Dubrovnik

Day 9
After getting off the bus at the bus station of Dubrovnik we walked all the way to the hostel, which turned out to be half an hour walk. Thankfully it was still early so the sun was not too hot just yet.
Once we arrived at the hostel around 7:30am, we off course werent allowed to check in yet. We left our bags in the luggage room and decided to have some breakfast in the old town, which is the main attraction in Dubrovnik. The walk took another half an hour, but at least we made it. The old town was still pretty quiet. We sat down for some lunch and meanwhile big touring car busses were arriving at the town. The town was filled with tourists within minutes.
After breakfast we had a little strawl through the old town. We climbed the surrounding wall of the old town which gave us nice views all around the old town.
After a few hours in the old town we grabbed a bus to find a new hostel for the next 2 nights, as we hadnt booked anything in Dubrovnik. It turned out to be quite a challenge to find something. On top of that, we cauhgt the wrong bus to the hostel we wanted to go to and ended up at the end of the busline at a 5 star hotel.
Fortunately the scuba diving center I wanted to dive with was located in this hotel, so we went in to get some information about diving with them. It seemed quite nice, so I signed up to go diving with them the next day.
Afterwards we walked back to the city and after a lot of searching we found the hostel we were meant to go to. We walked in and came into the living room of the hostel. We were greeted by two very friendly Croatian people. The husband welcomed us and gave us welcome drinks.
We felt a bit weird, as we hadnt booked anything, so it became a bit awkward as soon as we told them we werent really staying and were only looking for a place to sleep. The wife seemed a bit frustrated about the situation, but after checking her administration she told us she could put us up for two nights, which was great news for us.
We payed for our beds in advance, while the woman was giving us all kinds of food to take care of us. It felt like a home away from home. The woman, Milka, told us this was probably also why her hostel was voted number 1 hostel in Croatia last year.
Afterwards we headed back to our current hostel and checked in there. Once in the room we slept for a good two hours. Once we got up we had to rush to our new hostel, as we were invited to come and get dinner at the hostel of Milka. It seemed like a good idea, as we could easily meet new people that way.
We were about half an hour late due to the bus not coming and us being a bit late. Thankfully this wasnt much of a problem, so we sat down and met a big bunch of other backpackers in the small living room. The food we got served was amazing and far too much for anyone to finish. The atmosphere in the hostel felt really great.
After dinner we played some drinking games in the tvroom of the hostel. Around midnight the hostel had to be quiet, so we went for some drinks into town. The whole hostel went, so we were there with a big group of people.
We entered a bar which was serving thai buckets. Obviously we had no choice than to order a few of those in there. The night lasted till around 3am, which is when we grabbed the last bus back to our hostel for some sleep.

Day 10
I got up at 8am as I was going to do some diving today. I packed my bag, had some breakfast and ran out of the hostel to catch my bus to the diving center.Luckily I was just in time, so I was ready to start diving. Meanwhile Luc and SIdney were moving to our new hostel , so they had to carry my bag from the old hostel to the new one.
The diving was quite fun, even though it turned out the Adriatic sea doesnt have a lot of sealife. Instead, the surround areas have ship wrecks and lots of caves. I decided to do two dives. One in the morning and one in the afternoon.
The diving crew we were with were quite fun, especially the diving instructor. An older guy who was half Croatian, half Italian. The first dive went quite well, although I did have some problem clearing my left ear at times. Once back I chilled out at the 5 star hotel swimming pool with the British girls I did the dive with. After some lunch in the luxury hotel we went back to do our second dive.
The second dive turned out to be even better. We dove along a big wall to a cave which ended up in a lagoon. It was quite funny as we ascended into the lagoon where a lot of tourists were swimming and sunbathing. Surely it must have been weird to see a whole diving crew come out of the water justl like that.
The diving instructor also gave me a dive computer, as I was allowed to go deeper due to my advanced certification. As long as I kept eye contact, I was allowed to dive a bit deeper and further away from the group.
The dive lasted for about an hour. Afterwards we got back into the boat and headed back to the main land. There we filled out the logbooks and said bye to the diving people. The British girls asked me if I wanted to have a drink with them in the swimming pool of the five star hotel, which sounded good.
Later I grabbed the bus back into town and headed back to the hostel. There I found Sidney and Luc who were about to have some dinner with the rest of the hostel. I sat down and we had another massive plate of food.
After dinner I layed down for two hours, as I was so low on energy. Once I woke up I had a few beers in the common area of the hostel. Around midnight the whole hostel went out again to the old town. Again we had a few buckets, but this night the town was not as busy.. Probably due to it being a Sunday night.
We finally ended up in a bar with noone in it but us. We built the party ourselves and created a circle of people in which we were dancing one by one. It turned out to be a really good night. We caught the last bus at a quarter to three back to the hostel. Even in the bus we had a lot of fun, when guys were doing pullups in the bus. The whole bus was clapping and cheering, so it became some sort of competition. At some point the bus driver was fed up with our antics, and told us to be quiet.
Once back at the hostel we all went to sleep.

Tomorrow we are heading off to Sarajevo to make our way back up to Budapest. Stay tuned for more updates!

Aug 6th 2011 – Aug 8th 2011