by Justin
Split is a beautiful place where an ancient palace stretches out to touch a large port, and spires reach into the sky. This palace was ruled by Diocletian in the Third Century. Despite how old it is, the palace is so well preserved that it …
The weather on day two in Plitvice Lakes was the polar (and it actually felt polar) opposite of the first day’s weather. When we got to the store on the trailhead Dad said “we should get ponchos,” Mom said “it is not raining, so no.” …
Plitvice Lakes is the most stunning example of untouched nature you can think of. This explosion of natural wonders is not surprisingly a UNESCO World Heritage site. It also may be the most beautiful place I’ll ever go. One of the reasons it was so beautiful was because of the wooden pathways shooting out over waterfalls and lakes.
We spent two days hiking in Plitvice Lakes, and this post is about the first day. On the first day we went hiking in the upper lakes part of the park. The route that we took on the first day (also the route that my Fitbit says I got over 22,000 steps on) was Route E. When we got to one part of the trail we found a dog that kind of became our hiking partner without an invitation (although I was happy to have him because he was very cute).
As we walked there was nothing but blue sky, clear weather, and super vibrant blues and greens shimmering out of every corner of the park. Are you wondering how all of these lakes are connected? A river? No, guess again. Waterfalls (ding, ding, ding)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We also saw three types of birds on this hike: a heron, a warbler, and plenty of ducks.
That isn’t all, my next post is about the lower lakes… coming soon.
Our last, and I think most special, day trip from Zagreb was to Samobor. The first thing that we saw when we got there was a building with a swift’s nest built into nearly every eve of the building. The scene was crazy, a seemingly …
The first day trip that we went on from Zagreb was to Trakošćan Castle. Trakošćan was huge, very beautiful, and had lots of cool features and ancient artifacts. The coolest feature was the monstrous turrets, which were very well preserved (not to mention how well preserved the castle …
Zagreb, the largest city in Croatia, just happened to be the start of my vacation. This beautiful city also happens to be the capital of Croatia. The town is split in half by a hill and connected by a funicular and a tunnel system. The parts of the town are not surprisingly called the upper and lower town. The funicular is one of the shortest funiculars in the world.
The tunnels were used in World War II, but the weirdest thing about them is that they have now added bathrooms in them?!?!
The first cathedral that we went in was the great Zagreb Cathedral. The other, smaller, but personally more beautiful one, was the St. Mark’s Church (I know it sounds like it is in Venice, but it is actually in Zagreb). Bigger doesn’t always mean better, but they were so hard to compare (see if you want to compare them).
The stonework on the great Zagreb Cathedral was so intricate that it would blow your mind! Even more impressive was to be able to build what is still the tallest building in Croatia back in 1217.
St. Mark’s Church had a roof made of brightly colored tiles that made it almost look like the roof was made of beautifully colored legos forming a scheme that displays the coat of arms of Zagreb (the white castle on the red background).
When we got to Zagreb we saw huge screens set up in the main square. We did not know why until we saw stalls selling Croatia World Cup jerseys. When I saw this, I thought “that’s it, Croatia is playing in the World Cup” (it turns out Croatia was doing a lot more than playing, they pretty much dominated the tournament). I even went to one of the stalls and bought a jersey as a souvenir. I got Luka Modrić‘s Croatia World Cup jersey (even though his regular team is Real Madrid). Mom did not think that I would get much use out of it, but Croatia just kept winning so I used it a ton (I wore it for every single game). When we were back at home watching the Croatia versus Russia game, the announcers showed a view of people in the Zagreb main square cheering, staring at the huge screens, and some were even holding torches.
Zagreb was a completely amazing start to an epic vacation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hello, I just went on a huge trip to Croatia! I went to Zagreb, Plitvice Lakes, Split, Korčula, and Dubrovnik. Our trip was two weeks of pure fun! I am excited to tell you about my awesome trip, so get ready to get reading. …
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