divEr 24
WILL APPLEYARD
and his partner
Ana undertake a
Croatian diving road-
trip, though for long
periods it looks set to be no
more than a Croatian road-trip!I
’M NOT SURE WHICHintrusion wakes me
first – the banging on our windows, the
guttural laughter and shouting outside, or
perhaps a terrified Ana shaking me awake to
deal with a problem that I hope will eventually
deal with itself.
Peering into the night through a gap in our
camper-van curtains, I can just about make out
the partially lit faces of several men I had seen
earlier that evening, hunched over a rapidly
growing collection of beer-bottles in a smoky
locals’ bar in the village of Muc.
It’s 2am, and I just know that we shouldn’t
have “wild-camped” in this street for the night.
Ana and I had talked about Croatia a lot in
the past. We had heard only exciting things
about the destination above the water-line,
though always followed by a “...but Dubrovnik
is super-busy during the summer” rider.
Knowing little about the diving on offer, we
had decided to check out the country by road
during springtime to beat those crowds.
We choose a new cross-Channel route (forus at least) from Portsmouth to St Malo in
northern France, courtesy of Brittany Ferries.
Most of this overnight crossing happened while
we slept.
With hindsight, landing in Calais or Dieppe
would have been better, because we could have
avoided the hellish Parisian peripheral road,
while also reducing our mileage significantly.W
E MANAGE TO BYPASS all the pricey
French toll roads, easy enough when
crossing the top half of the country, which takes
us just over a day to knock off.
Germany comes and goes quickly thanks to
the slickautobahn, where I don’t dare to
venture so much as a tyre in the fast lane.
The traffic flows efficiently at high speeds,
cars leapfrogging one another in a well-
choreographed routine.
Austria brings snow in the high mountain
passes and two very cold nights. We’re relieved
to have packed an extra blanket and portable
gas-heater at the last minute.Slovenia offers scenery of unimaginable
beauty and pristine wilderness, with hints of
Canada and notes of New Zealand.
Rivers the colour of overly processed digital
photographs flow through deep valleys rich
with greens and yellows. We camp by silent,
glassy lakes that beg to be dived.
We clip the shoulder of Italy, stopping only
for coffee and to warm our pasty, wintery selves
in the sun, as the first signs of spring arrive and
temperatures exceed 20°C.
The border crossing into Croatia is slow.
I notice that my right arm has become
sunburnt from the drive as we crawl towards
passport control.
We enter the northern interior, which after
only a couple of hours’ driving reveals scars left
by the 1990s Balkans conflict. On wide, flat,
mountain-fringed plains sit small agricultural
plots dotted with houses, some new, some
abandoned or burnt-out and many riddled with
bullet-holes.
Croatia’s interior is a confused place in whichDRY
RUN
ish