Ha! I had said that I wouldn’t take my laptop with me today. But we all know that’s an empty threat. I’ve got too much going on to NOT take it. Though I did quite well. Woke up at 8, showered, went to breakfast, went back to hostel room, did some laundry, went to historic center.
It wasn’t until about 2.30 that I even opened the laptop. Partly because I was trying to help a waiter here get his iPhone working and partly because, well, I needed to check in on the rest of the world. It’s just that simple. I had photos to upload, comments to make, emails to read and all that. Plus, I had to make sure you all knew I was alive and well (I’m very alive and very well, thank you very much!)
Six and a half hour I managed without the Internet, after 7 hours of sleep. Not bad for a guy who was online working for up to 16 hours a day almost every day for the last year.
OK, so I’m in Zadar, it’s a small coastal town often overlooked by many travelers. It has a really cool center area which is laid out according to the original Roman street plan. It’s got city walls, marble streets and a Sea Organ (see the videos in the gallery) and more. In fact, I had a great time. Sure the people there in the center of the town aren’t as friendly as other parts of the country but it’s a tourist area. Oddly in the market where I bought fresh figs, hazelnuts, bananas and cherries, they spoke French and Croatian…but not always English heh. The car tags I’ve seen have mostly been Austrian, Croat or Polish.
I was trying to help a local fix up his iPhone which was doing the Apple logo of death (start, show Apple Logo, do nothing else) but the wi-fi was too bad to get the 246MB file needed, so I hand wrote him some instructions. I hope he gets it fixed.
Now I’m torn. Hana says she could come visit in this area at the end of July. Can I make it to Israel and back by then? I was thinking I’d ask the hostel if they needed some part-time help for a bit in return for a room. I figure 4-5 hours of work a day here is more than enough to cover the price of a bed. I thought about a month here but now I think I’ll just press on tomorrow with the hitchhiking to Split plan. Maybe I’ll ask them anyway and see what they say. If they’re open to it maybe I hang out for a bit longer. It’s not a bad place to be really. The three “B’s” of life are here – Beach, Bikinis, Babes – so why not?
There’s a ton of things to see and do here, I don’t understand why loads of people skip it when planning their holidays. The prices are good, the people nice enough and it’s a lively place. I even met the last of the barkariolos (see photo gallery) and hears the Sea Organ play (videos and audio clips in the gallery). For more information on all that you should search the web, personally I’m going for a dip in the channel which is a branch of the Adriatic Sea. Cau for now!
KPICASA_GALLERY(Zadar)
waiter
Anna Stikl