calling from some city...

Today’s entry is going to be short, because we didn’t really do much today. After the day we had yesterday, we wanted nothing more to have a very lazy, even boring, day in Dubrovnik. We went to bed by midnight last night, and I was asleep the minute my head hit the pillow. I woke up at about 9:30 and looked to my left and Scotty was not there. Figuring he was outside on the terrace, I lounged in bed for a few more minutes as I more fully woke up. It was nice to actually wake up on my own for once, instead of an alarm clock or Scott shaking me awake. I joined him outside, where he was catching up on his blog. We had cereal for breakfast that we bought last night, and he went over some of the details that the owner had done over with him about Dubrovnik this morning while I was still sleeping. We decided to forego seeing the Old Town of Dubrovnik today and see it tomorrow, and to just relax on the beach today. The owner recommended a nearby beach that is not as crowded as the beaches in Old Town. Since we still have our rental car, it was an easy drive to a supermarket with free parking and then 10 minute walk to the beach.

We drove to the Tommy supermarket and the parking lot was absolutely packed. Apparently, everyone knows you can park there when you go to the beach. However, Scott immediately spotted a very small spot right when you drive in. In any other car, it would have been impossible to park in the small. Luckily, we had the Smartcar, and he maneuvered us in. We made a quick stop in the supermarket for sandwich supplies and water and then we headed down to the beach.

After 10 minutes, the beach came into view. It was another gorgeous site- blue-green water stretching out in front of us with cliffs rising up on three sides of us. Again, you could see houses and hotels built into the sides of the cliffs, and behind them there are even larger mountains. We noticed several rocky beaches to our left, but they looked pretty crowded. Scott said the hotel owner recommended we walk to the right. We started off, in search of another beach. After about 30 minutes of walking, we still had not come across a beach like we were expecting. There were lots of stairs that led down to rocks that people were laying out on, or cement platforms that had chairs set up for people to lay down on, but not a legitimate beach. So either we misunderstood the owner, or he meant the rocks were in fact a beach, but either way we decided just to head back to the beaches when we first walked in. It was hot out, and I wanted to lay out in the sun. Fortunately, however, I got some great picture of the view as we were walking along the coast.

We staked out a spot on the crowded beach and started baking in the sun. Since it was so hot, I immediately went in the water to cool off and then Scott went for a swim. It’s annoying that because there are only 2 of us, we have to switch off going in the water because one of us needs to watch our stuff. In some other places, we felt safe leaving things on the beach to swim together (we never carry our passports, and only take small amounts of cash with us) but the owner yesterday had told us not to carry a lot of cash or passports, because while Dubrovnik is usually very safe, it is August and there are a lot more people here than usual. Actually, he made a crack about southern Italians visiting and thus we needed to watch our stuff closely, which I didn’t appreciate too much seeing as my family is from Southern Italy, but either way it didn’t seem safe to leave our stuff unattended. 

Thus, for the rest of the day we took turns laying out in the sun and reading, and swimming. The water was very refreshing- cooler than other places we have been, but that meant it actually cooled you off when you went in. We stayed on the beach until about 6:30 or so, and then decided it was time to head back for dinner. On the way, we stopped for gelato. We got back to the car and went into the supermarket to get dinner supplies. Once back at the guesthouse, Scott made an awesome meal: bacon and onion burgers with potatoes. It was absolutely delicious; I like that we have expanded our meals from just pasta. Even though Scott’s pasta is really good, we have eaten a lot of pasta on this trip. This was something new, and as usual Scott cooked it to perfection. Tomorrow night is our last real night of the trip, so we are going out to dinner to celebrate.

Anyways right now we are in our room. Scott is singing songs from some musical as I blog and soon we’ll each take a shower and probably go to bed. It was a really relaxing day, but the sun wore us out. Tomorrow we will be exploring Dubrovnik’s Old Town and then going to a nearby island.