After a final Albanian lunch in a castle where we got to visit Shkoder in our Skoda, we crossed the border and entered the warm and comfy embrace of the EU, once again, for more shenanigans in the Schengen…again.

It’s amazing what a (very, VERY hard) border can do over a historically short period. Our earlier travel buddy had commented how tall he’d felt in Albania, but as soon as we crossed into Montenegro James felt like Gulliver entering Brobdingnag…google it.

We had just under 2 days in Montenegro, but from that, we could make a case to call it one of the most beautiful countries we’ve ever visited.  Now, you can call it sampling bias if you want, sure…your prerogative to present rational arguments to an irrational blog, fine, but, to be fair, we’ve never visited a country for the first time and thought, “OK, let’s just go to the shittest looking places first up so we can properly judge this country”, so I think our snap judgements are well calibrated.

From Montenegro we ventured to some original Z2A spots in Croatia, first to meet friends in Dubrovnik, a town Lea has seen change now over 3 visits spanning more than 20 years and to set sail from Split after an unexpectedly short detour to Bosnia.  We:

• Sunsetted at aptly named Buza and Bard bars (I’ll let the reader decide whether this prose is more appropriately described as Buza or Bard) on cliffs outside the walls of Dubrovnik, overlooking the ocean
• Drank beers while walking the (now €40, previously practically free, previously previously still rubble) city walls while watching and cheering people playing basketball below us.  We only cheered when they sank a shot…we only cheered once…we drank a full pint…they weren’t locals
• Visited a stunning winery, recently crowned Europe’s most beautiful winery…..SURPRISE!
• Drank beers at Kravice waterfalls in Bosnia
• Missed out on visiting Mostar due to protests against the EU, SURPRISE!
• Witnessed a wine glass spontaneously split down the middle in Split (yes, this did happen, and no, it wasn’t one of ours…thankfully)
• Watched how quickly friendly service can change when you, somewhat, jokingly ask if they Split bills
• Spent a night at sea after swimming in the blue waters of the Adriatic all day
  • Docked on Brac for the night, where our skipper pointed to the town and told us to go to the white building for dinner (NB: they’re all white, but in Goran’s brain it was pretty clear he wasn’t saying the cream, the bone, the off white or the ivory…or even, antique white USA…it was the white. The brain of a good sailor…at his mercy, we knew definitely not to argue with the guy on the ropes…pun intended)
  • Were amazed how tight the boats were docked together in the marina over night, each being on the other’s side forever more…I guess that’s what fenders are for?
• Visited Froggyland in Split at the demand of our young travel buddy.  Never been? You should, and not just because of the proximity to the best cevapi, but to admire how rich someone must have been to spend their life (probably killing, then) embalming and posing dead frogs into human situations…it was very clever, and if nothing else, a ribbiting experience Froggy Land!
• And noticed a big change from 10 years ago when Dalmatian stew was all the rage in Croatia, but now noticed a shift towards Dalmatian tapas…the local chefs clearly taking the same Dalmatian Tapas…101 course.

After parting ways (temporarily, yelling “see you in Paris”, and sounding like over privileged arseholes) with our new travel buddies (incidentally 10 years on from when we were supposed to be travelling together on Z2A1, the change explained by the fact we visited Froggyland this time), we had a few more nights in Croatia, in new places for both of us.  We:

• Waited for an underground carpark in Sibenik, and witnessed a car being loaded onto a tow-truck at the exit, blocking the entry as well…the truck couldn’t enter all the way so we assume the car had also been pushed to the exit. Now, sitting at a bar watching this scenario could have triggered a case of schadenfreude, but sitting in traffic with cars piling up each way knowing I was up next, led to something closer to twin-tourist-driver-telepathy as I also felt like vomiting just watching the scene unfold
• Found an amazing winery (spoiler alert), where we had one of the best tasting experiences with a show. The show being another English speaking tourist from <redacted> complaining about the wasps. Because they were allergic to bees. They don’t smoke, and don’t like to travel with an epipen….  The situation was met with a sympathetic/on point “you don’t like wasps and you come to Europe in summer?” From the waitress and a “Haven’t you read Z2A1?” from James Z21 ciggies v WASPs
• Waited 20 minutes on a stationary bus to see some more falls after mutually high-fiving the perfect planning and timing skills (NB: the walk DOWN to the falls would have only been 10 minutes)
• Walked the 2kms on a wooden boardwalk with no handrails (apologies for the redundancy of mentioning lack of handrails #europe) to see the falls, where we were one errant backpack or weaponised stroller or native English speaking tourist from <redacted> who can’t read simple directions…in English…or European defending their space away from certain death/really annoying injury/getting really wet
• Hiked 45 minutes back up from falls in 100% humidity or more to avoid previously lived bus delays and ensure we made it to lunch…at a winery (worth it, despite the wet shirt, as they’d been timing the bread in the oven for each table’s arrival)
• Got buzzed by the airforce as they performed manoeuvres over Zadar and past our balcony for no apparent reason other than for our mensiversary
• Were amazed at the price of deodorant, causing Lea to postulate: “I guess that’s why nobody wears it here”. That’s your one, Lea. Just kidding…she was way over one, as was I (see above)
• Spent 4 hours on a 200 year old, newly varnished, timber boat full of people smoking (skipper included) to visit the Kornati islands and argued with a 25 year old German over who was more excited to get the all you can drink wine. He was. He really was.
• Were relieved that Ryan Air doesn’t (yet) weigh passengers after seeing the impact that 6 weeks travel had our bags when weighed in on their, I’m sure, perfectly calibrated scales
• And left Croatia, once again, amazed by how easy, friendly, beautiful and tasty everything is, just a little poorer than the last time #euros

See all about Z2A2 here: Z2A2

And don’t forget the Z2A2 updates: Z2A2 list