More than a hundred and one

And then I headed to Croatia. Dubrovnik was my first stop. It's actually pretty close to Kotor. Just over 2 hours on the bus and a chunk of that is spent at border control. The coastline between the border and Dubrovnik is littered with tiny towns only about 5 km apart. They're all squeezed between mountains and ocean so don't have anywhere to grow except sideways so you mostly go straight from one town to another. Sometimes the you are leaving sign was on the same post as the you are entering sign. Dubrovnik itself is pretty big though. I got in about 5pm and got picked up at the bus station by the hostel I had booked to stay at including a bit of a tour of that part of the city along the way. Had some nice conversation with the only other person staying in the whole hostel. I only had the one day in Dubrovnik so I started early. Left my bags at the bus station and walked to the old town. It turned out to be a lot further than it looked on my map, especially in new shoes. But I found it eventually and took the cable car up the hill for amazing views of the old town. Though in some ways it was more impressive up close. It looks a lot smaller in the pictures from the cable car than it actually is. The city walls are massive. Definitely some of the most impressive walls I've seen. You can walk all the way around them too which I did later. It's really amazing. I don't seem to have words to describe it. I took a heap of photos but they are all stuck on my camera where you can't see them.
So I did the main sights of Dubrovnik and then walked back to the bus station to catch the 5pm bus to Split. Turns out there isn't a 5 pm bus on Saturdays but there was one at 6 so it wasn't a big deal.
And then I got to Split which was all lit up with christmas lights and full of people. I've been a few places lately that are very touristy but very seasonal and are sort of quiet at this time if year. Not Split though. Granted the hostel I was staying at was still pretty much empty (I've gotten used to having an entire dorm to myself. Not sure how I'll manage when everything is packed for christmas) but the city was still a busy place. I guess it was all Dalmatians (being the coast of Dalmatia). Even the next day, the dreaded Sunday, was packed with people. I even stumbled across a square with a stage where groups of little girls were dancing. The lack of coordination of 5 year olds is awesome.
So I wandered the city and got into the Christmas spirit. Found a statue that must be of a magician. But the map said it was some saint. I also did the less fun hiding in my room trying to figure out where I'm going next. I hadn't decided what I was doing after I left Split and really had to do some proper planning. But I also went out after dark to enjoy the christmas lights some more. Most of the places before Croatia had kind of pathetic christmas lights. That's the best part of a winter christmas is having more hours of dark in which to enjoy lights.
The next day I went on a short day trip to Omiš. A girl I met in Athens said it was amazing. It definitely had potential but seemed to be mostly under construction. I headed back fairly early but don't specifically remember what I did with my afternoon. I think just wandering the market and the palace some more.
This morning I got all of my stuff organised. It spread a surprisingly long way in 3 days. That's the problem with not having to share the space with anyone. So that took a while. But since there wasn't anyone there I didn't have to worry about check out time. Once I was sorted I went to climb the hill and check out the city panorama. Not a bad view. I could have climbed higher but my lungs were not impressed with the damp it-might-rain air so I went back down and bought a train ticket instead. I got funny looks from the people at the train station for buying the ticket 4 hours early but I'm getting low on Croatian kuna and don't want to have to get more money out until I'm back to Euros so I wanted to know how much I had left after getting the ticket. Answer: probably not enough. Depends how much a ticket from Zagreb to Ljubljana costs. It's shorter than this trip which usually means cheaper but it's international which usually means more expensive so we'll see. Then I went to the grocery store (so exciting) because food is a necessity on a 6 hour train ride.
And now I'm 4 hours in and there's nothing to watch out the windows because it's too dark and the guy 2 seats ahead who was making muscles at himself in the window got off at the last stop. So I guess I'll go back to my book.
Coming up next: Zagreb, Slovenia and Vienna.