Day 14 - Hiking and Hitchhiking from Stari Grad to Hvar
Lying on the bench in front of the Stari Grad harbor, exhausted and dehydrated, I peeked under my scarf that was covering the heat from the sun and saw that Doug was talking to some random couple at the ticketing office. Doug pointed at me while the man turned and stared at me. Meanwhile Julee wandered off to take pictures of the lonely harbor without taxis, buses, coffee shops or restaurants, and there was not even a souvenir stand that sold water. The ticketing office was closed too. We were told today was some public holiday.
It all started at 5:30 AM this morning when Julee and I got ready for our day of island hopping. Our destination of desire was supposed to be Hvar. A town on the Adriatic coast that is known to be the playground for the rich with fantastic scenery, harbor, and a castle. Last night Julee read the Lonely Planet guidebook about Stari Grad, the transitioning town where we should take a bus which will lead us to Hvar. The guidebook said Stari Grad was older than Hvar and had some sites worthwhile to see. Out of delusion, we decided that we would go to Stari Grad first after we arrived by ferry from Split around 11 AM. The town of Stari Grad was not near the port. It was 2 km away from the port. On the ferry, we encountered Doug, a backpacking traveller and a body double from Vancouver. Unfortunately, after hearing that Lonely Planet somehow recommended not to miss Stari Grad, out of the entire ferry load of hundreds of tourists, we were the only people who decided to head to the opposite direction from Hvar to go to Stari Grad instead. We walked two thousand meters against the traffic on the street without pedestrian pavement. Stari Grad was indeed a pretty little town but it was only worth two minutes of stroll on its picturesque promenade by the water.
It was too late when we found out that we missed the bus that connected from Stari Grad harbor to Hvar at 10:40 AM and the next one was at 2:40 PM. Julee and I had to catch the ferry back to Split at 5:30 otherwise we would not make it back to Trogir tonight.
*The never-ending road leading to Hvar...
At that point the only solution would be to hitchhike out of Stari Grad and into Hvar. We left the town and walked by the roads in the farmland full of olive trees, grapes, lavender and wild flowers. The country roads had no pedestrian pavement, we followed the safety rules so we would face the oncoming traffic and meanwhile we waved at all passing cars, trucks and vans going toward Hvar direction, which by the way were scarce.
At one major crossing, we stopped. One side of the road pointed to Hvar, the other pointed towards Selca. To our surprise, 8 out of 10 cars coming out of the fork decided to turn the other way, the other 2 out of 10 cars would not stop for us. We had drivers passing us multiple times, some put up two fingers indicating he was going a short distance only, others drove by opening both arms as if to say " What do you want me to do?"
Two hours and an estimated 7000 meters of hiking later, we were back where we started at the Stari Grad ferry port.
It all started at 5:30 AM this morning when Julee and I got ready for our day of island hopping. Our destination of desire was supposed to be Hvar. A town on the Adriatic coast that is known to be the playground for the rich with fantastic scenery, harbor, and a castle. Last night Julee read the Lonely Planet guidebook about Stari Grad, the transitioning town where we should take a bus which will lead us to Hvar. The guidebook said Stari Grad was older than Hvar and had some sites worthwhile to see. Out of delusion, we decided that we would go to Stari Grad first after we arrived by ferry from Split around 11 AM. The town of Stari Grad was not near the port. It was 2 km away from the port. On the ferry, we encountered Doug, a backpacking traveller and a body double from Vancouver. Unfortunately, after hearing that Lonely Planet somehow recommended not to miss Stari Grad, out of the entire ferry load of hundreds of tourists, we were the only people who decided to head to the opposite direction from Hvar to go to Stari Grad instead. We walked two thousand meters against the traffic on the street without pedestrian pavement. Stari Grad was indeed a pretty little town but it was only worth two minutes of stroll on its picturesque promenade by the water.
It was too late when we found out that we missed the bus that connected from Stari Grad harbor to Hvar at 10:40 AM and the next one was at 2:40 PM. Julee and I had to catch the ferry back to Split at 5:30 otherwise we would not make it back to Trogir tonight.
*The never-ending road leading to Hvar...At that point the only solution would be to hitchhike out of Stari Grad and into Hvar. We left the town and walked by the roads in the farmland full of olive trees, grapes, lavender and wild flowers. The country roads had no pedestrian pavement, we followed the safety rules so we would face the oncoming traffic and meanwhile we waved at all passing cars, trucks and vans going toward Hvar direction, which by the way were scarce.
At one major crossing, we stopped. One side of the road pointed to Hvar, the other pointed towards Selca. To our surprise, 8 out of 10 cars coming out of the fork decided to turn the other way, the other 2 out of 10 cars would not stop for us. We had drivers passing us multiple times, some put up two fingers indicating he was going a short distance only, others drove by opening both arms as if to say " What do you want me to do?" Two hours and an estimated 7000 meters of hiking later, we were back where we started at the Stari Grad ferry port.Doug walked to me and said "I think I got us a ride". "Really?" I immediately sat up and yelled at Julee to come back from the water front. This wonderful couple on vacation in Hvar from Austria, became our savior of the day. They loaded our backpacks into the trunk of their car and drove us to Hvar, whose distance of 17 kms seemed so impossible to reach on our foot only minutes ago.
posted by Koshka at 5/22/2008
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