Grown-up Gap Yah

Lake Bled is famously gorgeous. We’d seen the pictures, and our daughter Elin recommended a visit to Bled after staying there while inter-railing. To be honest, we’ve seen a lot of lovely turquoise lakes on this journey, Lake Bled was going to have to go some to out-lake Plitvice and Ohrid.

Lake Bled is indeed bloody gorgeous. Like Plitvice, the waters are an almost glowy blue green, and there’s an idyllic little island in the middle, to add to its photogenic appeal. Other lakes are as, or more,  beautiful, But I think what makes Bled special is the way the lake is integrated into the life of the resort, without being spoiled or overwhelmed. 

People ran, walked and cycled on a footpath that fringed the very edges of the lake. There were competitive rowers from the Olympic club, more pedestrian kayakers and paddleboarders, and swimmers and sunbathers in the small beach areas. There were also cafes serving enormous cream cakes and waterside bars where people seemed to sip Aperol Spritzes around-the-clock. In late May, it was simply idyllic- in August, I imagine it may be rather more manic. 

Our campsite was across the lake from the town of Bled. We walked the 6km circumference of the lake, joined the sundown crew in a bar, and Mr G rowed me out to the island. I can confirm that his two years in the Christchurch second eight did not go to waste! We made it to the island in record time, with effortlessly professional coxing from me on the lines of ‘err, no, can’t you go a bit more that way.’

Quick campsite comment:

We stayed at Camping Bled. It was in a perfect lakeside location, near a beach, jetty and boathouse.

The good bits: This was a great, and very popular campsite. We were glad we’d booked, because there were queues of campervans and RVs waiting for a spot. The facilities were excellent, and there was a super restaurant and bar area that served  delicious coffees, pastries and meals.

The bad bits: It was on the pricier side, but location, location, location. At €40 a night it was certainly worth the extra Euros.

In a close contest, Ljubljana has effortlessly leapfrogged Dubrovnik to take poll position in the race to become our best-European-city-for a romantic-mini-break. It’s so lovely I’m even going to forgive its fiendishly tricky spelling.

The Slovenian capital is a relaxed but buzzy little city. It’s incredibly easy to get around, with such an excellent bus system that I never once whined to Mr G that we should get an Uber. That’s rare. It was busy but not rammed and the elegant streets were lined with gorgeous cafes, bars and restaurants spilling onto the pavements and canal sides. Mr G rates Slovenia as his top holiday country so far, and it’s difficult to disagree. It seems a little bit more adventurous and off the beaten track than France or Italy, but it’s more cosmopolitan, glamorous and easy to negotiate than Albania or North Macedonia. And the roads are surfaced.

We followed the usual ‘ What to do in one day in Ljubljana’ itinerary. Luckily, it wasn’t arduous, with plenty of scheduled take time to have a coffee overlooking the canal stops. If you’re after a lazy city break, book now! We had one of our best days of the trip so far, while staying in a city camp site next to a playground, which underlines just how fabulous Ljubljana is.

Quick campsite comment:

We stayed at Camping Resort Ljubljana. In the city but about 4 miles from the old town. 

The good bits: It was a leafy, green site on the riverside in Ljubljana with a bus-stop near the entrance. It took less than ten minutes to get into the centre. There were pretty spacious pitches, electric and Wi-Fi, very helpful staff and clean showers with a rather swanky dressing table area and hairdryer in the ladies’.

The bad bits: It’s city-centre camping, which always has a bit of a municipal feel. The first night was quiet and chilled, but on the second night an enormous American uni group arrived. There was much wandering around the site with beers, jumping on the kids’ trampoline and squealing on the merry-go-round. Just one of those things, but not something that me and Mr G are very relaxed about!!! We collapsed pop top, chairs, table and BBQ and high-tailed it to the other side of the site. 

Being geographically challenged, Mr G and I hadn’t heard of the Plitvice Lakes. We saw pictures of the extraordinary network of otherworldly coloured lakes and waterfalls and thought they were a real undiscovered gem. I’d imagined the two of us kayaking alone on the limpid azure waters. Naïve numpties. It’s true that the Plitvice National Park is a stunning natural phenomenon- but it’s about as undiscovered as Lake Windemere on a sunny August bank holiday. 

It turns out that, when it comes to Plitvice, us, the Croatian tourist board, UNESCO and a GAZILLION tourists from across the globe are in the know. Luckily it is a slickly run tourist attraction. There’s timed entry tickets, carefully maintained paths, colour coded hiking routes, immaculate cafes, and electric boats and trains to shuffle you between locations. If Disney did lakes in Croatia, this is what they’d aspire to. 

At the beginning it felt like we were shuffling in single file, with chaos ensuing whenever anyone paused to take a selfie. However, we chose one of the longer hiking routes and pretty soon, we were away from the madding crowd and able to soak up the scenery. The carefully managed tourism has some real benefits- there was absolutely no rubbish and the natural environment was beautifully preserved. Definitely worth a visit, hidden gem or not. 

Big waterfalls, small tourist

Quick campsite comment: 

We stayed at Camping Plitvice, a very smart resort three miles from the national park. 

The good bits: It’s brand new and IMMACULATE. It’s less like a campsite and more like a hotel with pitches. There’s a gorgeous swimming pool, bar, excellent restaurant and fabulous shower facilities. It is by far the poshest campsite I’ve ever seen. 

The bad bits: It’s expensive. Very. At €48 a night it’s double the average campsite price so far. It’s also next door to a building site ( I suspect they’re extending the site) and we were rudely awoke by a jack hammer attempting to break through the rocky sub soil. Me, Mr G and the van are all covered by a fine dusting of limestone- but it’s heritage limestone so that’s OK.

After two months nipping through various countries across Europe, the Hungarian authorities have finally caught up with us! Our daughter Elin is at home, checking our mail in case something important arrives, and today it did. Our very first fine of the road trip- for very slack purchasing of a vignette to cover tolls in Hungary.

Fugitive, hiding from the law

Now, I’m not one to apportion blame, but Mr G really is officer in charge of vignettes. The problem is, in his eyes the teal-mobile is a passenger vehicle that carries less than seven people. In the eyes of the Hungarian po-po it’s a van. It’s much more than just a van, but it’s probably not worth arguing the toss. We have an £18.91 fine for driving with the wrong vignette PLUS £44.45 for administration in the UK. So very annoying.

I’ve rearranged the spreadsheet, so that the ‘Tolls and péages’ column is now ‘Tolls, péages and fines.’ We’re all ready for the Czech, Austrian, Bulgarian and Turkish summons to arrive!

We headed to the Dalmatian coast to celebrate Mr G’s birthday. Luckily, the Croatian powers that be had invested in a brand new motorway. So, after swinging down the mountains on hairpin bends, we zipped to the Split area in record time. With the empty roads and statuesque mountains, Mr G felt like he was a driving god in an episode of Top Gear. 

Birthday boy

Croatia is unbelievably well set up for camping and van-life. There are sites everywhere and they’re mostly massive, with several pools, waterslides and a selection of restaurants. That’s fabulous if you’ve got a family, but we were looking for something that was a bit less of a megalopolis. The Facebook group ‘Dubbed-out’ has been an excellent source of information, as well as a big drain on finances because of all the Amazon click through recommendations. Someone pointed us in the direction of Trogir, a UNESCO World Heritage village with a castle, winding streets, turquoise seas and a marina. Heaven. and proof positive that no amount of aimless Googling can beat a personal recommendation.

I panic bought Mr G a bespoke boat tour for his birthday. We’ve been together so much, there’s been no chance to nip out to the shops- desperate times! I couldn’t quite stretch to £3,000 for a yacht, but we had a fabulous day island hopping in a little white speed boat with our skipper Nano. He even came to pick us up from the jetty on our campsite.

We snorkelled in a turquoise lagoon, dived down to a sunken boat, pulled onto a jetty to have sea bass and rose for lunch, and visited picture-perfect harbours that I’d sailed to back in 1985. We also nearly froze our butts off being buffeted by the wind when slightly damp after swimming, but no pain no gain! It really was a pressie for me more than for Mr G, but he didn’t dare say so.

Quick campsite comment: 

We stayed at Autocamp Rozac, just outside Trogir. 

The good bits: A great location on a small peninsula, so most sites had a sea view. We managed to get a front line spot, which cost €24 including electric and WiFi.  We walked into Trogir in half an hour and there were  supermarkets nearby. The site had great facilities and a small restaurant that was pretty good. 

The bad bits: The pitches were a bit higgledy-piggledy with no hedges, so not very private but we liked the relaxed vibe. The second loo block was closed, so we had a bit of a schlep to go- but it wasn’t a big deal.

We had more than the usual level of insurance shenanigans with Bosnia and Herzegovina. Apparently, UK insurers are meant to cover the region, but ours don’t according to the policy documents and most of the border crossings don’t have an insurance office. Cue endless Googling, route planning, and calls to Admiral. At one point I just huffed to Mr G ‘well if we can’t go, we’ll just miss Mostar out, it’s only an effing bridge!’

Fortunately Admiral came up trumps, because it turns out that Mostar is much more than a bridge. The old town is gorgeous, the river is such a glorious shade of turquoise that all my pictures look like l’ve used a filter, and the bridge towers over it looking magnificent. 

The iconic Ottoman bridge and Mostar old town were destroyed during the Balkan conflict and, despite great restoration the city is still scarred by bullet holes. On this journey, we’ve seen plenty of war damage in great cities- but it felt particularly poignant because the wars in the former Yugoslavia are so recent. The Museum of War and Genocide in Mostar was compelling and harrowing. It was run by survivors and showed images, objects and personal experiences of mass murder, concentration camps, ethnic cleansing and neighbour turning on neighbour. All less than thirty years ago.

We ate in the evening sunshine overlooking the bridge, a delicious and enormous traditional Bosnian mixed grill platter. The reviews on Trip-advisor were appalling, but we’ve found the restaurant reviews more and more unreliable. We’re increasingly old-school and just go to places that look OK, without obsessive research. This is VERY unusual for me. 

Quick campsite comment:

We stayed at Camping Neretva on the river just outside Mostar. It was in a beautiful but blustery spot on the river. We walked the 2 miles into Mostar and back, although allegedly taxis are available for around €4. 

The good bits: Clean, comfortable site with great views, clean showers and loos, decent WiFi and what looked like a nice bar and restaurant. €20 a night, all in.

The bad bits: It was so windy we couldn’t put up our pop-top and the chairs blew away! It’s not clear if that was unlucky, or whether the geography creates a wind tunnel effect. The restaurant was closed when we were there. 

We’ve managed thirteen consecutive days in the van, smashing our previous record. Despite lovely sites and gorgeous weather we were starting to feel a little vanned out. The bed seemed to have shrunk and Mr G was developing manspreading, starfish tendencies at night. I was perfect, of course. 

Before tensions rose to Balkans-in-the-nineties levels we decided to cash in our two Hotels.com rewards nights for a little R&R in Dubrovnik. We booked the Royal Blue, it was the sort of place I wouldn’t usually go for, a bit big and resort-hotel-y. But it had parking outside, we only needed to supplement €50 a night, the views were extraordinary and it had ENORMOUS beds with the softest pillows in the world.

I’d sailed around this area when it was still Yugoslavia. The scenery and architecture were just as lovely, but the atmosphere was a bit grim. There were police roaming the harbour with machine guns and the restaurants were legally required to serve the same limited fayre. 

We were blown away by Dubrovnik today. The city has bounced back after the terrible bombing during the war and is probably the loveliest I have ever visited. The coastline is equally stunning and the people were delightful. We had the same conversation with every waiter. Something along the lines of – where you from? Ahhh I know Leeds. Leeds United. You’re doing very badly this season!

Montenegro was the fourteenth country on our #IceColdinIstanbul adventure and after some wild and woolly times in the Balkans, it’s all started to get much glossier. The roads have surfaces and signs, the restaurants are stylish, and the yachts are plentiful. Of course, that’s reflected in the prices, so expect some professional spreadsheet manipulation over the next few days. 

Kotor Bay was in our guidebook’s top ten Eastern European highlights, and rightly so. Byron said:

‘At the birth of our planet, the most beautiful encounter between the land and the sea must have happened at the coast of Montenegro. When the pearls of nature were sown, handfuls of them were cast on this soil.’

He’s a much better writer than me, so I’m going to leave it at that and add a few photos.

Our campsite was tucked away on the other side of the gulf from Kotor in a small fishing village called Morinj. It meant we were away from the cruise ships and much of the hustle and bustle of the bay. It also meant there was another unexpected ferry to get across the bay, but it was a slick operation, only cost €8 and was a much more exciting way to arrive at our destination.

Camping Naluka was in a beautiful spot where the river meets the gulf. I’m not going to lie, my bottom lip started quivering when all the waterfront pitches were occupied- but I got over myself. It really was a gorgeous tranquil site with stunning scenery all around.

The site was full of German RVers of a certain age. They were extremely friendly and chatty but spoke no English at all. Every day seemed like my O-level German oral exam, I was waving my arms around expansively and digging out vocab from the very depths of my memory. They spoke to me rather like Englishmen abroad, slowly and loudly and had rather glazed expressions when I expostulated in reply.

We were camping, but please don’t think that me and Mr G were keeping it real. The village had a chic waterside beach bar and a fabulous fish restaurant that’s been frequented by Novak Djokavic, Ralph Fiennes, Gerard Butler and the legend that was Bruce Forsyth. It was a real Brucie Bonus for us, we only went there because it was next door to the campsite and were shocked to enjoy the best meal of our entire journey so far. Beautiful fresh fish, simply but elegantly prepared. It reminded me of one of my favourite places, Passos in Portugal. If you’re ever in Kotor Bay try Ćatovića Mlini. They’ve got a helipad, so easy to get to if you haven’t got a campervan!!!

 Ćatovića Mlini

Quick campsite comment: 

We stayed at Autocamp Naluka in Morinj.

The good bits: Roomy pitches, reliable WiFi, clean facilities and good hot showers. The very best bit was the location, we could walk in minutes to great restaurants, the beach and a mini-market. It was a very reasonable €20 a night.

The bad bits: No laundry, lots of people staying for several weeks so you may struggle to get a waterside pitch.

Shkoder is a pretty, historic town in Northern Albania. It’s a convenient stopping-off point for the evocatively named Accursed Mountains and for Montenegro. We were tempted by the Albanian Alps, but the weather forecast promised rain, rain and more rain in the highlands, so after a whistle-stop tour of Shkoder we planned to head on to Kotor Bay. 

Shkoder has a lake, river, old town and an Illyrian castle, but it really seems to be the place people rest and recharge en route to somewhere else. We had a lovely time marching up the hill to the castle, sampling some delicious Albanian food and wine, doing yet more laundry and lolling by the absurdly OTT pool at the Camping Legjenda. 

Quick campsite comment:

Camping Legjenda’s web presence lives up to its name. It has legendary reviews and was strongly recommended by Rino in Ohrid. As a campsite, it does tick a lot of boxes, but is maybe a victim of its own success. 

The good bits: It’s in a great location, close to town and in the shadow of the imposing Castle Rozafa. There’s an extraordinary pool, a cocktail/snack bar, a restaurant and excellent showers, loos and laundry. There’s a reliable onsite taxi, which was fantastic and the price at €17 a night was good value. 

The bad bits: It’s very busy and the vans are packed pretty closely together. There were big hoardings promoting tours, and large packaged groups of European RVers having presentations and meeting for organised events. There weren’t dance classes in the Hawaiian Ballroom but it was all a bit Hi-de-Hi for our tastes!

In the evening two coaches spewed around 70 teenagers on a school trip to squeeze into dorm rooms and glamping pods. They had a lovely time playing music, laughing, chatting and running around by the pool and in the bar until the early hours. We packed up before breakfast and headed onto Montenegro thankful for the flexibility of #vanlife! Next stop Kotor Bay.