Eleventh stop - Croatia!

So, overnight trains. Yeah. About that. We VERY quickly discovered that they are only as high quality and developed as the countries they belong to, I suppose. We were forced into second class due to a lack of space, which wasn’t a problem at all last time. As the train pulled up to the station (45 minutes late) in Venice, we couldn’t find our carriage (car) labeled. The only one without a label was the last cart: a rainbow display of graffiti and Lord knows what else, and what you could describe as the runt or ugly duckling of the train clan. Upon inquiring, we discover that we hit the lottery! It was in fact our train! Yes! As if the lack of running water, toilet paper, or elderly Serbian man yelling for an hour in our six person little room wasn’t enough to keep us awake, the lights or lack of any air did the job just fine. Needless to say, this led to three separate naps on busses and at a bus station today.

For Croatia, the plan was to enjoy Dubrovnik and all its white, beachy glory! However, we soon realized that you can’t just waltz into Dubrovnik; it would require a very expensive plane ticket or a 12 hour train ride! During the last third of our trip, we just don’t have time to spare for one day of travel to and from. Long story short, we decided that we could hit it on a Mediterranean cruise someday.

Dubrovnik was only one half of my desired locales to visit in Croatia. The other half was the beautiful park of lakes at Plitvice, two and a half hours south of Zagreb. After arriving via our luxurious overnight accommodations, we paid an outrageous amount of kuna (approx 1 USD = 5 kuna) to go the bathroom, change clothes, and shave. At 5:00 a.m., it was very difficult to find a pleasant, smiling face in the entire station, but we managed to book our next overnight to Munich, store our bags, and get the bus tickets out to Plitvice.

The bus ride was just over two hours, and was a very much needed nap break for Steven and I. It was nice that we had finally found a leg of transportation that dropped us off RIGHT where we needed to be! A little before ten, the bus let us off in the heart of the national park, and we were on our way.


































Plitvice is Croatia’s largest park and a UNESCO world heritage location, with numerous lakes, waterfalls, and beautiful glowing blue water. We basically went on a 5 hour hike with a couple tram rides and a ferry ride in the mix. Beautiful time! It’s water was just as clear as Jamaica, but bolder and much more vibrant. Loved it!


































































































































































































































































































































































We’re taking another overnight train from Zagreb to Munich tonight, so hopefully we will experience the high quality German ingenuity that we’ve come to know and love!