Sali, Dugi Otok, Monday 6 June

Well, Gert was at the dock. The last dive two days ago he said he would take care of washing the dive gear. By take care of he meant “do nothing”. It was where we left it two days ago, clearly not washed. Not my gear, but not a good way to maintain it. He’s a lazy bugger.

We did a single dive, and couldn’t be bothered putting up with his moroseness anymore so said “no” to a second dive. This time he took us out to an underwater hillock, easy to navigate around, but not much to see. I guess this reconfirms what people say, that diving in Melbourne is very good, despite the cold. Or he just took us to a dead paddock because it was close.

To be fair to Gert, I think the sea is fished out. Fish of what we would call a keepable size were few and far between, and everyone I saw fishing was simply hauling out sardines.

Given Gert was sitting at the pizza restaurant last night, I asked him if he ate there. He was suspicious as to the point of the question, but when I explained the mystery of the menus and the pizzas all being the same he laughed and explained it…the pizza cook had injured himself and they had a stand-in who had no idea what they were doing. I could have told them that!, but it was a relief that there was an explanation.

The tour with Boznor the day before made me realize that if we were going to stay here longer we should move on to other places on Dugi Otok. There’s caves and other things further down the island, and we’ve close to exhausted “to do” things in Sali. There’s plenty of opportunity to do nothing – you can’t fault lounging on the rocks and swimming every hour or so in stunningly beautiful water.

But the weather is turning, wind starting up and the dead flat sea is starting to bustle.

So, not quite sure if we are doing the right thing, tomorrow we are on the early ferry back to Zadar, and from there will find a way to Split. It isn’t clear how we will be travelling. The internet says there is no ferry from Zadar to Split, but our map shows the route marked up. I think the ferry is out.

There’s quite a few buses but I was thinking if we can get a train we’d be better off. The train might be slower, and more expensive, but it will be a lot more comfortable than punching it out for a seat with locals on the bus.

Can I suggest that you add Sali to your list of “must visit” places, and if you need somewhere to stay I can direct you to a great place? We called upstairs to sort out our bill…6 nights will set us back $250…Boznor and Maria were lovely and obviously would have been happy for us to stay on longer.

But instead of doing the money there and then, Boznor instead pulled out a killer liquor he had made (load up a 4 litre glass bottle with lemon, walnuts, spices, sugar and tequila and leave it to roast in the sun for 3 months), and we sat and sipped that, on the balcony overlooking the harbor while he earbashed us some more.

No complaints from me, I enjoyed it immensely.