Dubrovnik

The day trip into Dubrovnik started with a boat ride along the coast. We went into the lovely town of Cavtat and sat on the dock and waited with some other tourists for the vessel to arrive so we could hop on for calm trip through the Adriatic. It was a very nice trip through the deep, blue (I had never seen such a beautiful blue) water and it gave us another perspective of the coast we had driven down a few days before. It was nice because the boat wasn't over-crowded so we were able to walk onto the front of the boat to watch Dubrovnik come closer and closer until we arrived in a picturesque port of the old, walled section of the city. As we entered the big, old walls there was a gelato stall which we couldn't go past without stopping in for a taste. It was hot and we needed some refreshing - that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

Cavtat

As we gobbled down our tasty gelato, we strolled through the alleyways and had a gander at the charming shop fronts and restaurants filled with equally wide-eyed tourists who had probably just finished their very own serving of delicious, icy treats. It was a very beautiful, old town and no matter how many times we walked around the same little streets, there was still new things to discover.

Aurysia eating 1 of 2 gelati from that day.

I would happily play basketball on this court. What a nice view!

Since we had all day to spend in Dubrovnik we decided to have a long and relaxing lunch at an Italian Pizzeria where we had a tasty, Italian espresso... mmmmmm.... delicious! We also had pizza but it wasn't good enough to rave about. Pizza was the most common thing that my fellow vegetarian Julian and I could eat on this trip so we had a lot of it.

Once our lunch had settled we thought we might take a stroll on the wall that surround the old town. We purchased our tickets which were expensive enough for me to reconsider the walk but I was convinced to go up and I'm glad I did. The views were spectacular!

We took some more great advice from the lady at the apartment and went to a fantastic, vegetarian restaurant for dinner. We made sure that we made a reservation earlier on in the day to secure a table in this rather small, extremely popular vegetarian oasis called "Nishta". I can't begin to tell you how excited I get when I go to a place where I can eat EVERYTHING on the menu without having to worry about whether there is going to be some part of an animal in it. Nishta had all different kinds of styles of food - Indian, Mexican, Italian.... We ordered a selection of plates to share so we could all have a taste of the delicious food. Mmmmmm... I was a very happy girl that night.

Before we were ready to find the bus to go home, we searched for a gelato shop for a bit of dessert to finish the night off perfectly.

We arrived back in Cavtat on the local bus and searched for our trusty hire car but whilst walking to the car we heard the heart-wrenching sound of a tiny kitten meowing for his mummy. There was a larger cat hanging around our car which we thought was it's mother so I tried to do a Steve Irwin or RSPCA rescue worker (whichever you prefer) and reunite the two cats. After playing a bit of 'cat and mouse' (me being the cat and the cat being the mouse - oh confusing), I finally caught the cute-but-mangy kitten and took it to the larger kitty. It wasn't a very charming reunion because as it turns out, the bigger cat probably wasn't the mummy cat. There was much spitting and hissing and surprisingly the bigger cat was the wimpy one who ran away first.

So here's me holding the moth-eaten kitty trying not to catch ring worm or fleas, not knowing what to do with my newfound friend. There were lots of upturned boats lying around in the car park - it being a seaside town and all, which looked like a nice hiding place for a tiny, vulnerable kitten. I went to the nearest one and encouraged the little furball to make a nice little home for itself out of the elements but I think I made quite an impression on the stray because it decided that I was it's new mother. It did more of it's heart-wrenching cries as I walked away and it began to follow me until another sucker came along and started to pat it. I don't think it was particularly attached to me persay, it just wanted anyone to love it. Awwwww.... That night I was doing a little bit of reading on a travel forum and found out that it is quite a common story in seaside towns of Croatia. There must be an abundance of stray kitties trying to make tourists fall in love with them.