Return to Split, Croatia

It's been a year of repeats, Australia, Peru, Croatia, and it's taught me something.  Returning to a foreign place makes you feel like a local.  You know where to eat, you know the people, you know where you are going.  I like it.  This time it was Split, Croatia, that I returned to for two days before my infamous Yacht Week adventure with my buddies: Judith, JagerMan, and Crispy.

Thursday, July 4, 2013

We arrived on the Fourth of July after a very long journey from JFK to Munich to Split.  At least Munich had a beer garden in the airport.  We checked into our Apartman (yup no "e" no "t") which was much nicer and larger than I'd expected!  It was going to be very difficult to find though... we wandered up and down a lot of windy streets to get there.  The only other annoyance was one key between four people.  After dropping our stuff, we immediately changed into our aggressively patriotic ensembles to celebrate our country's independence.  Imagine that walking down the streets of cozy, laidback Split.

 

 

 

 

As the resident expert on Split, I recommended the restaurant (which was still just as good as I'd remembered) and got almost everyone to order the rumpsteak.  And then I took them to Charlie's Bar... the site of the infamous Lil Sass shirt switch.
 

 Photo Credit: Split Hostel Website

Within 15 minutes we had everyone chanting "USA! USA! USA!"  I immediately confiscated a sparkly USA flag vest from one guy who looked suspiciously like Ryan Reynolds and Crispy gifted her headband to another guy after ripping all the buttons off his shirt (this is how you know she likes you).

 

He would become our fifth roommate for the next two days and was adoringly labeled "Ostreicher" after the character from American Pie.  This was just my luck considering Crispy and I were sharing a room (JagerMan and Judith were sharing the other) and right before going out I'd said, "If your roommate needs the room you sleep on the couch!"  So I slept on the couch and woke up to Judith's head nestled right by my butt.  Love these people.

Friday, July 5, 2013

Toast and two Cokes into breakfast I was feeling much better.  Brunch would mark the beginning of "Yeah, yeah," the phrase that would later sweep through all of Yacht Week and eventually make it's way back to New York.  Judith and Crispy had somehow created this term while twerking to a Lil Wayne song.

Again as the Split expert I led the ratpack to my favorite beach area in Split so that we could get rid of our NewYorkVampire look before Yacht Week the next day.  Bacvice Beach is not really a beach per se.  It's more of a man made pool made from ocean.  And it comes with lots of beers.  Crispy and I got to test out our lilos (water inflatables) which turns out... are awesome.  Keeps you floating AND cool.  Genius.

 

 

After about an hour we looked starboard and low and behold Ostreicher appeared on the horizon along with none other than Ryan Reynolds Sparkle Vest!  Turns out that we had just somehow lost Ryan Reynolds the night before which is why we'd never realized they were friends (but no worries we made him the sixth roommate).  We spent the remainder of the afternoon drinking beers and making memories.  For those who were there I leave you with a few inside jokes for prosterity.

- The Waterboarding Vine
- The Maybe Gays
- Floating Woohoos
- Jenny Herpes
- Baked Beans
- Wee Wee Sharm Sharm

While at the beach, Ostreicher graciously offered to cook us dinner (he is a budding chef).  In exchange we just had to get the drinks.  Crispy was on me like a hawk to make sure I didn't add any snacks to the cart.  "No SNICKERS!!!!"  Luckily I got one in while she wasn't looking.  Mmm it was tasty.  On the way back I managed to get us all lost while carrying a ton of drinks so by the time we got home we barely had time to shower before Os and Ryan Reynolds showed up for dinner.

Dinner was delicious and quickly deteriorated into a close game of Never Have I Ever (because we are juveniles).  Reynolds and I managed to go out at the same time for the same thing.  #FITB

From there we ended up BACK at Charlie's Bar and then onward late night to Caffe Bar Inbox where I lasted about twenty minutes.

Photo Credit: Inbox Website

 More good inside jokes:

- Stand at Attention
- Moon Walking
- The Bed Squatter
- Hooker Graveyard
- The Goat Cheese Nose

Man, Yacht Week hasn't even started...

(check back for that blog later this week)

Some photos have been stolen from my last trip to Split since I didn't take a lot of scenic photos this time around.  For more touristy information on Split I recommend reading that blog post - http://blog.travel-addict.com/2012/09/fun-in-sun-in-split-croatia.html"

Fun in the Sun in Split, Croatia

Continuing on to Split, Croatia....

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

We didn't do a full inventory of the apartment the night before so I'd thought I'd give it a little love.  Yet again we had booked a three person apartment instead of the main hostel (which looked a little shabby).  The apartment was ADORABLE.  It was the equivalent of a three story walk-up with a little downstairs, a mid-level bedroom and an upstairs complete with kitchen and bathroom.  It was much nicer than the slightly shabby looking hostel (Hostel Sunseekers).

 

 

We woke up early and hit the market to buy figs, bread, salami, olive oil, walnuts and pag cheese for our picnic in Marjan Park.

Marjan is a huge park that overlooks the city of Split.  It was quite the hike (we were panting by the time we reached the top) but the gorgeous views of Split were well worth it.  A perfect view for a picnic.  On a random note, keep hiking uphill even if there doesn't appear to be a path because the best view is from the lookout at the top of the mountain which isn't marked THAT well.

 

After taking in the views, we wandered down the hill towards Kasjuni Beach on the far side of the park from downtown Split.  It took forever to get there because the road curved in on itself a couple times because of the steepness of the mountain but the resulting beach was relaxing, sunny and beautiful - totally worth it.  Plus it probably didn't hurt to walk off all the rumpsteak I'd been consuming.  We napped for a few hours and walked back into town (there is also a bus but it only comes every 20 minutes or so and so it was quicker to walk).

 

We changed and then spent the early evening wandering the old palace ruins watching fire dancers and eating "award-winning" chocolate gelato which definitely deserved it's name.

 

 

Dinner was at Fife, a super cheap, very tasty restaurant that had been recommended by the hostel.  We ordered the goulash and gnocchi and then passed out early.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Turns out grocery shopping really works considering we woke up the next day and had leftovers!  To start off the day we decided to try the shop next to us where you can have little fish nibble at your feet to clean them.  It felt SO weird but was also fascinating.  The shop also played amazing classic American songs like Backstreet Boys and the theme song for the Neverending Story.  So random.

 

This time we decided to head the opposite direction to try out Bacvice Beach which is apparently a little more "touristy."  Turns out this was my favorite "beach" of the trip.  It's kind of set up like a pool with lounge chairs on concrete around the edge but then has a small strip of sandy beach at one end.  The nice part is that it was deep along the concrete edges so you could just jump right as opposed to wading out over painful rocks.  We spent most of the day here although the food options are kind of crappy.

The way back consisted of me buying purple sneakers (yup I'm a shoe whore), drinking beers and seeing the old palace.

We also touched the big toe of the statue of Archbishop Grgur Ninski just outside the Bronze Gate.  Grgur Ninski was one of the first bishops to speak in Croatian during services instead of Latin (Pope was NOT happy about that).  Apparently touching his big golden toe brings good luck.

For dinner we hit up San Giovanni's where, you guessed it, I had the grilled platter of rump steak, bacon, peppers, onion and eggplant with a bottle of Pejalvasac wine.  It was sooo good and really filling.

We rounded out the night at Charlie's Bar which was TERRIBLE.  A Spaniard told Lil Sass she sounded "Like a Mexican" in a really disparaging voice and a really drunk Irish kid kept following me around the bar and finally got mad at me for not talking to him.  Apparently dodging through people to get away wasn't enough of a hint.

The only highlight of the night was Lil Sass complimenting a guy on his shirt to which he replied with "Let's swap shirts" to which she replied "Ok."  He then retorted with "You American girls can't hold your piss" to which Lil Sass responded by tearing off her shirt and handing it to him.  Wide eyed he took his off and I got an amazing picture of the trade.

Seeing as that was the ONLY highlight we left and went home.  This ended our time in Split.  I'm sure part of the depression was the Australian withdrawal we were both going through.  Split just can't compete when you are coming from Hvar.  However, it is a beautiful city and definitely should be a stop on anyone's Croatian adventure.