Vienna & Croatia

noviembre 2023 - enero 2024
Finn has finished Grade 12 so we are heading off on a family holiday before he starts uni. Leer más
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  • Día 19

    Last night in Split

    13 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ 🌧 15 °C

    We ended up taking a stroll through the streets on our last night before escorting Hannah back to her hostel.

    Fun fact: Hannah's hostel is costing her €12 per night. During summer it is €40 per night!Leer más

  • Día 19

    Last day in Split

    13 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    We walked the other half of Marjan Forest today. Throughout one part were the suggested stations to stop and do various exercises which included using logs.

    There was a fabulous cafe with views over Split at the end where we stopped to have a cappuccino. Here I looked up the various options for Croatian street food so we could narrow down some options not yet tried

    Walking back into Split Craig and I bought pljeakavica for lunch which is a burger with a special type of bun which had small sausages, a sauce made from roasted capsicum and eggplant and a type of cottage cheese. Really yummy! Are this down on the waterfront

    Next stop was a street stall for our first ever roasted chestnuts... I would say these most resemble a roasted bunya nut on taste and texture, although somewhat easier to come by 🙂.

    Dinner at the parents place again, Craig made a yummy massaman curry again tonight.
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  • Día 20

    Split to Brac

    14 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☁️ 12 °C

    This morning we said goodbye to Hannah after a week of hanging out in Split. She is heading to Zagreb for a few days before going back to Germany.

    We packed up our three little stone apartments and drove down to the ferry to come across to the island of Brac. It was all very smooth even though you can't do a reservation for vehicles. Whilst we do appreciate all the safety aspects Australian regulations offer, it always amazes us how "rule abiding" we are in comparison. In Australia we would have had announcementa on the car ferry about not remaining in your vehicle, not returning to your vehicle until there was an announcement etc. Still, without these it was the quickest and most orderly ferry process I've ever seen! Apparently you don't die if you stay in your car on the big ferry when it is moving across water 😱.

    Fifteen minutes after the ferry landed we were at our new house right next to the water.

    Last night I was texting with the Airbnb owner. She said she is at a loss on what to tell us to do because in the four years she has had here Airbnb we are the first guests to ever stay in winter, and pretty much everything on the island is closed down. Pretty funny.

    Craig and I did a walk into our little town Postira. She was right, most things are shut. A local came down to start fishing on the jetty we were standing on and started to chat to us. He owns a restaurant on the island and works 7 days a week for seven months straight during high season, and for the remaining five months tends to his olives and wine venture and has a holiday (off to Vienna and Dublin he said). But this arvo, he was squid fishing off the jetty.

    We made rice paper rolls for dinner and Glen and I started a 2000 piece jigsaw puzzle. Luckily we are here for 8 days because it is H.A.R.D.

    ATAR results are released at midnight our time. Finn just went to bed at 10.40pm even though we threatened to come and wake him up.
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  • Día 21

    Supetar

    15 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☀️ 12 °C

    A fairly relaxed day today although it did carry on after the very late night excitement at the release of ATAR rankings. Our very unassuming son walked into the bathroom where Craig and I were cleaning our teeth, put toothpaste on his brush and said "99.8". Kate jumped out of bed and came into the tiny little bathroom too, so we did our best to congratulate him through mouthfuls of toothbrush and toothpaste.

    So proud of his absolute and unwavering dedication.

    Craig, Kate and I drove to Supetar to stock up on groceries and look for fishing gear. There were three gigantic supermarkets within metres of each other with the most amazing views. Hard to see how such prime real estate was bought for a grocery shop! We stopped for a coffee on the waterfront in a small bay.

    Although we had brilliant blue skies, it was VERY windy today and got worse as the day progressed. Glen and I cracked on with the world's hardest jigsaw puzzle. Craig and Kate walked to some nearby Roman ruins.

    EDIT: It is 10.30pm and we quite literally just had to batten down the hatches. Gail force winds. Just went outside to rescue a sun lounge from the rocks about to disappear into the sea, chairs on the patio being blown around etc, so decided to close the shutters. The sound of the wind is really loud!
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  • Día 22

    Splitska

    16 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☀️ 8 °C

    We survived the night but various members of the household found it difficult to sleep next to a noisy sea.

    Craig, Kate and I walked a 6km round trip to the next village of Splitska this morning. It was so windy at times I felt like my legs were being pushed along. When we got to Splitska we stopped for a coffee. Although today we may have preferred sitting inside, all the locals were inside and smoking, so we demonstrated our crazy tourist nature and sat outside in the sun (and wind) with beautiful bay views. The owner obviously thought we were a little bit nuts.

    To be fair, walking in these conditions would have looked like the residents of the local asylum were let out for an excursion for the day. Still, we did reach 10,000 steps today 😄

    The rest of the day was spent doing the impossible jigsaw puzzle in the warmth.
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  • Día 23

    Bol

    17 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☀️ 15 °C

    We went on a day trip to Bol which is a village on the other side of the island which was a hairy drive with lots of switchbacks but spectacular views. There is a famous Croatian beach called Zlatni Rat (Golden Horn Beach) in Bol. In summer it is packed, today we had it all to ourselves. Today was also the day to put the tootsies in the sea. Not as cold as expected. The sea is so clear it really is not surprising why it is such a popular place to come.

    We had to stop to descale the car of salt after days of windy, was getting a bit hard to see. The servo was closed (being Sunday again) but the owner was there hosting down his building, so kindly gave the car a once over to get the salt off it

    Lunch was a traditional Balkan pljeakavica burger and beer at a great cafe, except for the complaints from the kids because we were surrounded by smokers. We are really discovering that obeying laws are kinda optional here in Croatia.

    As we were leaving the village, families were starting to gather for a Christmas market, so we passed a Shetland pony in a Christmas jumper and a llama with a tinsel wreath, being followed by a lot of children.

    Work on the impossible puzzle continued in the afternoon, which concluded with the annual watching of Love Actually.
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  • Día 24

    Scrip

    18 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☀️ 15 °C

    Craig and I decided we would do a hike which offered a bit of road and a bit trail to a nearby village called Scrip, about a 7km round trip. It was an opportunity to try out our hiking poles with an elevation gain of about 250m. The kids decided to stay at home (Kate went in for a dip in the sea out the front of our house), the parents went to Supetar.

    We followed an off road trail according to Suunto but after quite a bit of elevation gain we got to a temporary fence, went through that and came across two more blocking the trail where there had been a bit of land slippage, so we turned around and went all the way back down to the road.

    After then following a footpath on a back road we came to a sign which was for walkers to follow and said 1.7 km to Scrip. That would be 1.7km of steady and at times quite steep descent. Pretty sure most of our 250m elevation gain happened in that 1.7 km.

    But, beautiful views and we popped out at the top at a lovely cemetery. After walking down a boulevard of sorts past an old church, a 15th century castle and a variety of buildings which looked of similar vintage, we bought some baguette, cheese, salami, beer and chocolate and walked back to the cemetery as it had a park bench with fabulous views (the deceased really do get prime real estate in Europe).

    It was a great stop. A flock of sheep just below us had bells attached which provided a lovely background sound! I feel like this was a bit of Camino-in-training... Although of course we only walked about 8.4 km and the Camino will call for 20 km/day minimums.

    Back home, the boys tried a bit of fishing and the impossible puzzle quest continued.
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  • Día 25

    Lazy day

    19 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☀️ 15 °C

    A lazy day of doing not much at home, other than the impossible puzzle and lots of Christmas movies. Pretty sure we've exhausted the entire Netflix range of Christmas movies now!

    Craig and Jeff did some fishing. Craig grilled some fish in the BBQ for lunch. Those sentences are totally unrelated. 🙂

    Craig went for a walk to get his 10,000 steps and came across a crop of myrtle berries.

    Hot tip if you get a chance, try Milka Choco and Biscuit Chocolate bar!
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  • Día 26

    Hiking to Supetar

    20 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    All members of the Ingram Junior family did a 17km round trip hike to Supetar today as a means of getting a bit of exercise and this resulted in a 20,000+ step day. Still short of a Camino 20-25km day, so will see how we pull up tomorrow. Kate went to bed before 8pm.

    This was Finn's first walk into any of the villages which is a bit weird given we've been here for 6 days.

    We pretty much followed the coast line heading west. Passed lots of olive farms, and got to see up close the phenomena where the owners have made little retaining walls of rocks all over their property.

    In Supetar there was only one restaurant open, so decision making was easy on what to do for lunch!

    I had read that Lidl-brand Cornetto icecreams had won a taste test as being better, so since we needed to walk past a giant Lidl on the walk home, we bought some for dessert. Inconclusive results since Kate and I had pistachio flavour and it was not pleasant. We may need to submit ourselves for further testing 😄

    The kids saw a Dalmatian dog today, so our first sighting of a Dalmatian in Dalmatia! Makes it more authentic 😁

    This afternoon we also completed the impossible puzzle, and there was a spare piece which means some poor bugger out there in the world is spending the better part of a week doing a 2,000 piece puzzle and will be one piece short.
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  • Día 27

    Sutivan & mixed grill BBQ

    21 de diciembre de 2023, Croacia ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    Edit from yesterday: we had obviously had too much to drink because when I got out of bed this morning, the parents had found the space where our jigsaw puzzle piece went, so puzzle had the right number of pieces, we were just blind (either literally or figuratively, hard to say🤭).

    We all took a short road trip east to a village called Sutivan today which seemed a lot more "Italian" to me than other villages so far. It had a lovely palm tree lined boulevard, and a lot of very old but charming buildings. We had a coffee looking out over the marina whilst local school kids were having some sort of PE lesson doing races in pairs along the length of the marina.

    We decided we'd use our BBQ grill again, so Craig and I stopped at the supermarket for supplies whilst the kids came home with Glen and Jeff to get the BBQ charcoal going.

    I also stocked up on a new jigsaw for Dubrovnik since we have lots of public holidays and... well it is my tradition to do jigsaws at Christmas.

    Back home, we got some roasted potatoes in the oven and meats such as pork rolled up things, rib things, and two different types of sausages going on the BBQ (including Craig racing off into the village to buy more briquettes). Salad on the table and we were feasting on the deck, with beautiful views.

    And right on cue, just as we finished eating our spectacular meal, Finn spied a pod of dolphins jumping out of the water, a magical way to end our meal. We didn't get photos, so we've borrowed a line from "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" and decided to "enjoy the moment without the camera getting in the way" (code for it is too hard to capture a picture at the right time they jump).

    An early night tonight because we have to wake up significantly earlier than our usual 8.30-9.00am to be down at the ferry by 6.45am. Off to Dubrovnik tomorrow!
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