Our trip – Plitvice.

So, we did quite a bit of driving, starting at about 4:30 am on Saturday morning. We went through Italy and Slovenia, and even got stamps in our passports at Slovenia and Croatia! (Usually we don’t get any stamps because the countries we’ve travelled through have been part of the EU.) The guy at the Croatian border asked in a really cool (think Russian) accent, “Where you go?” It was awesome.
We went to a restroom in Italy and there was a lady standing there waiting for us to give her a euro, and I kindof thought- gosh, aren’t restrooms a given FREE human right? Then later we stopped at a restroom that was THE nastiest, stinkiest, squat toilet restroom I’ve ever been in. And I thought- okay, I will happily pay my euro next time! (and then on the way home we stopped at a rest stop in Switzerland and they had squat toilets and Hazel exclaimed, ‘I thought Switzerland didn’t have squat toilets!”)
So. Croatia.

We were driving through a neat part of Croatia as the sun was getting a bit low and lighting everything up all golden, and it felt kinda cool because it was a village that seemed so real—people were out doing chores, or eating dinner, and just about every other house was bombed out and deserted. It felt more real than the other places we visited on our trip.Here are my pretty bad moving shots.





We passed this old lady all in black, with her black headscarf on, and since my camera was already out, I snapped a picture and was so so sad that it was so blurry.

Next stop, Plitvice—on countless lists like this one of most beautiful places, or best lakes in the world to visit.

So we stopped that night at our little bungalow/campsite near Plitvice. The next morning we had breakfast and went to Plitvice National Park. We swapped about 300 Euros (367 Swiss Franks) to about 2,300 Kunas. That was cool. Then we bought our tickets and started walking. The water was a GORGEOUS color and so clear. The boys loved seeing the fish.









The kids wearing traditional Croatian hats in the souvenir store.

Cute little pictures on some chocolate bars.

We even got to go on a short boat ride.











To be absolutely truthful, I was a tad bit let-down by the park, but I think it was because #1- I had such high expectations (from seeing all those lists of it being one of the most beautiful places ever in creation), and #2- it’s the time of year when there is a lot less water coming down the falls. Most of them were fairly trickly. Not like in this picture, which was probably taken in spring:

Anyway, I know- I sound totally whiny when it was a beautiful beautiful place, but those are my real thoughts. It was a good day and I am glad we got to go.