Photography
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Leaving Izmir, Loving Selcuk
Usually, it goes like this: “Hello madam hello sir, where you from?” “England”. “Ooohhh, England! Where from? London? Manchester?” “In the south, about 100 kilometres from London” “OK, come look in my shop, I have best prices for leather, handbags, watches”. However in Izmir it goes more like this: “Hello madam hello sir where you from?” “England”. “Ooohhh, England! Are you here for the teeth?” “Errr…what? No!” “Many people come from England for teeth work. Izmir very good for dentist”. “Really?” “Yes. I am a dentist. I also have shop with best prices for leather. Come look in my shop”. Our time in Izmir is up, so it’s back to…
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Merchants, Mosques & Masks: 3 Days In Izmir
Mexico, Thailand and Turkey. Of all the countries we’ve visited so far, those are our top three on the international cuisine league table, and our first night in Izmir posts a huge reminder of why Turkey is up there. But first the day starts with a 2am alarm, a small hours taxi pick up and a red eye flight out of a very quiet Gatwick. Once in Izmir, it’s a train and a metro to Basmane station and a trudge with our backpacks to our next bed in the heart of the old town. We chose Hotel L’Agora for its unique location: a riad style building right in the middle…
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Escaping COVID: Our Next Move
Our regular readers will know that we retired at the end of 2019 to pursue our long held dream of full time travel. Unfortunately the obvious intervened and we were forced to abandon our trip after just 7 weeks of what should have been endless exploration. UK lockdown followed. As the slight easing of restrictions started, we took full advantage of the so called travel corridors and have just returned from 5 weeks touring Croatia, which was more than fabulous. We’re now nearing the end of the 14-day quarantine which was imposed just a few days before our return from that trip. These 14 days have naturally felt pretty dull…
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Last Days In Croatia: Back In Split
For the last time until we start the journey home, we don the backpacks and trudge through the streets, this time in the half light just before dawn. Korcula rubs its eyes and awakens, swifts and swallows start to swoop and call, the Adriatic is as calm as a lake as our catamaran pulls away from the quayside. Korcula Town looks beautiful as we wave goodbye to the islands, as alluring at dawn as it is as evening falls. Just under three hours later we are in Split ferry port, breakfasting alongside the ferries for the third time in these past five weeks. It feels good to be back here.…
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Split: The Role of Hajduk
Being a big football (soccer) fan, I’ve always been fascinated by the role of a football club in cultural history: there are great histories here which tend to pass unknown to non-football fans, stories which far transcend the game itself. The reason Barcelona became so big, and the part Espanyol played in that story, is a stirring tale on its own. The history of Hajduk Split tells a parallel tale to Barcelona, in as much as, during times of extreme political oppression, the football club became a critical point of identity when such individual nationalism was prohibited. During the long years of communist rule and the enforced unification of Yugoslavia,…
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Croatian Islands: Korčula
It’s only 6.20am in sleepy Stari Grad but there’s drama at the bus station as we await our early morning ride. An irate elderly couple pull up in their car and accost two females waiting for the same bus as us; a row ensues, money changes hands and the couple speed off. We can only conclude that the two females have exited their guest house without settling their debts: how incredibly rude, if we are right. Drama over, it’s breakfast at Hvar Town port and then the early catamaran to our next island destination, Korčula, where we are met by our next host Tonci and taken to our seventh home…
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Croatia Island Hopping: On To Hvar
Our departure from Bol is so cool that we can’t stop smiling. The only boat service from Brac to Hvar is a catamaran which sails in the evening, a bit later than we would like, and with no outside deck to enjoy. But our wonderfully helpful hosts tip us off that one of the excursion boats, the Andrija, is skippered by a guy who lives on Hvar, and so, each afternoon when his excursions for the day are done, he heads home with his boat. If we can catch him, he’ll give us a lift. And so it is that we find the Andrija, cadge a cheap lift on a…
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Croatia, COVID and other tips
Entering our fourth week of this Croatia odyssey, we feel qualified to offer some advice to anyone thinking of heading out here, so here goes… COVID If you think you’d feel threatened or vulnerable due to a lack of COVID rules, then it’s probably best you stay at home. If however you feel there is some overblown mass hysteria afoot, or just want to escape the “new normal” for a while, then Croatia is for you. It’s masks on buses and trains, and inside shops and public buildings, but otherwise life is absolutely normal. Locals do have a tendency to wear the mask only over the mouth, and leave the…
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Island Hopping Croatia: Brač
Some of the inter island ferry services have been scaled back due to an expected drop in visitor numbers during COVID, so to hop from Šolta to Brač we have to go back to Split and on again from there. So it’s an early alarm, the 7:20 bus from Maslinica and the 8am ferry, breakfast in Split harbour and then a second ferry over to Supetar on the island of Brač. Brač a much bigger and more mountainous island than Šolta, in fact the third largest Adriatic island; our next billet means travelling some distance to the south of the island, and we’ve been recommended that the best option for…
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Croatia: Leaving The Mainland
Day 14 of this trip is significant, as we say goodbye to both the hire car and the mainland, and head off to indulge in a bit of island hopping for the next few weeks. So it’s our first early start in quite a while, completing the 90-minute drive back to Split before breakfast. Once again we follow the E8 road, hugging the coast alongside pretty coastal towns, sumptuous bays and alluring marinas, but there’s no time to stop and stare this morning, we have a target. Consequently it’s only a little after 9am when we pull in to Split harbour, hand back the keys to the Clio, and take…
