Camping Split, Croatia

Camping Split, Croatia 😎

Ferry Ancona (Italy) to Split (Croatia).

It was early morning 8 am start from our Mediterranean base to the ferry port of Ancona on Italy’s Adriatic Coast. We reached our destination at 3 pm in plenty of time for our 5.30 pm boarding.

I laughed nervously when the loading officer asks me to reverse onboard with the caravan. Fortunately, he took control, and with his hand through the window, a firm grip on the steering wheel, with my foot on the throttle, we managed as a team to load safely. PHEW!

After all the excitement we settled down to a picnic dinner of roast pork (from the supermarket) melon and bubbles on the aft deck and then some shut-eye in our bunk bed cabin. We docked in Split (Croatia) the following morning at 8 am and headed through customs to our Camping site only a 15-minute drive outside the town, luckily we’d booked. They were turning people away.

Camping Split, Stobrec

Our first trip to Croatia by ferry from Ancona (Italy) finds us at Camping Split only 15 minutes from the ferry terminal and what a lovely surprise. We just loved it, came for a week and stayed for two.

Cost 20 euros per night in the low season with ACSI and I think they have winter specials for longer stays too. There are about 300 touring pitches (70-110m2) and all water, power, and drainage. Visiting mid to late Sept and they are still very busy so book ahead.

Friendly staff and clean tidy facilities. A great little restaurant is open all day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and lovely white pebble beaches surround the site they have a small grocery shop on site and others are within walking distance.

I took an easy bike ride along the coast into Split (only a couple of hills) and by car… 15 mins. We found parking close to the city for 1 euro an hour. And the campsite is open all year.

Split Croatia

The people are so friendly and generous. Running short of gas and refill required we head to what we thought was the local depot. When the proprietor came out to meet us he told us he only swaps bottles. To our surprise, we were handed a juicy bag of grapes by the lady of the house as compensation.

The beaches are so clean with white pebbles and the water is clear and ever-changing shades of blue.

Whether it is a hike, bike ride, a swim, exploring the old town, or just lying in the sun, Split has it all. We hope to come back and cruise around the many islands off the coast. Most of the inter-island ferries start here, and there are also many small cruise boats in the harbour. If Split isn’t on your list I’d recommend adding it.

Split – Diocletian’s Palace, A Cabbage Story.

Well, quite intrigued by the Story of the Roman Emperor Diocletian. He built this palace at the turn of the fourth century AD.

Today it forms about half the old town of Split. Diocletian wanted to grow cabbages in his retirement so he needed some to live right!! After his retirement in 307 AD, his people begged him to return to the throne in order to resolve the conflicts that had arisen through Constantine’s rise to power and Maxentius’ usurpation.

Diocletian famously replied:

“If you could show the cabbage that I planted with my own hands to your emperor, he definitely wouldn’t dare suggest that I replace the peace and happiness of this place with the storms of a never-satisfied greed”

This was a reference to the Emperor retiring to his palace to grow cabbages.

Post Thought

“You can talk with someone for years, every day, and still, it won’t mean as much as what you can have when you sit in front of someone, not saying a word, yet you feel that person with your heart, you feel like you have known the person for forever…. connections are made with the heart, not the tongue.”
C. JoyBell

Dubrovnik (Old Town)

Croatia fought for its independence during the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1991 gaining recognition from the EU later that year. The old town was severely damaged during that campaign, but you wouldn’t have known during our visit.

It was a pleasure to walk around this historical and well-preserved town, or should I say well-restored, not sure… it has been around for a loooong time and withstood attempted invasions from a lot of other people too.

We had to be careful we didn’t get bowled over by the cruise ship tour groups that waddle through the town completely oblivious to anyone else and looking so bored. If you haven’t been definitely put it on your bucket list.

Fabian Foley, Author

My wife has always wanted to write but there was always something holding her back. To find out a bit more about why here is a link to her webpage where she explains the reasons.

https://fabianfoley.com/

Her book is presently listed in presales on Amazon, Apple Books, Banes & Noble, KOBO, and Smashwords to name a few. Due for release in early 2023.

When nowhere is safe in the world you know, you have to hide… or start making a new one.

Robert is eleven when his best friend dies and he learns that if he wants to survive in the world he has to be ‘normal’. He buries his feelings, his awful childhood memories, and his suspicion that he is gay. Even when he falls in love with Johnny, he pretends it isn’t happening, and buries those feelings too, choosing safety in the closet, a career as a lawyer, a wife and kids, and suburban happy ever after… Until Johnny returns needing help, and then disappears, and Robert’s façade begins to crack in heartbreaking and dreadful circumstances.

Only one other person saw what happened that night, and after being arrested for drunk and disorderly, he disappears.

Trying to keep his secret and himself safe isn’t Robert’s only priority. He wants justice too. But when the police force is corrupt from the top down, justice isn’t merely elusive, it’s an impossibility. Or so it seems when you’re fighting for yourself alone. But other people have been fighting for justice too. If Robert can convince them to help him, together they may set something unstoppable in motion. It will either run down the corrupt police or run over and destroy Robert’s life.

Inspired by the true story of a suicide that was reclassified thirty years later as a gay hate-crime murder, The Outing is set in 1980s Queensland, (Australia), where corrupt police and politicians rule together, with an audacious disregard for the law. It shares poignant and emotional elements of Douglas Stuart’s Shuggie Bain and Craig Silvey’s trans-coming-of-age novel Honeybee, with the suspense of The Dry by Jane Harper, while drawing on the historical facts leading up to the airing of the dirty linen of the Bjelke-Peterson era with the broadcasting of The Moonlight State-1987.

Breaking a corrupt system can sometimes break you, and those you love… some, forever.

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