Facial Disgracial.” Haha! He asked to talk to Captain Roman Christonovich, but the captain was out in town.

The mike was passed to me, and I asked to talk to the dean on duty. He asked who I was, and I responded with a quick “Academic Dean Phil Hearn” in my most academic dean sounding voice. There is such a disconnect between the crew and the faculty that they couldn’t even tell a punk kid from Phil Hearn. Hilarious. We waited for about ten minutes, while some crew member was running all over the ship looking for the Duty Dean. I’m sure they were paging over the ship-wide PA system as well.

All of the sudden a voice came over the radio. “Hey Phil, this is Debbie, what do you need?” In my Phil Hearn voice I clarified, “This is Debbie?” “Yeah Phil, it’s Debbie, what’s going on?” It was silent for about five seconds, and then in my best high-pitched Pillsbury doughboy voice I blurted out, “Hey Debbie, this is the Pillsbury doughboy! I got some hot sticky cinnamon buns coming fresh out the oven. Oooh here comes the frosting! Oh the raisons are sooo yummy, so much cinnamon! MM HMM!” She let out a little surprised laugh and didn’t say anything. The doughboy went on for a few more minutes, getting pretty crass, and she eventually hung up.

Our last day in Dubrovnik, Taylor and I ran into Debbie in an ice cream store and it was so hard to keep a straight face. Crank calling is so immature but it is so much fun.

Sipan Island

The next day we made it to Sipan Island with enough time to see the sunset, which was fabulous. The girls made us walk around for an hour in search of a hot tub. Why did they think they would find a hot tub on an island where there isn’t even a restaurant? I don’t know. We did see a few people on scooters out. We got a random dog all riled up and it started mauling a fallen tree branch. After that it was back to the boat for the nights festivities.

Miljet Island

We made it to Miljet Island after dark. We spent the night docked in a bay. In the morning, after some mimosas for breakfast, we went hiking. Croatia has to have some of the most beautiful coastline in the world. This was definitely one of the most amazing places I have ever seen. The island was pretty empty. Apparently the Croatian islands are the place to be during the summer, but after tourist season is done, there isn’t very much going on. We saw hardly anybody on any of the islands we visited, which was actually kind of nice.

Kolocep Island

We stopped briefly on Kolocep Island, where we did some swimming in the wonderfully clear waters of the Adriatic. We also found a dead squid and fed it to a dog.

Sailing!

There wasn’t a whole lot going on in Dubrovnik, so instead of heading up north we chartered a sailboat. It seemed kind of strange to spend our time in port by getting on another boat, but we were all sick of plane flights, bus rides, car rides, camel rides, etc. Being out at sea is our “happy place” and sailing would be an awesome way to see the islands.

We got up early our second morning and loaded up on supplies for our three day excursion. Pasta, bread, cereal, and a bunch of turkey and cheese were our main purchases, although we spent most of our money on beverages. After dropping a thousand Croatian Kuna at the supermarket, we headed out to meet our skipper.

The crew was me, Aaron, Tyler, Tayler, our friend Christina, and the resident director of our hall, Danelle. We were able to get the girls to come “yachting” with us by grossly exaggerating the boat that we had rented and underestimating how much of the bill they would have to pay. We told them that we had chartered a seventy-five foot yacht and made it sound as luxurious as possible. The boat turned out to be only 36 feet long and was definitely sail powered. The first thing that Danelle said when we got to the dock was “What the hell, that’s not a yacht!” It was definitely a cozy boat for seven people to live on for three days, but once we set sail there was no turning back.

Our skippers name was Ivan, and he was a burly Croatian sailorman. Aaron was already pretty good at sailing, but nobody else had done it before. Ivan got us all up to speed and it was tons of fun. My bruised tailbone was pretty painful, but I sucked it up like a man and had a great time.

Cliff Jumping

At a little café just outside the walls, there was a good spot for cliff jumping. A few kids had discovered it before we got there, and we promptly ripped off our clothes and joined in the fun. There was a big rock jutting out from the patio, and the water was plenty deep as long as you jumped out enough to clear the rocks. The drop was between 40 and 45 feet. I can measure altitude with my watch. I know I’m a dork.

I’ve never jumped cliffs before and it was such a rush! I didn’t hesitate, I just ripped off my clothes as soon as we got there and jumped. It looked easy but man do you get going fast! I smacked my tailbone really good and for two weeks after this I was not able to sit in a chair. It still hurts, but it is getting better. I decided to skip X-rays as I figured it would be in my future children’s best interest not to have a bunch of radiation shot at my pelvic region. A bunch of people on the ship had also racked their tailbones jumping off the cliff, so this was fairly common.

There was another ledge a ways up that was around 55 feet. My ass was all messed up so I didn’t do it, but there were a few that did. A guy named Fritz from CU Boulder did a flip off of it. That guy has some serious rocks. I don’t care who you are, somebody flipping off a cliff that high commands respect!

Bad things started happening when girls started going for it. The first girl didn’t jump out very far and missed the rocks by just a few feet. One girl broke an ankle and another got seriously injured and had to be flown to Austria for back surgery. Thankfully she is going to be alright and is walking around already.

Cliff jumping is a burly sport. It was tons of fun, but the consequences are big if you mess up!

Dubrovnik

Tyler, Aaron, Taylor and I spent our first day in Croatia walking around old town Dubrovnik. This is an amazing red-roofed city that is completely surrounded by a 75 foot stone wall. We walked the 2km around the walls and then hung out in the town. Dubrovnik is a very charming place and has lots of little cafes and shops nestled among its windy alleys. Perched over the Adriatic, it has to be one of the most picturesque cities I have ever seen. Look at the pictures! Dubrovnik got shelled during the war in 1991. There are a few buildings that are still leveled, but the rest of the city is really nice.