All right Game of Thrones fans, your time has finally come – we go now to Croatias’s most famous city of Dubrovnik! There are dragons lurking in every dungeon and GOT set pieces on every gleaming white street. Spoiler alert! We didnt actually do any GOT stuff at all except for an incidental staircase here or there (SHAME!) Instead,of course, we did our typical semi-guided blundering through the city while doing our best to figure things out. So hold onto your butt, dear reader, because Jon’s still writing another blog section and you’re stuck with me again. We rolled into Dubrovnik by bus from Mostar. No late night rouge taxi drivers this time, just a pleasant port side walk flanked by giant cruise ships disgorging their tourists by the thousands. Our Airbnb was about 40 minutes walk East of the old city, so we just stayed on our side of town the first night and had a few beers at the Dubrovnik brewing company and caught up on our sleep. It’s a great place to pour half your flight of beers on yourself while mocking a Scotsman for drinking 2 beers at once. The next morning, as usual, we got […]
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Hello everyone! It’s time now for a guest blog post from that other guy that is walking with Jon. I will be blogging at you about Sarajevo and Mostar. So hold onto your butts because those cities are lit af and I’m a much worse writer than Jon. Sarajevo We arrived in Sarajevo by bus from Split that got in around 8pm. Since it was dark and our hostel was 40 minutes walking away, we ended up sharing a cab with a nice English woman and her Austrian husband who I met on the bus. Lucky us! Or was it? As it turned out, Jon and I’s first minutes in Sarajevo were wide eyed and clamped onto the “oh shit” handles in the back of a rogue taxi while the driver careened all over the road, all while getting in an increasingly heated argument with an Austrian diplomat in broken Croatian about the flagrantly inflated price of the ride. Apparently the driver somehow mistook Jon and I for rich play boys staying at the 5star hotel downtown and was running the meter at like triple rate. Anyway, we didn’t die, but we did find out later during lunch with that
Split is an amazing city on the Adriatic coast in Croatia that has millennia of history and millions of stories to tell. The old city itself is a Roman Palace/Retirement Home that became a medieval city, then a Venetian trading hub, was attacked by the Ottomans, fell to Napoleon, became a seat of Austrian-Hungarian power, joined Yugoslavia, conquered by Italy, occupied by Germany, joined Yugoslavia again, and only very recently because a tourist hotspot in Croatia. Each ruler of Split left its own distinct mark on the city, sometimes making the city feel disjointed and lacking defining features. But that becomes the marvel of Split: a city unlike any other with new secrets to uncover and different, distinct personalities around every corner. The Old (Ro)Man The beating heart of Split is the Diocletian Palace, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that has stood since 305 CE. The palace was built for as the retirement home for the Roman Emperor Diocletian when he abdicated rule to his hand picked successor, and it stood as a military fort and home to the elite to centuries after his death. The palace walls are still standing but much of the traditional palace inside is
Plitvice National Park is a jewel in the crown of Croatia. It is a gorgeous collection of lakes that cascade into each other creating gorgeous waterfalls. Every vista is stunning, and the park paths bring you right to the base of the falls. At peak times (especially in the summer) the boardwalks can be crowded with tour groups that flock to the falls for day trips from Split or Zagreb. The crowds will definitely detract from your enjoyment of the falls, so try and come to in April or May, or stay the night and enjoy the park early in the morning at 8.00 or stay late and go after the crowds at 16.00. The falls have 2 entrances, aptly named Entrance 1 and 2, which are about 2km apart on the main road. There are a few hotels in the park, but most places to stay are located 2-4 miles from the entrances. When we got our tickets, we got 2 days for the park, but we bought them for different entrances which turned out to be a little bit of a hassle. There is no dedicated bus between the entrances and the city buses don’t run consistently. The
If there’s one thing we have learned from our month of traveling so far it’s this: we’re kinda bad it. I mean, we aren’t terrible travelers, but I don’t think either of us realized how hard it would be to continually plan an around the world trip on the go using only the phones in our pockets. Take our week in Zagreb for instance. We came here with a rough outline of what we wanted to do and see, but after 5 days in Croatia’s capitol city, we found ourselves stumbling time and time again over our Croatia plans, hiking plans, ending up in a police raid, and we even had trouble finding a good dinner. Here are some tips for surviving Zagreb, staying positive and perfecting failing. Traveling to Zagreb: Double check the bus schedule So, believe it or not, Croatia is not a popular destination for many Scots in mid-April. Fights from Edinburgh or Glasgow to Zagreb (and even the tourist cities of Split and Dubrovnik) were few and far between – or really expensive. The best flight we could find was from Edinburgh to Zagreb via Brussels on Brussels Airlines. The flight left EDI at 6.00,
The West Highland Way is an amazing long distance hiking trail that leads from Milngaive to Fort William in Scotland. Most people head out from the small suburb of Glasgow: Milngaive (pronounced MULL-guy)(wait, really?)(yes, MULL-guy)(but-)(I know…). Aaron and I, however, decided to be bold and walk South, starting in the small, pub-filled town of Fort William. The trail is 96 miles long, that took us 7 days, with 6 nights of wonderful camping in the wilds of Scotland. The West Highland Way is a beautiful trail that takes you across the sweeping vistas of the Scottish highlands to the intimate forests of Loch Lomond. One note: Aaron and I had some of the most amazing weather on the trail, and we were told time and time again that our journey was not typical. While we are sure the trail will be beautiful in any weather, keep in mind that our experience is not how most people will experience the trail. Day Zero: Fort William Fort William is often filled with young adventure seekers, either finishing the West Highland Way or climbing Ben Nevis or setting out for the whisky filled lands of the Great Glen Way. All this activity
As we were leaving Edinburgh, Aaron and I came across a rare treasure in the Scottish Highlands: the forecast called for a sunny day atop Ben Nevis. While we initially planned to hike the West Highland Way south to north (from Glasgow to Fort William), we decided to take take the train north and and try our hand at climbing the famous Ben Nevis. And while the mountain kicked our ass, we were so glad we did. At 1344 meters (4410 feet) Ben Nevis stands as the tallest peak in the U.K. And it’s not messing around. While on paper it’s not as tall as some of the mountains in the Smokey’s, the climb up Ben Nevis begins at only 20m above sea level, making the total climb much longer than most treks you’ll find in the states. Taking about 4 hours to get to the summit, and another 3 hours to descend, it’s a walk not for the faint of heart. Add in massive wind gusts and an icy summit, you are looking at one challenging hike, even on the beautiful sunny day we had. We started the hike at the Glen Nevis Youth Hostel, where a life-saving
While walking down the twisty maze of historic streets I stopped and turned to Aaron and said, “I think American cities lack imagination.” There was not really any other way to describe the feeling I got while exploring the lovely city of Edinburgh. There was imagination around every corner, with buildings crammed one on top of another, spires twisting to the sky and streets that created an intricate web of history, both true and fiction. Edinburg is most famously known as the city where JK Rowling penned Harry Potter, and it is said she pulled inspiration from the city around her. Walking along the streets, I knew I was in Harry’s world – there was a magic here that I hadn’t felt anywhere else in my travels. From the school that is the inspiration for Hogwarts, to the famous Victoria Street, that is the real life Diagon Ally, I kept wondering, “could Harry Potter have been written America? Could our cities have been inspiration for an epic fantasy world?” The answer I kept coming to: No. Exploring the streets of Edinburgh is its own joy, uncovering it’s secrets is a challenge that is worth undertaking. We started off our visit
8:00 pm. Atlanta Ga. After saying good bye to our parents, and some last minute legal document signing (thanks Dad!) we headed to the Airport and we boarded our Virgin Atlantic Flight to London. The plane was called “Scarlet Lady” which seemed like a good sign. 9:00 am. London, U.K. The flight went well and we arrived in London on time. Heathrow, as promised, was a maze as we had to change terminals. We transferred to Terminal 2: The Queens Terminal, again a fitting sign of a trip we’ll planned. The famous London Fog had set in, causing a short delay in our flight to Edinburgh, but we boarded the small, twin propeller plane and made our way up north. 6:00 pm. Edinburgh, Scotland. We landed with out a problem at EDI and grabbed a bus into town. Everything was easy, and we termed traveling in the U.K. as “Foreign Lite”, since even though we are in a different country, the language is the same making navigating a new city easy. First impression: Edinburgh is beautiful and going to be a lot of fun. But we were way too exhausted to do any exploring. We checked into our cute
Lets talk about gear! We (just me) have been slaving over hot gear for months, trying to get it just right. In the end, everything needs to be durable enough to last 6 months, light weight enough to carry up and down (huge) mountains, and warm enough to sleep outside in freezing temperatures. If we have any exceptional pieces of gear, good or bad, I’ll be updating about it as we go. – A Here is a brief overview of what we decided on, complete with a typical gear display picture! Aaron’s Pack – Hyperlite Windrider 3400, Jon’s Pack – Gossamer Gear Mariposa 60 Tent – Big Agnes Copper Spur HV UL2 Sleeping Bags – Western Mountaineering Summerlite 32 Ground pads – NEMO Tensor Insulated Water Filter – Sawyer Squeeze 0.1 micron filter, Aquamira Drops as needed Camp Stove – Snow Peak Gigapower 2.0 Underwear – ExOfficio Boxer briefs Socks – Injinji Original Weight Sport toe socks Aaron’s Shoes – Altra Lone Peak 4 RSM, Jon’s Shoes – On Running Cloudventure There are tons more little items from spoons to pillows to rain pants that we’ll carry for the trip. Ya’ll know I can nerd out on gear forever, so