Cavtat, Croatia - Week 1

After an anxiety-ridden, 2-hour delay in Las Vegas, we boarded our plane for the first leg of our journey (LAS to Frankfurt, Germany).  We were nervous that the delay would cause us to miss the ongoing flight to Croatia, but at least we would be in Europe!  Knowing this would be a long flight, I spent the extra cash to get “premium” economy which normally allows for extra leg room and little more.  So when we arrived at our seats, we both felt there had been an error on our tickets.  We had “pods” like in first class!  Only 4 seats per row and they fully reclined.  I still think it was a mistake, but we quickly sat down and pretended like we belonged.  We had delicious meals with alcohol and more movie selections than on Netflix!  While we slept, the pilot put the metal to the peddle and landed the plane only 20 minutes late. 

Needless to say, we arrived in Frankfurt on Tuesday afternoon pretty rested and happy.  The onward flight to Dubrovnik was “cattle class,” but it was short so no complaints.  After Passport Security and Customs (there was no one there!), we were met by a young man holding our name on a sign and hustled off to our AirBnB apartment in the small picturesque village of Cavtat.  A very “soft” landing for us.

Cavtat (pronounced Savtat) is tucked in a harbor on the Adriatic.  It is a sleepy, one-street resort town surrounded by forests and high rocky mountains to the east.  The apartment we rented is up 52 steps from the harbor.  And the bedroom is located on the top floor (another 24 steps!).  Once our host showed us our place, we changed clothes and walked down for dinner at an outdoor restaurant on the harbor.  Beer and pizza!  (We can’t give up old habits immediately, you know.)  The next few days we walked around town, peeked into shops, read restaurant menus and hiked around a bit…just letting our bodies adjust to the new time zone and climate (lovely humidity with temperatures in the 70s and 80s).  

                                                        Steps from the harbor to our entry door

                                        Our front door and patio.  The bedroom is on the 3rd floor.

View from our bedroom window

Aqua water - On the path around the village.

Harbor-side restaurant

Overview of Cavtat

On Friday, we caught a tour to Montenegro, a small country to the south and east of Croatia.  We originally planned to stay in Montenegro for our first week, but covid restrictions and extremely high car rental rates for people over 65 (the nerve!) made us rethink that plan.  The bus tour was the perfect “plan B.”  We traveled from the jagged cliffs above Cavtat to the farmland and vineyards of southern Croatia, and finally (once over the border) to the twisty road surrounding the Bay of Kotor, our destination.  We passed many small villages with Illyrian, Venetian, Roman and Greek influences, all pasted to the sides of the limestone mountains surrounding the Bay.  We stopped at Perast, a world heritage site and considered to be the “pearl of Venetian baroque.”  It has a population of just 200 residents.  We walked through town, grabbed an ice cream and then boarded a boat for a visit to the man-made island Our Lady of the Rocks.  The boat then took us to the town of Kotor (the highlight of the trip).  Kotor is butted up against a steep cliff and at the end of the bay (or fjord).  Its Old Town is a delightful walled-city with 3,000 residents.  No streets, just narrow paths between a randomly placed collection of limestone buildings.  Yes, it was touristy.  It gave you a Disneyland feeling, but it was real.  The Old Town walls crawl right up the mountainside.  It takes 1-½ hours to walk it round trip (1,355 steps and 700 ft elevation gain).  We passed on that fun adventure and had a delightful fish lunch instead.  We still made our 10,000 steps that day.  

Kotor Walled City

                                                    Our Lady of the Rocks island in Kotor Bay

Perast, a tiny village on our way to Kotor

Roger in Perast (small village near Kotor)

Paths in Kotor

Wall and moat around the city

The wall extends far up the hillside - takes 2 hours to walk it.

On Sunday, we took a bus to nearby Cilipi (pronounced Chil-ip-e, accent on the first syllable) for a folk dancing and singing performance.  We thoroughly enjoyed the mid-day performance - traditional dress, traditional instruments, and lots of laughter.  Kathy even got to dance with one of the performers.  We returned to Cavtat to have lunch, read and later to take an afternoon swim in the Adriatic—cool, but refreshing.

The musicians and dancers

Kathy teaching one of the dancers (ha!)

A great first week!  Many people on tours accomplish in a day what we did in a week.  But like “slow food,” we enjoy “slow travel.”