June 29, 2009 – Day 186 – Sibenik, Croatia

A good base for visiting the Krka National Park, Sibenik is only an hour or so away from Biograd. When we arrived, we were scooped up immediately by a very flamboyant man with a bad toupee and a cheap room to rent. It was decent enough for a couple nights and after settling in, we set out for “Skradin,” the bus stop for visiting Krka. It was maybe 20 minutes from town and dropped us right at the park entrance.

Path through the park

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May 4, 2009 – Day 130 – Tinos, Greece

Stepping off the ferry onto Tinos, we quickly sized up the tiny isle. It was perfect for us. Despite the cold weather and fierce winds with clouds threatening rain at any second, we were ecstatic at everything that lay before us. It was the white buildings with classic Greek blue shutters and rich pink flowers in the window sill, small streets winding uphill and between buildings, the absence of people and thus, the absence of noise. Everything came together to make us forget the crummy weather and appreciate the misty fog passing across the highest mountains and ancient stone walls and the numerous dovecotes left over from Venetian rule around the 18th and 19th centuries. We spent the day driving around in our tiny rented Yaris admiring the charming countryside of the island.

Our hotel

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Day 20: Flores, Guatemala

Another rainy day but we went to Tikal anyway. We arrived by shuttle around 7:30AM. A guide is not required (they cost extra and go very, very slow…but they do give lots of interesting facts) but it’s good to buy a map for a couple bucks when you purchase your ticket ($20US). It turned out to be even more spectacular than on a sunny day. Read the rest of this entry »

Day 19: Flores, Guatemala

After a pretty awful, smelly bus ride we pulled into Santa Elena… at six in the morning… in the rain. Funny enough but the local market was already bustling, rain be damned! As soon as we got off the bus we were accosted by the usual hoard of yelling taxi drivers. We grabbed the first one and headed across the causeway into Flores (an island town in the middle of a lake). Read the rest of this entry »