Mama With Wanderlust

This morning we had some boat side services that were really unique to us.  Someone came to our Mooring ball to collect our garbage.  Also, a bakery, juice, and fruit market boat paid us a visit.

It was fun purchasing a few breakfast items this way.

Shelly was taking a ferry boat from Hvar to Split, so we got to view Hvar from the harbor.  This would be a great city to visit in the future.

Kim and Shelly

Hvar is really grand and beautiful as you can see.

We had some good wind today for sailing.

 

Ryan Heeling

One of the cool things about sailing the Croatian islands is you come around a corner and than the city appears. That is how we first experienced Milna.

Milna is a small town worth visiting.  The beach is really nice, it was around the corner from our marina and we all enjoyed swimming in it.  You just go down to the rocks along the shoreline and swim.  There are showers there to rinse off the sea water.

Milna has a big fishing presence there.  Some of the buildings in the main part of town were destroyed in 1991 during the Croatian Civil War.  Don’t let this stop you from visiting here.  The people are so friendly and we all really enjoyed this town.

We had a great dinner on the boat with the best cheese in our salad which is the brand President that is a feta cheese.  It is so creamy and delicious.

We had to do a toast with our last bites of octopus, which I totally loved.

The Wong’s and Hahler’s were in Paris before coming to Croatia, so they brought Foie Gras and Champagne.

 

We had a nice lazy morning on the boat of swimming, snorkeling, and enjoying breakfast before leaving for Vinogradisce Beach on the island of Pakleni.

Morning coffee on the boat

Our sail was great today and we saw DOLPHINS!!!!  Didn’t get a good video of them but it was so great for all of us.

We had fun on the boat.

Kimberly enjoyed sailing today and Murray even got in on the action.

Lunch on the boat

We swam in the afternoon and Kim’s sister Shelly who was in Croatia with a friend came to visit and spent the day and night with us.

In the early evening we ventured onto the island and had a cocktail at a fun bar by the marina.

We had a great dinner at Bacchaus on the island.

We had this great fish and octopus.

Another beautiful night.

Today we had an earlier start to get to the Blue Caves.  When leaving the med Mooring I learned to always check the Mooring lines that are on the boat for knots.  Somehow mine had a large knot at the end of the line and got stuck under the plank of our neighbor boat.  Thankfully no wind, so our boat did not get pushed into the neighbor boat and he was able to get it out.  It was an interesting conversation with the neighbors because we both didn’t speak each other’s native tongue.

The Blue Caves are accessed by little wooden taxi boats only.  You moor if you are in a sailboat on Mooring balls and the taxi comes and picks you up.  The other option is to take a taxi to the island and get in a long line and they taxi you out to the island.  You can not ride the dingy into the island, only the taxis can do that.

We had to wait a couple hours for a taxi to get us.  It is hard for the drivers to know who was there first, so be prepared to possibly wait a while.  The kids had a snack and swam while waiting.

The taxi came and picked us up along with a neighbor boat who was waiting a long time as well.  Everyone was excited to be on the boat over to the Caves.

Once at the entrance to the cave, you need to pay an entrance fee before you enter.  You need to duck down in the boat so that you don’t get hit in the head.  The entrance is tight and there are a few other boats in the cave circling the blue grotto.

When we exited the cave (inside the cave for about 10 minutes) our driver took us to see the original entrance to the cave.

The man who found it was a painter and crawled in to discover it.  He took us back to our boat, we quickly jumped in to the water and were off.

We then sailed to Budikovac.  The ride was stunning and we went along beautiful shoreline with huge rock walls.

Budikovac was a sweet nature preserve type setting with one home on the island that also serves as a restaurant and a vineyard. We swam in and just had a glass  of the red wine from their vineyard.  The kids had ice tea or apple juice.

We did a lot of snorkeling here and the kids discovered if you throw crumbs off the back of the boat these beautiful blue fish come and eat the crumbs.  The kids had a blast swimming with them.

The sunset here was gorgeous.

We had a late dinner under the night sky of a cold leftover seafood salad and local white wine.  Magical end to a magical day.

We had a really relaxing day in Komiza. We spent the day swimming at the public beach and some people choose to go walking up to the monastery.

Komiza

The town is really cool to walk through.  Lots of cafe’s, restaurants, a bakery, and shops.  The buildings are stone with wooden shades and doors.  Really cool iron work around some of the windows.

Boats are docked all around the marina.

In the evening we took the kids for gelato and to the beach again.

One of the things the kids really enjoy about Croatia are all the cats that are around the town.

We put the kids to bed and had a great meal prepared by Ryan and Kimberly.

So Day 2 we left the sweet city of Maslinica and sailed to the big island of Vis, the city of Komiza.

Marina in Maslinica

Leaving the marina Med Mooring Style

My job and Kimberly’s job is to let go of the two lines that are holding our boat from the stern to the marina quay.

Raising the Main Sail

This was the first day we got to have the main sail out.

The sail was 25 nautical miles and we had to sail around the island of Vis to get to Komiza.  We had a good period of miles that we were in the open sea.  The trip took about 6 hours.  The wind conditions were good for us to sail for about 3 hours.

Brad was able to sail for a good portion of the trip.

We all had our Sea Band wristbands on to help with sea sickness.  Lavender oil behind the ears also can help as well as medication. If you are prone to sea sickness, the best part of the boat to be is on top of the boat, in the center. Lay down and just rock with the boat.  There are also medications you can take if it gets severe.  Luckily, Brad, the kids, or I have not experienced it yet.

Our lesson we learned today when we med moored in Komiza is as follows.  An unused Mooring line got caught up in our propellor.  It shut the propellor off right away.  The issue at hand was someone had to dive down to check out the prop and disengage the line from the propellor.  Ryan was going to do this BUT the water is disgusting in the marina because the toilets empty into it.  For 50 Euro/400 Kuna, a diver decked out in full scuba gear (so protected from the filth) will dive down and investigate it for you.  He successfully got the line out, Ryan paid him the money while the diver was still in the water.  The diver simply dove down and swam away.  The kids thought it was hilarious that he swam away with the money.  So the lesson learned is, DO NOT GO IN THE MARINA WATER YOURSELF, PAY A DIVER.

Maslinica Marina

A view from the top of the island

The town is gorgeous.

It was Father’s Day so we went to this great restaurant with a beautiful view, Senjar.

This was a super exciting day for us.  We have been planning this sailing trip for a couple of years.  Kim and Ryan filled a bucket list wish of theirs by receiving their International Sailing Certification so that we could charter a boat ourselves.

We have to do “Med Mooring” in Croatia which means you have to back in with no dock in between and sometimes a boat on either side of you.  We were excited to leave, but also nervous because of the proximity of the boats on both sides.  We all have jobs assigned to us that we are responsible for when we arrive and depart.

We left our space successfully.

Putting up the jib sail

We sailed over to a cove and anchored to swim and have lunch.  It was so fun swimming and snorkeling.  We saw some fish and paddle boarded.

We had a minor issue that added some excitement to our first day of sailing. The jib halyard was not connected to the mast, so slowly started falling down during the day.  We had to let it down completely, but it got stuck during strong winds.  So first Kim was holding it, then Brad went up to help.  They discovered the rope had a large knot in it, so while they were trying to fix it, I went over to hold the jib and it was so hard, that Bryan had to come hold it.  Even with the two of us, we still needed one more so Kimberly came over to help pull the sheet down and tie it down.  We could not put it back up until we moored again.  It was all handled well and the communication was great.  People asked for help when needed.  The kids did great remaining calm and watching out for each other.

This was the view coming into our first marina that we had to med moor in.  We did a great job!

We met up with our friends in Trojir, Croatia.

A happy reunion for everyone.

We went out to lunch while waiting for our sailboat to get ready.

The food is amazing!!!

Old Town Trojir

Marina

Selfies by the kids

Hanna found her boat

 

Our last stop before leaving England was Uffington to see the White Horse.

The walk from the parking lot to the hill is really pretty and you of course walk through grazing fields.

Before reaching the chalk horse, you go through the grounds of where the Uffington Castle once stood.  From this view point, the royals would be able to see pretty far.

Once by the hill, it is hard to get a good view of the entire horse at once.  Because they are experiencing dry weather, parts of it were fenced off to elude erosion.

There are a ton of walking paths around there and you can get to Wayland’s Smithy .  We tried to find it, but it was further away than we had time to reach it before running off to the airport.

We all loooooooved England and will be back for sure.  One of the things I learned from Kate and Jacks is that the English will not let the weather hinder their plans.  If they are on a beach vacation and it rains, you are still out on the beach.  The one day it was rainy and cold, there were still people out.  I really admire this spirit.

Now on to Croatia!!

A work of art….Salisbury Cathedral.

You can look around the inside of this Cathedral and the entrance is donation based.

The Magna Carte document is here and on display.  It was written on sheepskin and the script is small and written in Latin.