Day 5: Sea, Makarska, Deep Club

Makarska was by far my favourite stop over the 8 days.

1. 2. Chuggin along on the M/S Plomin.
3. 4. Cute cheesy photos with our captain Luca courtesy of our guide Duayne.

The Croatian coastline is breathtaking, and nothing less. There's the water along the shore, crystal clear and blue. Then go inland a little while and you have huge rocky mountains that jut fiercly out of nowhere. It's spectacular, my brain failed to fully absorb it all while I was there and even now when I look back at photos, they never cease to impress me.

Above: Makarska by day.

Something happened that night in Makarska. Someone drugged our entire boat or something because everyone completely lost their minds. Just a forewarning.

The boys somehow decided that they would do a shit shirt night, and here are the results...

At the cocktail bar four out of the five people that took part in the beer bong competition were from our boat. The most impressive (and the only girl, watch above) was not only from our boat, but managed to skull every last drop (unlike everyone else).

1. Inez, Nisa and Claire-Ellen doing what girls with tits do best.
2. 3. 4. 5. Deep Club; rave in a cave. The coolest club I've ever seen, a literal club, in a cave.
6. 7. Mike on Josh's shoulders, before everyone lost their shirts.
8. 9. Just outside the club.
10. 11. Matty with Mike's shirt around his head.

At some point during the night, all the boys had their shirts ripped off. And when I say ripped off, I mean ripped into shreds. Poor Mark had his Topman shirt torn apart, but it then came in handy the next day for pirate night. Chels and I knew that a club in a cave would mean a lot of sweat so we wore our bikini tops, which resulted in our tops being taken off us. The next second someone else on the boat was dancing around topless with their arms around their chest, and I don't remember who it was and who took it off her (shows my state of inebriation) but it was around then, even a bit before, that I realised that the everyone on the M/S Plomin had gone completely loopy.

There was a complication with a creepy man following us all back to the boat and not leaving until Duayne told him to more or less fuck off (excuse my french). Other than that, it was hands down the best night out I'd ever had.

Life Lesson #1

Some people are meant to stay, and others go, even if you don't want them to.

The hardest thing I've experienced during my travels so far is leaving people behind. I don't like goodbyes in the first place, but they're okay when there's a "see you again" or "keep in contact" involved. However I've met the most amazing people that I've left behind without saying goodbye, without any form of contact, without a single photo to remember them by, and I dread the day that their faces fade from my memory altogether.

I'm simply not used to having a relationship end against my will. I'd never had a bad fall out with a friend until last year, and it plagued me for months. I've never lost a family member. When I moved schools, friendships dissipated over time while I was building new, stronger ones.

It's been hard. Hard to remember them for the time that we had together and the experiences we shared without getting down about the fact that I'll never see them again, never talk to them again. Hard to not let it cloud over the most incredible memories that I now have and even harder to not be scared that those memories will fade over time. It's hard to let go.

But I'm learning.

Day 4: Sea, Korčula

My Daily Routine:

Wake up, sunbake, lunch, sunbake, swim stop, sunbake, arrive at that days destination, explore city, dinner, happy hour, go out to a bar (or two), then a club, get home before the boat leaves, sleep, repeat.

1. 2. 3. The view from where we docked in Korčula.
4. The cabin......
5. 6. 7. Watching the sunset from Massimo cocktail bar. Not sure why I nearly always seem to pull a weird face when I have a photo taken of me. The turret was only accessible by climbing up a ladder so luckily we were all forewarned about wearing flash-proof clothing and yes, the view was breathtaking.

Had another 'quiet night' that night = went to two bars which were perfect for some table and pole dancing, although the guys were the ones hogging the pole which was recorded and projected live onto the wall opposite the bar. I'm pretty sure they enjoyed themselves a lot more than the girls who had a go, espcially the guy who dropped his pants and gave the entire crowd of people outside the bar and along the street a great view of him stark naked dancing front on toward the camera, hanging loose, and rubbing himself up against the pole having the time of his life.

Day 3: Dubrovnik, Revelin

All the photos above are from the walk along the old city wall. The old town is stunning, to say the least. It was bombed to pieces in 1991 when the Serbs tried to seize the city so pretty much all the buildings are only just over 20 years old because of the restorations since then.

Above: Inside the walls of the old city. Eating the most incredible peach I have ever tasted.

It was in Dubrovnik that I found the favourite thing that I've bought during my trip so far; the silver ring on my middle finger in the photo above. The city is well known for its jewelers who still make jewellery with ‘konavoske puce’ or ‘konavle’ buttons that were worn on traditional folk costumes. It seduced me through its glass case, Inez, Chels and I all ended up getting something and I've worn it everyday since then.

Celebrating the return of the Croatian water polo team from the Olympics with their gold medal. The players were HUGE but proportionate, so next to each other they looked like regular sized people but when they started mingling with the crowd I realised they were gigantic. We were lucky enough to witness their arrival just outside the entrance to the old city while our guide Duayne and I were taking Chels back to the boat because she felt too ill to come out and rumour had it that they were heading to Revelin, which is coincidently where we were going that night!

Revelin is the only place that parties on a Monday night so naturally.. that's where we went. 

Imagine a giant club in a fort with an endlessly high ceiling and cages for people to dance in with a security guard stationed at each platform who shakes the bars vigorously whenever a fifth person drunkenly clambers into the cage (only four are allowed in at a time) - the complete lack of amusement in their faces and the oblivious confusion of the people in the cages was hilarious to watch.

Imagine a guy dressed up like a cowboy but isn't actually meant to be dressed up as a cowboy that stands as still as a statue and then does weird jerky movements that are probably supposed to be too-cool-for-you dance moves but instead made him look like a cowboy trying to do the robot. Refer to above photo.

Imagine the crew; Luca, Antonija, Mario and Gloria, the people who have been driving, navigating, serving food and drink, cooking, cleaning for you, coming out to party with the entire boat and going all out and getting completely shitfaced, with you.

Imagine a guy on the boat (Willy), buying multiple drinks that looked like those giant slushies you used to buy at the easter show and handing them out like water. No idea why and how he had the money to churn them out at 150 kuna each, but we were all too drunk and happy to care. More on Willy later.

I could go on forever, but needless to say I had some good stories to tell Chels when i got home at 5:30 that morning.

and got a nice view of Dubrovnik waking up on a Tuesday morning.

Day 2: Sea, Mljet National Park

Today is the day that 4 girls; Claire-Ellen, Inez, Chels and I decided to be adventurers and swim to the island in the 3rd picture ^^ with a lilo and then get left behind by the boat.
It basically went like this:
*4 girls piled on top of one another on a lilo floating in shallow water around a small island*
"Is the boat moving?"
"What?"
"Oh my god the boat's moving"
*Girls tumble into water*
"AAAGgHHNGHghh!!?!?!1?!?!!!?1111!!!"
*Other people on the roof of the boat stare in amusement at the panicked girls swimming towards the boat dragging a lilo behind them*

Every day we'd have a swim stop, the boat would anchor in a bay and we'd all jump off the boat into the beautiful clear water, climb back on board, sunbathe, and jump in again, float around on a lilo and cool off; it was heaven. I have never seen or swam in water as beautiful.

Mljet National Park

1. 2. First glimpses of the salt lake which was originally fresh water until the monks connected it to the sea.
3. Mini current between the two lakes.

Monastery St Mary inside the National Park

1. The old monastery on a little island.

2. 4. 5. Inside the ruins of the monastery.

3. Some gorgeous fellow Sydney-ians.

6. Swimming off the island. We didn't actually spend too much time looking at the monastery itself.. Most of the afternoon was spent in the water just off the island pretending to be jellyfish and spinning around in cirlces.

That night we had a 'quiet' night on our boat which involved playing drinking games such as

• Never have I ever, then 
• Some mushroom card game that everyone was too good at playing
• Slap - passing a clap around a circle and drinking when you screwed up, then taking a shot when you screwed up twice in a row then buying the next one, then
• Zoomie zoomie - chanting "whoaaaaaaa zoomie zoomie, fuck me up" and yelling allocated numbers; this last game didn't get very far..

and got to know everyone on the boat even though it took me another day or two to learn everyones names.