Europe – Page 2 – ThePassportPrincess

Day 69 – Rome

October 23, 2015June 13, 2016SarahLeave a comment

I left my apartment in Split, Croatia just after 11am and headed to the airport.
My flight for Rome didn’t leave until about 3pm but I needed to walk down to the bus terminal with all my stuff and get a ticket.

Thank god I left when I did because it started pouring with rain as soon as I got to the terminal.
I bought my ticket and then waited for the next bus which was at 11.45am.

The bus ride was long, and everyone was so pushy trying to get on.
Eventually I got to the airport and checked in my over weight bag. And again, they didn’t charge me. Woohoo!
Maybe they understand that I need a lot of products to make me look half decent some days haha.

The airport was verrrry average. There wasn’t even anything to eat really. I just ended up buying some kit kats from duty free and nibbling on those while I waited for my flight.

When it was time the board, I kind of laughed at how small the plane was. Oh well, I guess I was only flying to Rome haha!
The time on the flight was spent talking to the lady next to me. I think she was slightly nervous flying on that small aircraft so we sat and chatted and she showed me her pictures of Croatia. She was actually from Split but had moved to Australia years and years ago. She just went back to Split to bury her mother as she had passed away recently which was sad.

It was good to meet someone new though to add to my list of ‘people I talk to on planes’
The flight wasn’t too long, and when I landed I tried to decide whether to catch the train or catch a bus.
The bus seemed cheaper so I went with that option.
I probably should have taken the train though because I had to wait for the bus for over 20 minutes.
Then when it came, everyone was so rude and just shoved past each other to get on. I had already loaded my bag underneath the bus so luckily I got on by probably pushing in front of a few people too. (But in a nice, slip-in-there way) not like some people who blatantly just stood right in front of you when they used to be 4 people behind you.

The bus took way longer than I expected, we got stuck in afternoon traffic so I didn’t get to my hostel until about 7.30pm.
It was easy enough to walk to from the train station (which was where the bus stopped) it was just so painful having to carry all that luggage 😣😣

I stayed at The Yellow Hostel and if you’re ever in Rome and want some cheap accommodation, I really recommend it. The rooms are all good, not super fancy or anything but I roomed with 3 other girls and we had our own shower and toilet.
The Yellow Hostel is spread out along one street, so they have like 3 different buildings where all the bedrooms are and they have their own pub/club too where you can get food 24/7 and good drinks!

They also have some entertainment on at night on certain days. That night they had a magic show and I saw this guy put his whole body in a balloon haha.

I headed to the bar as soon as I’d re-done my face and funnily enough I bumped into Nick who was on my Top deck tour through Europe haha. He was staying at the hostel as me so I sat down with him and we grabbed some late dinner from the bar.

I ended up talking to this American girl for a while over some drinks and then these Aussie’s came and joined us for more drinks. After a night of drinking and dancing I headed off for my first nights sleep in Rome at about 3am 😴

Day 66 & 67 – Split (Croatia)

October 22, 2015June 13, 2016Sarah1 Comment

Friday 16th October & Saturday 17th

This is the first time that ive done 2 days in 1 post, but the Friday when we got back to Split wasnt super interesting.
We arrived in the afternoon and then all went out for dinner at this Italian resturant.

I had a really yummy lasagna (I don’t think I’ve eaten this much lasagna in a month haha) One of the guys on our Sail Croatia trip lost a game of ‘chances’ so he had to go and get a tattoo done. He got ‘Hakuna Matata’ on his wrists which actually turned out looking quite cool. Plus I love the lion king haha.

We all went out to a cocktail bar afterwards and had some yarns and some drinks but as lots of people had flights to catch in the morning it ended up kind of being an early night for a few of us.

The next morning we had to be off the boat by 8.30am.
I’d already packed some of my stuff the night before so when I woke up I had a shower and packed the last of my things into my already overflowing bag 😑
I’d organized to stay in Split for the next 2 nights at an Air B’n’B
If you’ve never used Air B’n’b before I highly recommend it (especially if you’re travelling as a couple)
It’s a website for people around the world to list their home, holiday house or apartment for people to stay in. So if you go onto their website, you can scroll through and find somewhere pretty much anywhere in the world to stay.
I Googled it and it has over 1,500,000 listings in 34,000 cities and 190 countries.

If you look on Airbnb there’s some awesome places that people rent out. Like homes underground, penthouse apartments and cool caravans.
You can either opt to have the whole place to yourself (some people own apartments or holiday homes) or you can share the house with the owners which is always a good way to meet people.

I got a studio apartment to myself in the center of Split. I organised to meet up with one of the owners at 9.30am so I had some time to kill. When I left the boat, I went to a cafe and had a croissant for breakfast and waited in the shelter while it absolutely poured down with rain.

When the owner Jure came and met me, the weather had cleared up and the sun was out yay! 🌞
He carried my heavy backpack for me all the way to the apartment which was nice of him. Along the way, he told me a little bit about the city and places to see. He worked at a restaurant just around the corner from where I was staying so I knew of somewhere to eat.

The apartment was up 4 flights of stairs so I was happy he was carrying my bag haha. I swear Croatia just doesn’t use elevators anywhere! They’re very behind with a lot of things.
The apartment was exactly what it looked like in the pictures. It was so cute! And so close to the local shops and restaurants.

I can’t crop the black boxes out of these pictures unfortunately

When Jure left me, I went for a walk to Diocletians Palace which is an ancient palace built by the Roman emperor Diocletian. It’s right in the center of Split and even though it’s referred to as a “palace” because of its intended use as the retirement residence of Diocletian, the term can be misleading as the structure is massive and more resembles a large fortress: about half of it was for Diocletian’s personal use, and the rest housed the military garrison.

There’s lots of places to eat in the palace, along with souvenir shops and places to buy bags and jewelry etc.
I stopped and listened to this really good Capella group which was nice and took lots of pictures.

I also went and bought a new SD card for my phone because I’d run out of room from all the pictures I’ve been taking lately!

Eventually after my exploring, I went to the local grocery store and bought an apple and a yogurt. Along with a couple of ciders and some corn chips with salsa haha.
The next 2 days I’d planned at the apartment just to chill out and relax a bit so that’s exactly what I did.
I ate my corn chips and watched some Orange Is The New Black on my tablet. I read some of my book and then got ready to head out and watch the rugby.

In New Zealand, Rugby is obviously a big deal because we’re so great at it and all. 😜
That night they were playing France in the quarter finals and seeing as I thought it was a big deal, I assumed some bar in Croatia would be playing it live on TV.
I got changed and headed out to the local sports bar but they were only playing Football (soccer) that night.
Turns out every bar was only playing football!
I’d seen a sign at a restaurant saying “rugby live tonight” so I went there and they were closed!! 😳
I was so annoyed.

So I went back to the apartment and tried about 10 different live streaming sites to try and watch it online but none of them worked.
Eventually, I ended up Skyping my friend Ben from Contiki who lives in Australia and was watching it on his TV. He set up the Skype on his iPad facing the TV so I could watch it. I only got to watch the last 40 minutes but it was better than nothing and it was such a good game!
We won against France

I ended up going to sleep about 2am after I’d Skyped Ben for like 3 bloody hours and had eaten my apple and yogurt. (Probably my first healthy thing I’d had all month)
🍎🍎

Day 65 – Makarska (Croatia)

October 22, 2015June 13, 2016SarahLeave a comment

This will probably be the most pathetic blog I’ve written so far.
I can’t even remember what I did in this town.
As I’ve bought a new SD card for my phone (to make more room for all the pictures I’ve been taking) I took the old one out which had all my photos from Mljet. Now I have nothing to jog my memory.
I could go into my bag and get my old SD card out and put it into my phone but it’s currently 12.36am where I am and honestly, after 3 cocktails no one has time for that.

Instead, these wonderful pictures off Google Images will have to do.

Being honest, if I can’t remember this place then it can’t have wowed me.. (or it could be the fact that I slept for ages that afternoon and only awoke when it was dark)

It sucks because all the places in Croatia I went to, I can imagine in the Summer time for them to be amazing!!
I could imagine lots of people walking around, a Gelato in their hand, drinks in the other, laughing on the way to the beach.
But the scene I got in some places was tumbleweed rolling down the empty road. All the restaurants had shut, a few were open with one worker just having a smoke out the front, the boats all docked in the harbor, a few oldies having a walk around. (Korčula I’m looking at you) zyoonoghbcr8q
Apart from Dubrovnik, It wasn’t really the Croatia I was hoping for.
But it was to be expected when you book your sailing trip for late October.

about-makarska-croatia-5

As this post is about Makarska I guess I should write a little bit about the place.
Its about 60 km southeast of Split and has a population of 13,834 residents.
Lots of tourists come to Markarska as here lies Biokovo Mountain. It’s the second-highest mountain range in Croatia and tourists can join an organised hiking trip to climb up. Otherwise, there’s a Nature Park at the bottom of the Mountain with a Botanical garden.

franjevacka

The center of Makarska is an old town with stone-paved streets, a main church square with a flower and fruit market and a Franciscan Monastery that houses a sea shell collection featuring a giant clam shell.

I didn’t wake from my sleeping slumber until about 5.30pm (I was soo tired, I had come down with another cold on top of my sickness) so I got myself dressed and then joined everyone for dinner at this sea food type restaurant. I ordered a chicken curry type dish that was actually really nice. Apart from the fact I felt really sick afterwards 😩

When we got back to the boat, we all started drinking and then headed out to one of the clubs. It was so small though and ended up being really hot! I sat outside with a few others half the time because I’d just be sweating inside otherwise.

I didn’t stay terribly long that night. I guess I just wasn’t really feeling it so I went home with a few others at about 1am. Thank god I did though because when we got back a storm came over us and it just absolutely poured down.

Next day was Friday and we were heading back to Split in the morning 🙂