Island Hopping Croatia SPE25001
Everybody arrived just in time at the beautiful Almayer Art & Heritage Hotel in Zagreb. After the welcome briefing and handover of the bicycles we did the guided city walk. The "greeting to the sun", the "Sea organ" and the Roman Forum where just some of the highlights of this beautiful city. A delicious dinner made a perfect day out of it.
Blue skies, sunshine - we're ready to go. Two islands are on the program today. The island hopping begins - Uglijan and Pasman.. Along the sea, through olive groves and small villages, we reach Tkon in the afternoon. A delicious picnic and a few unforeseen events make the day interesting.
After a good dinner buffet and a quiet night we were ready for the next part of our tour. Today we were riding from Biograd to Vodice. First we visited Croatia's largest lake. On the well made boardwalk we had the chance to view some of the thousands of birds that live around the lake. Further south we climbed up to the Kamenjak viewpoint, where we enjoyed the view over the lake and the many islands in the Adriatic. Next we cruised down to the coastline, it was time for lunch and we found a great restaurant. With new power we continued to Vodice. We have definitely earned the ice cream cone that waited for us at the beautiful yacht harbour.
A new day, new luck - and what a luck. A short briefing in our beautiful hotel garden and off we go. The theme of the day: lonely mountain roads between 2 world heritage sites. Sibenik is the first World Heritage Site, ride along the sea - wonderful, great lunch, lonely mountain roads, sporty climbs. A couple of snakes later (dead and alive) we arrived in Trogir, the second World Heritage Site. Well, and then we took 2 speedboats to Split. The 5-star Hotel Cornaro awaits us there and an extraordinary dinner inside the Diocletian's Palace. Hard to top this day!
Losts of things to see, lots of things to do. Difficult to decide. We went together on a guided city tour in the morning. Than everybody spread out. We looking forward to tomorrow`s stories.
After a day in gorgeous Split, which was at the same time entertaining, stunningly beautiful and also relaxing, we continued our e-bike-tour towards the south. We started with a very short ride down to the harbour, where we caught the ferry to Korcula Island. After reaching Vela Luka, our first stop was a beautiful restaurant for lunch. Now we split up - half the group went on a cycle trip to explore the northern part of the island, the other decided to visit the famous grotto Vela Spila. We all had a great time, and ended the day with lots of stories of what we had seen today.
The plan was perfect: Rain during the night, blue sky and sunshine during the day. We left Vela Luka in the morning to explore the whole island of Korcula. We went to the west coast first, before we climbed inland again and stopped at a very beautiful winery. After some delightful snacks and a bit of wine tasting, we continued southbound. The planned road was closed, but fortunately we found out that with a little detour we could still ride it - and we were rewarded by some of the most beautiful scenery! After a pretty serious climb we reached the scenic town of Korcula, where we had enough time to visit the old town, before we took the ferry to our destination, Orebic.
Lets call it the lost and found day!! What an excitement! We started from the Crystal Hotel in Orebic, the most friendliy people ever, best service, and had the first climb high up along the coast. Dingac Tunnel, the "Million-Dollar-View", a coffee place where everybody wanted to stay for the rest of the day, another missed wallet, some lost fearless riders, the "Chinese Wall", awesome snack stops, meeting a Tourguide collegue and his wife on the motorcycle, another climb, stunning views - and thousands of pictures later we arrived happy at Slano where a cool bootbeer waited for us. Thank you all for an unforgettable day
A short ride with a big destination: today we will reach our destination, Dubrovnik. We left the beautiful bay of Slano a bit later than usual, as the ride was not too long today. As usual, we started with a long climb. We were rewarded with great views and a bit later with a very good coffeeshop. Back down at the Adriatic, we passed under the Franjo Tudman Bridge on our way to Dubrovnik. We stopped one more time for lunch, and then we were there - Dubrovnik, the Pearl of the Adriatic!
The local guide Ana picked us up in the Kompas Hotel and we had a very interesting introduction into the cultural highlights of Dubrovnik, the independence war and the local habits. Thank you Ana. The absolutely highlight was to walk the city wall. After our last dinner together we had to say good bye. Thanks to all of you for your cooperation, the fun we had, interesting talks and all in all for a wonderful week in Croatia. Safe travels Ursula and Marko