Saturday:
Woke up about 11am with a cold…soar throat, snotty nose, a bit achy, weak, and dehydrated. I drank like a gallon of water and bought the croatian version of Dayquil (I was proud of myself for properly eliciting the croation generic drug names from the label). Appearantly acetaminophen is paracetamola…whatever. Took a nap and got packed up. Sorted out the ferry schedule and there were only 2 that day to the next island…one was at 8am and the other was at 6pm. Considering it was already noon I opted for the 6pm one, but that meant I didn’t get there until 10pm and was only there 2 nights and was already feeling like shit. Turns out I had to go back to Split then catch the other ferry. So basically 6-7 hours of travel time….lesson: don’t assume that because islands are close to each other that there are direct connections between them. Made the first ferry, then had to wait about 90 minutes for the next…so I sat under a small tree by the dock. This was the only shade. Still felt crappy, but better than when I woke up. I drank a liter of OJ and listened to some podcasts. This lady got off a boat with her cute little cocker spaniel. It came up to me and I tried to pet its head, but it lifted its leg and peed on the tree I was leaning against….getting a small amount on me. The lady didn’t give a flying fuck and just took her dog and kept walking. These are the type of Europeans I hate. I was ready to curse her out, but was so exhausted I just let it go. So, just like in Budapest when I was an hour early for the train, I sat there and made sure I was in the right spot. I got in line to board and had my ticket ready that I had just purchased about 2 hours earlier on the island (not in this port). Appearantly this boat eventually goes internationally (though not on my leg) so there was this whole process that I was not aware of where you have to check in at the main terminal (about 200 yards away). It makes sense I guess…just like checking into an airplane you need a boarding pass but you don’t on the local ferries. Well, I was told this as I tried to board and handed them my ticket (but not my boarding pass). This was at 5:58 and the fucking thing was scheduled to leave at 6pm. I of course yelled at her and said that they should have told me that when I bought the ticket, but she yelled back. This process happended to about 5 people in the line. I’m pretty sure they do it to fuck with people. So I ran in flip flops with 2 backpacks on, sick, dehydrated, on croation dayquil the 200 yards…lines of people everywhere except for the international check in windown which was of course empty. I went and stood there for a few minutes looking around and was joined by 2 other people from my boat looking equally confused. Finally a lady appeared and said that she could not do anything and I was to go to the check in line. I pointed to the sign abover her head and she said that was not the line and to go to line 6 (which was about 3 feet to the left). The whole time there was this guy just chilling in the back looking at me…I had made eye contact with him several times in the previous minutes and waved my ticket in the air with a shrug. It wasn’t until I walked up to his window that he took the time to walk forwad and check me in. I swear they fuck with tourists on purpose. So back to the flip flop sprint. I made the boat and felt like complete ass afterwards. As I was boarding she pointed to my backpack….I thought she was going to say I needed to have paid for luggage or something but she just said some shit in croatian and I walked up the stairs. I headed to the lounge/bar area instead of sitting out on the deck in the sun. Typed this blog entry and now I’m flipping on a mindless movie. Waste of a day and learning that maybe I should have just stayed in one place for a week or something. Anyways, onto the next adventure.
Arrived in Korcula town on the island of Korcula. Staying at a centrally located hostel that was highly rated and honestly not that expensive. It was almost 11pm when I arrived, extremely weak and still a bit dehydrated in spite of drinking loads of water all day. I went into the reception (which doubles as a bar) and the Aussie guy behind said that he thought I wasn’t coming so he gave my room away already. I got a bit pissed and said “how was I supposed to know” and he said that I should have called or emailed him that I was arriving late. There was a bit of a pause and then he said, no mate, I’m just fucking with you. Sigh of relief…I told him briefly about my hassles that day. He said I was at the top of 5 flights of stairs in the 15 bed dorm and that whatever bed was open was mine. I made my way up there and found the room should probably only hold about 8 people (4 bunk beds), but instead there was that plus about 7 mattresses thrown on the floor in various corners. The last remaining bed was on the top bunk where the ceiling angles down from being directly under the roof. There is 2 foot clearance at one point and about 4 foot clearance at the high point…so pretty hard to get into. I didn’t even bother going down to the bar to socialize. I just crawled into bed, watched an episode of How I Met Your Mother on the old netbook and crashed.
Sunday the 8th:
Slept in a little, tried to decide what I was going to do given my physical state. The old town was pretty touristy….by that I mean old people and kids. I saw Marco Polo’s house but didn’t go in because, well it cost money and there were loads of old people taking pictures. Looked into riding a scooter around but decided against it, definitely was not going to rent a bicycle. Opted to walk up to the top of the hill and see the fort (picture a 3 story rook in chess). This place actually ended up being very cool and not many people around. There was this one guy chilling out in front of the fort by himself, then after I went up the 3 flights of stairs to the top, he came up and just sat there facing the other side. I was eating something and had my headphones on, and this guy kept turning around and staring at me. I pretended like I didn’t see him but he kept doing it. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to hit on me or what but it creeped me out so I eventually headed down. I kept walking through the trails and got a bit lost which was good. I found a main road and a map and went to this church on top of another hill…loads of steps but I just walked up the wall next to the steps which was much easier. Amazing views. Chilled out and ate a bit more before heading down. Stopped to feed some ferral cats my leftover ham. Made my way back towards the hostel and found 1 cat that let me pet her. Calico and pregnant. She got 2 pieces of ham and some milk because she was nice, though she appeared a bit diseased. Went back upstairs in the hostel and changed beds to the one by the window which was much nicer. Took a bit of a nap then came downstairs around 6pm for the evening movie they show in the bar....Forgetting Sarah Marshall which was actually pretty good. Ran into the Welsh girls from Split and we went and got a bit of food. Everyone started drinking except for me so around 11pm I got bored and headed upstairs.
Monday 9th:
Woke up at 8am to get in line to buy a ferry ticket to Dubrovnik. They don’t sell them ahead of time and they don’t even know how many tickets they have available until that morning. So basically I got to the office 1 hour before the thing opened and there were 12 people already in line. They had us sign up and come back in an hour so I went and checked out of the hostel then came back and was worried I wasn’t there early enough but I ended up with a ticket and 6 hours to kill. Went back to the hostel and hung out with a few people who were waiting to check in and a few others who were waiting to leave. This hostel is stupid because they are open 10am to 2pm then 6pm to 12am. Otherwise you are fucked and have to sit outside unless you have checked in already and have a key. If you leave early you have to check the night before or your fucked because they keep your passport. Also, you can leave you bags there if you have a later departure, but you can’t get them until 6pm. Anyways, I was leaving at 4pm so I was sort of stuck doing nothing with my bags. I would have been happy to sit and play on the internet but they refused to give out the wifi password….even though they had a laptop that was available for use in the common room which was obviously hooked up to a wifi network. This is all going on the review website because it is basically annoying. I digress. Eventually I ran into a Swedish girl from the previous hostel and we went to the beach for a few hours before my ferry. Made it to the ferry, feeling a bit better than 2 days ago. Still probably going to not drink for the rest of Croatia (2-3 days) and save myself for the Greek islands. Now I wished I had stayed at the FunkyDonkey for 4 days instead of trying to squeeze in another island but live and learn…
