Are we in Italy? No, we are in Croatia, it just seems very Italian. We start the morning with an early swim in the Adriatic Sea, and put our bike gear over our wet cozzies to give us a cool ride on this hot, hot day. We’re riding the 534kms Dalmatian coast from the campsite at Rijeka in the north all the way South to Dubrovnik  (https://goo.gl/maps/nV7ingfscYC2).

It’s amazing. Sheer drops into the bluest of seas on our right and steep rocky mountains spotted with scrubland on our left. The road winds and twists, up and down, sometimes near the water, sometimes inland. We saw people randomly bobbing around in the sea, virtually at each curve of the road, over the low stone wall that separated road from sea. We whizz by, keeping cool and start looking for our own camper’s swimming paradise.  We also saw a big break in the water a good distance away. As it appeared to travel with us we reckoned it was either a whale or some dolphins. Other turbulences that we saw from high vantage points were left behind as we rode, so we reckoned these may be underwater rocks. The Italian waitress at the lunch restaurant in Senj assured us there were no whales or dolphins in the bay. A little bit of research on t’internet told us otherwise. The lunch was a very expensive Spaghetti Cabonara at 30euros, almost a 3 days food budget. We need to rein in a bit and get back to basics on the food store front. I keep a daily record of all costs and we really are trying to stick to the smallest spend possible over this 2month adventure. We’ve roughly estimated 15 euros fuel, 15 euros food and 15 euros accommodation, rounding it up to 50 euros a day. So far, so good. I wandered around Senj, searching for a sticker, and found the seaside town to be very interesting. New constructions added to old and clearly a place that had been severely damaged in WW2.

We found our camping/swimming  paradise at camp Sibuljina, where the bright alert friendly receptionist locked the office and personally escorted us to ‘the best site in the camp’. It certainly was! We could fall out of the tent into the sea. We travel with two pairs of shoes each, boots for riding and our trusted Keen Sandals for everything else. They are great for swimming as they help us float and keep nasty things from stabbing our soles. The shallow waters of this pebbled seaside were cluttered with large black sea urchins. Hopping carefully from pebble to pebble, we cross the danger zone and flop into the perfectly temperatured water. Our site faced the sea and the promenade, which encourage friendly folk to stop and chat, discuss bikes and what to see and where to go.

The next day’s ride was just as glorious, stopping for a swim and picnic on the island of Rogoznica. The coastline is stunning, the roads fabulous and very little traffic. Speed limits are a bit restrictive, being 70kms most of the way, but occasionally 90kms/hour. At one point on a straight stretch, which was 70kms hr, we had a big flashy car ‘pushing’ us, so B drifted to the right and let him overtake on the dotted line, no problem. Unfortunately for him there was a copcar in the layby out of sight around the corner who captured him with his radar. We rode on by steadily at 70kms/hr, feeling a bit bad that we had waved him on making it easy to overtake (and speed). Feeling thankful it wasn’t us we started to look for campsites, the first one too steep, second not near the sea, third one too expensive and the fourth one at Sutikla, just right. We keep our cozzies on all day, so it’s easy to park, pitch and swim. We join the throngs of ‘promenaders’ along the beach front and restaurant area before settling in for another cosy camp.

There is a 9kms stretch of land dividing north and south Croatia. It is where Bosnia-Herzegovina owns a bit of coastline. Talk goes that if we cannot get across on our bike, with our white ‘green paper’ we then may need to catch a boat that transports vehicles across this little break in the boundary. We’ve heard the queues are long and the guards are a bit moody. Taking no chances, and because the border post is 150kms away, and we have a site already booked a bit beyond Dubrovnik, a further 50kms, we want to be there before 10 am. This means a very early pack up and push-off at 5.30 am. It normally takes us one and half hours to get going so by 7am we are ready tackle Bos-Herz. None of the stories were true, we got smiling border guard, who just waved us through and we had a fabulous breakfast in Bos-Herz for 3Euros. Yes, they take euros, but are not part of the EU.

Re-entering Croatia was just as easy and we got to camp Kate way ahead of schedule, with enough time for a ride around the city of Dubrovnik and a pre-lunch beer and chips, followed by an afternoon swim and snooze. 24 years ago, when I moved from South Africa to the UK, I teamed up with a work colleague. We are still in touch and with the help of social media we have arranged to meet up in Dubrovnik square. Their ship-cruise schedule and our bike-cruise schedule have coincided by about 3hours. We have a wonderful hour celebrating our 24 year friendship over another beer and plate of chips, before their tour guide waves her flag and we say farewell.

Windy gusts blew the tarpaulin and poles down in the night, even though we are tucked into a bank of bushes.  Guy ropes seem to stretch when wet, flap in the wind and then the pegs work their way loose. B improvised with a couple of bungees, which did the job as they give more flexibility whilst at the same time keeping the tension when the wind blows. We’re having a four day break from touring as more friends are arriving by plane from the UK this afternoon. These are friends from 37 years ago and for the past 6 years we have spent some part of the June holidays with them somewhere around Europe. We do the WALL in Dubrovnik city, have a sunset supper beach picnic and get shaken up by an earthquake registering 3.5! We swim and swim and walk and walk and talk and talk and laugh and laugh.

Day 51 dawns with thunder and lightning, but nevertheless we need to pack and go. Its June 29th and we have 5 days to get back to France to fetch our grandchildren for their annual holiday with Ouma and Oupa. We know it’s at least 750 kms to Trieste in north Italy, so another early set off at 7am. We feel confident about the Bos-Herz crossing and stop again at the cheap and tasty breakfast café. When we were there 4 days ago, B had taken out his stylo-pen that he uses to type  with on his android phone. He had written a few messages/mails at breakfast, but when we got to Dubrovnik he could not find his pen. A finger-pen, being not so easy, makes this e-pen rather valuable and it is NEW, because he’d lost one in Thailand earlier in the year. They are not cheap to replace. The lovely breakfast lady remembered us and produced the pen, along with the breakfast. Whew!! B is so lucky. We take the coastline/ mountain road as far as Senj, where we find a charming camp site on the beach. More swimming, splashing and a presentation of Slivovitz by a German neighbour and his South African son-in-law both on 650’s ended a very pleasant 474km ride that day. We branched off onto the highway the next day and rode in appalling cross winds the 429 kms from Senj to Bologna in one go. But that’s another story https://goo.gl/maps/grEWzuffBh42