Borders crossed: 2.5
I have to say 2.5 as I technically only drove the car across the Bosnia Herzegovina border to turn around as they didn’t let me in. Twice. Boo. (I tried to sneak across what I thought would be an unmanned border in a tiny little village. I was wrong, it was still manned. Damn it) There’s something very annoying about border officials - if your paperwork doesn’t look exactly like they are expecting it to look then they wont budge. No common sense required or needed for this job. *ahem*
The other 2 countries on my travels were smashing. Croatia really was like their marketing spin “The mediterranean as it once was” (not that I knew what it was once like…but it’s how I imagine Cyprus was before it got spoilt by feckless tourists. D’oh!)
Slovenia made a lovely change from the rocky coastline that mostly makes up Croatia (a very clever wheeze to grab all of the coastline there, guys) it has an almost Alpine feel about it. And it was good.
Bestest of all was getting to tick off 2 capitals from my list. Much yayness. I love capital cities, so deciding to go and try and visit them all in my lifetime was a very good idea. Anyway, Ljublyana and Zagreb are now officially ticked.
Ljublyana reminded me of Amsterdam actually, with it’s bridges and weird little streets (only without loads of cafes with people staring at shiny stuff inside) and if I’d had more time there, I would have definately considered going on a boat trip there. As it was, I was trying to rush to see a big tank museum…only to find it closed, so I could have gone on that boat ride after all. Damn you hindsight.
Zagreb felt totally different - a big cosmopolitan city full of big shops and monsterously oversized blue trams. A fact that scared me quite a lot as I found myself driving in Zagreb during the rush hour and got caught on the tram lines behind traffic. It did a tram-like bbbbbbring at me, but there wasn’t actually anywhere I could move to, so I just hastily avoided eye contact with the tram driver - hoping that he/she didn’t scratch the hire car (a month old Opel Astra, since you asked)
One evening in the hotel I even managed to gate crash a German welcome party by just quietly sitting and smoking a fag with my beer. It was great, as they were handing out free champagne (not normally included in the free bar thingy during the evening meal). I managed to grab not one but 2 glasses of the stuff as they went around and also avoided any tricky questions in German, which is always good. I did, however have to watch (at the back of the group) a dubious looking woman giving an equally looking dodgy looking german chap a handjob under his bum bag. Good god, why is it always me who notices these things?!! It was at that point that I thought the free champagne just wasn’t worth it, so I staggered off to bed.
So anyways, the flight home was the scariest of my life. Somewhere nearish London, the plane suddenly just drops out of the air. No warning no nothing. Gaaaaah! It must have only been for a couple of seconds, max but it was enough for me to think “shit, I’m gonna fucking die on this plane”.
I floated up in my chair, held in only by the seat belt and people were screaming up and down the plane. I could see people’s hair thrown up in the air, and I also watched mesmerized at one woman’s drink as it wafted up to the overhead cabins, like it does in films about space. After that, the plane rapidly climbed again and I made a mental note to check as to whether or not I’d made a will (I haven’t).
Luckily, we landed fine and I took some very happy steps onto the ground again. On leaving the airport I can honestly say I’ve never seen so many police everywhere - it was quite eary actually.
When I got my car back from the parky-carky place I pulled out, naturally onto the right hand side of the road, only to be screamed at by my passenger. I thought I should probably take it easier and engage brain.
Thankfully I did, as we ended up in a traffic jam only a couple of minutes out of the airport. The reason became obvious soon enough - an RTA at the bus stop. Only, they hadn’t moved the body yet. I’ve never seen a body close up before - not a real one and the image has burnt itself onto my retinas. The poor guy must have been college age, and at the bus stop were lots of school children and other collegey types all stood quietly as if in a trance. There were 3 or 4 other cars all mashed up, and I suppose it had only just happened - the ambulance was there, but was treating the people who needed it (I don’t supposed the splatted guy actually needed anything).
It was quite a strange day all in all.
Moosh
Tags: Bosnia Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, Planes falling out the sky
