Trogir, Split and with Sam on Board, Hvar!

On the 18th July and just to get some breeze, we left our little bay just after dawn, dawn and motored across a mill pond!

We arrived at Boatic Zeget Marina in Trogir, just after 8am, but it soon became an absolute mad house, with people everywhere and the beers flowing, Boatic Marina being a big charter boat base! There were some 150 charter yachts in the marina and the change-over day meant that the charterers that had finished their week and those starting theirs were all in the marina at the same time, it was absolute chaos, but entertaining..

Just because we are all tucked up in the marina, the wind decided to blow for once, typical! Still we did get a good chuckle watching the 150 odd charter boats try to extricate themselves from their moorings!.

David & Steven then disappeared off to collect a hire car and Sam., leaving me to some peace and quiet, something I doubted I would get for the next 2 weeks.

19th, David and I left the boys to their own devices, which mean’t a day around the marina pool and getting friendly with the hotesses and waitresses in the bar, whilst we took to 4 wheels sightseeing, starting off in Trogir and then Split’s old town.

Trogir

We then decided to take the 2 hour drive in the afternoon to a wonderful old place inland called Mostar and were just about to jump onto the Main road, when, on checking directions, I noticed that Mostar was in fact not in Croatia but in Bosnia Herzegovina! Just as well, as we neither had our passports or permission to take the rental car across the border! So we ventured into Split and had a great lunch before exploring.

Split

We returned to the boat early evening to find the boys still trying to top up their tans by the pool, and spent the evening on board, wine and limoncello flowing, with some food of course.

Monday the 20th, we stayed put, a) as we had booked for 3 nights and we thought there was more exploring to do inland (sadly there wasnt in this neck of the woods) and b) waiting for a part for the spinnaker furling system, being despatched from England. David and I once again left the boys behind and went off to do some much needed provisioning for our departure the next day.

Tuesday 21st, we left the marina early in the hope that we might secure a place in the marina on  the  Parmezina Islands, 2 1/2 miles off Hvar, being the most sensible place to leave the boat to venture into what is meant to be the party island of Croatia. we managed to grab a space amidst dozens of charter boats, full to their capacity with party goers and wondered whether we had made the right choice!

Parmezina Island

 The boys fancied exploring on their own, well they are 17/18 after all, and I doubt very much they were into exploring, more like on the pull, so David and I jumped on a high speed water taxi and made our way to Hvar town. we were however sorely disappointed, even after a bottle of wine before dinner, the people watching wasn’t up to much, and to quote Steven, Mojacar was a better place to party! We returned back to the boat just after midnight, expecting the marina to be buzzing, but clearly some had found more to do in Hvar than we did, then again most of the charters were closer to Steven in age than David and I! However having risen at 6am, it was amazing to see where people slept on yachts that were fully loaded with people, the favourite being either the dinghy or a lilo on the deck, but there were some very sore heads around as the day arrived !

Otok Hvar

The following morning we decided that Hvar did not warrant a 2nd night so made ready to leave, heading north, (via Trogir to pick up our parts which hadnt arrived when we left on Tuesday). Unfortunately and somewhat stupidly, our departure was delayed when I slipped at the bottom of the stairs, twisting my knee in a direction it really didnt want to go. Even the boat next door heard the scream, and the (choice language )! One could say it was worth it, just to have 3 chappies rally around me, but then again no. Luckily, I think I just pulled something and whilst I am a little ginger, ( not the Rogers variety ),  on my feet, it wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been!

We stopped for the night on anchor just north of Trogir, and the boys made the effort to dig the kayak out and pump it up, all just to row to shore to check out if there was a bar!  They returned quite quickly so i guess the answer was no!. Despite the heat, a request had been made for a curry on board so i set about cooking it, not from scratch i might add, I had some help from a little friend in a jar by Sharwoods, I think they might have regretted it as it was another sweat box of a night, to the point that we were all fighting for a space to sleep up on deck!.

Wednesday 23rd we headed towards Sibernik, the plan was to stop off at Primosten, however 2 hours prior to our arrival, the most awful noise started emanating from the engine. Not being able to source the problem, we stopped it and were forced to sail in 4 knots of wind, making a detour to a place called Kremic which had a marina and more importantly a Volvo Penta engineer. And once again, fate seemed to be with us as we were tucked up all safe and sound when the Bora decided to rear its ugly  head again blowing 50KMs of wind and bringing torrential rain. Still the boys had only just cleaned the dinghy, not the yacht at that point so they got away with some of their chores!

Thankfully, the problem was to do with the engine room ventilation fan, not a crucial part so we have left it with the company to order it for our way back through in a month, and went on our merry way to Sibernik.