Jul 14, 2014
Trogir, Croatia
We had such a wonderful night’s sleep–we could hear the waves lapping the shore and feel the cool breeze off the water. We went to have our breakfast on the patio and I was just so sad to have to leave the hotel! I really loved staying at Hotel Bellevue and I can’t recommend it highly enough. But soon it was time to hit the road. We decided we’d head into Split for lunch then make our way over to our hotel in Trogir, another walled city along the coast.
There is a small section of coast that belongs to Bosnia, and this time when we passed through Neum we stopped and had a beer. It’s a really beautiful town with great views of water and islands. Neum cuts Croatia into two non-contiguous parts, a boundary I was surprised to learn dates back to a treaty in 1699. The Croatian government would like to build a bridge to by-pass the area to avoid the double border crossing, though for us the entry and re-entry was easy enough.
The not-so-easy part was still to come. Getting into Split was tough. It’s a big port city and the traffic was snarly. Then we couldn’t find parking. So by the time we did finally settle in for lunch at Konoba Marjan, John was so tired of driving. Then, what was supposed to be a half hour drive to Trogir took 2 hours due to construction. Add to that our location of the hotel in the walled city with no parking in sight, by the time we were checked in and ready to tour John was really over it. We made the best of it though and found an amazing restaurant, Konoba TRS, that featured John’s favorite meal of the trip.
I have to admit that I really, really wanted to go to Korcula, which was also on the list of European gems that we consulted in making our decision to go to Kotor. But we had a tight itinerary and so decided to stay on the mainland. Reflecting on that decision, I would have skipped Split and Trogir and headed to Korcula. Also, since we were driving a lot I would have chosen a hotel with parking outside the city walls (I was so spoiled by Hotel Bellevue.) Lessons learned.
We still had a wonderful day, and went to sleep looking forward to our hike the next day.
