Back to normal morning routine, by the time we were done 930am.
We were visiting the Krka National park and it was going to be our first drive out of the tight spaces. As I had parked head first into the carpark, I wanted to do a “many point turn” so that I could just drive out – it was a bad decision. After reversing onto the road, mommy got out of the car to help guide me as I struggled but the 2 cars parked along the road made it impossible for me to drive out. Baby K was cranky after sitting in the back seat for too long made it all the more frustrating. Tried to go back to the landlord for help but no one was to be found. It was then the neighbor who parked one of the cars by the road side came out, a face of displeasure and mouthful of complaints saying that we had hit her car (which we didn’t of course). She told us to stop moving and she got into her car, maneuver it onto the kerb and created space for us to drive out. We thanked her, which made her feel better, before we drove the car out to the main road and towards the national park.
The drive to the park was fairly easy, just about getting onto the highway and followed the GPS to Skradin for about an hour. The toll was 31 kuna. When we got close to the parking lot, we were welcomed by a lot of (fake) parking attendants, all seen wearing the “P” Tee. Learning from my lesson in Mostar, I stuck to GPS route that brought us right to the correct carpark.
We entered the tourist information center but there weren’t much to see (the payable restroom was public one and located outside the building) and I had earlier purchased the tickets online in Singapore. The boat however was running on a schedule so I went to get lunch first. There were many stalls along the walking pavement near the port and I bought 2 large ham and cheese for 54kuna and one ice coffee 30kuna from the food stalls there. At the same time while having the sandwiches, we fed baby K. Couldn’t finish the huge sandwich and we proceeded to board the 12pm boat (we missed one that left earlier at 1130 because we thought the frequency was by the hour).
The boat ride from the port to the falls was a 20mins slow gentle ride. The surrounding wasn’t very much interesting as the river meandered between trees towards the disembarkation location at the falls. We got off the boat with lots of passengers and as we walked towards the falls crossing crowded bridge, we passed the ticket counter which already had a queue. With the printed tickets, we walked to the entrance route of the falls manned by 3 staffs. Upon showing my printed tickets, they said that it had to be exchanged at the ticket counter! Mommy went back to queue and got the exchange while I let baby K enjoy kicking the small rocks on the ground.
It was a very busy day with many people streaming into the park. The falls were pretty close to the entrance and we walked onto the bridge where we could see the majestic falls and the many people having a dip in the lake in which the falls send the waters. Tried to take some photos on the narrow bridge, difficult but we managed with a selfie. We continued through the bridge and then there was some steps that brought us further upstream. We could see there were still some smaller falls and had to go close to the waters that were fenced up to prevent people from going into the rushing waters. We didn’t venture further upstream (as we didn’t know if there were more or not).
As we return crossing the same bridge, I was very interested in getting my feet wet by the lake and taking a dip but mommy was overly concerned and I to give up the idea, disappointingly. We walked all the way back to the pier to wait for the next ferry, which already had a crowd waiting. We managed to board the 130pm return.
As we returned back to Skradin, we got ourselves some icecream at one of the stalls and drinks and before going back to our car. There were still a couple of places to go and off we went after following the GPS route to Roski Slap. The toddler was quick to fall asleep during the drive there. The route got more difficult as we approached the falls and become single lane which I wasn’t comfortable with as it would be a problem if a car in the opposite direction came but thankfully none did. After merging from the 1 lane route onto a clearing, the park attendants directed me to park a clearing atop a small slope as the main carparks were full.
Mommy and I had to take turns to go see the Roski Slap since baby K was sleeping in the car. With the same tickets I walked to the entrance not too far from the car park and advanced quickly downhill. It wasn’t a straight forward route as there weren’t signs but it was not difficult to find either. The Roski Slap was just one falls and from the place that I could see, it was quite far away and didn’t turn out to be as majestic as I had in mind. After a few snaps, I returned to the car so that mommy could go see the falls. While in the car, I couldn’t do much as there wasn’t any signal for mifi. Mommy returned soon and we decided to skip visiting the smaller multiple necklaces falls as it was about 1.35km away.
Our last nature viewing for the day was to check out the view point called the Visovac lookout. From there one could see a tiny small island with a church in the middle of the river. It wasn’t far from the Roski Slap and we soon found ourselves on a major clearing where I parked the car so that we could go look over the cliff at the island. Again we took turns, I went first followed by Mommy. There was in fact a way to visit the island by taking a boat but we weren’t that interested.
Baby K woke up from his nap as we embarked on our journey to a nearby town Sibenik. Worried that parking could be a problem at the old town, I parked at a carpark meant for ferry passengers which had barely a few cars but at about 750meters away from old town. Approaching the old town, we visited a supermarket to buy yogurt. Supermarketing became like a habit that we had to do it at the different towns, as we stocked up our supplies of bottled water and foodstuff for baby K.
There wasn’t an itinerary for Sibenik since it was an ad-hoc visit knowing that it was just 30mins away from Krka NP. We thought of just lounging by the port and so tried to find a cafe. As we walked around the old town, it was like walking in a maze, not knowing where the route would lead us. After heading in the general direction with google map, we finally found the Rivera with cafes by the sea and went into one.
I was in an urgent need to pee but as I visited the cafe’s one and only restroom, it was busy and I had to hold it until it was available ( there was someone shitting behind unlockable doors.) we ordered a scoop of vanilla icecream, sprite and Coke Zero to cool ourselves from the heat and baby K delighted to have his first taste of icecream after having his yogurt.
After our short lounging session, we walked back to the carpark and paid 12kuna for carpark. Then the return on the highway to Split resulted in a toll of 27kuna. With the previous disastrous parking the first day we arrived, I decided to try parking butt first and I found easier much easier in fact! However we couldn’t do it upon arrival as the private lot was chained up to prevent other people from parking. We had to get the landlord to help unlock the chain.
Mommy cooked while I did some washing of bottles and entertained K and cleaned K after he crapped. We only left the apartment again at 830pm for dinner in Split’s old town.
There were a variety restaurants to choose from and we entered one of the restaurants, De Belly which featured a live band, making the dining experience relaxing and also a distraction to keep baby K’s attention. Ordered mussels in white wine and turkey ham and it was not bad!
After dinner we walked along Riveria to look at the mobile stalls selling things from food to souvenirs. The whole strip was lively with many restaurants, and it was a nice feeling to soak in that atmosphere. Baby K was walking about with me as we visited stall to stall. We returned back to the apartment late.
Bath time and it was off to bed.