Days 1 & 2 - 14-16th Aug. We are on our way to Croatia!

Day 1

The day is finally here! We are so ready after putting the trip off last year, to just start enjoying all the planning now. We caught the gippy shuttle in on the afternoon run to the airport.

We are staying at the parkroyal hotel tonight, so we didn’t have any stress tomorrow getting in. We were lucky & they had given us an upgraded room & when we asked, they had a runway view room available too so we have spent time watching the planes coming & going this afternoon, along with a couple of coronas- noice!
We decided to go & explore the pool and steam room which we had never gone to on previous stays and it was great. Swum some laps, then jumped in the spa, then tried the sauna – soooo good for relaxing.

But alas– our family tradition of a meal and a pint at PJ O’Briens is no more, boo. Knew they had just closed it and there is nothing there atm, so we had a lovely bar meal at the hotel restaurant instead. Have a late checkout tomorrow, so we are just cruising now.
   
          

Day 2 - Thursday

Flight days! Big couple of days – we are flying Melbourne-Singapore-Copenhagen-Zagreb-Split, about 34 hours in all & we will arrive about 1am Aussie time on Saturday – long but exciting
too! We are thinking of getting the local bus in Split to our accommodation as with 4 flights, it was too risky to book a pick up transfer since they will only wait 1 hour if any of your flights are delayed and we enjoy using what the locals do – so we will see .

Will be good to see what Singapore airlines are like, they rank really well professionally, so should be good. This is the payoff for subscribing and watching for bus class specials every week for ages! So good to book through a fantastic deal with SAS airlines but getting the Singapore air product at a much lower price through their codesharing.  With the number of back-to-back flights, I am very grateful we have this.

Our 1st flight Mel-Sin was 8 hours and the plane was only about half full up front, It was a good flight – watched Avita the cgi action movie, was really good. Then watched a bit of Dumbo even though we had seen it at the movies. Graeme watched Avengers-end game, then the series on Chernobyl.
The seats are interesting- they are really long – over 2 metres, but your legs are on quite a sharp angle to the right. A couple of comfy cushions and we were set! The cabin crew were very efficient but not particularly friendly and it was really warm in the cabin, but no stress.

Landed on time at Singapore – it’s a huge terminal – can see why it was voted No1 airport in the world as it has a movie theatre and a butterfly place. Went to the KrisFlyer lounge but it was chocker as a Japan Air flight had been delayed. Had a shower though and around 11.30pm we went down to the transfer lounge – took a skytrain to get there and then customs screen cabin luggage again.
       
Boarded and off again about 12.30am – this flight is 12 hrs. We changed seats to 2 bulkhead seats.  In 15 F & K as they had a much squarer layout and your legs didn’t have to swing over to the right- had found that sore on your hips after a bit. The bulkhead seats are awesome and while they are a bit shorter than the others & are by the toilet, they have a seat you can sit on to visit and Gray fitted laying down in mine too, easy!

I didnt eat on this leg as wasn’t hungry and we were pretty knackered by this time. Everyone seemed to have the same idea and had brought comfy clothes for sleeping, then we settled down for a sleep at 4:30am. Slept for 3 ½ hrs and Gray slept for 5hrs. Woke feeling like we had had a whole nights sleep but knew we needed more as we still have 2 more flights after this. So back to sleep after a nice cup of earl grey for another 3 hrs each . The crew have been so nice on this flight too and the cabin temp was a lot cooler.

I’m sitting here now gazing out the window - I love the views above the clouds when you are flying – can see why heaven is up here somewhere!



Later- we are in Split! Very long day but great to be here – had a cuppa and waited 3 hrs before we could check in, in Copenhagen, then a couple of hrs wandering the airport and then a 2 hr flight, 1 hr transit, then a 1 hr flight into Split. The planes got smaller as we went along haha and there are so many Aussies I can hear around us!

We caught the airport shuttle bus which was 30 kuna each- about $12pp, then a taxi to our hotel - were going to walk the last bit but our newly acquired ph plan sent a message that we had used up all the data? Of course just when we needed it to navigate! Always the way – but we got to our apartment for the night no worries. Had showers and after more than 35 hours of travel and only 1 shower for me- they were lovely.

Tidied up and walked through the cobbled streets, we are staying in the old town so just a stroll to lovely streets of restaurants and bars. All feels a little surreal in our current state of jetlag and lovely when you have saved hard and planned well to realise it . Had dinner in a historical building – local craft beers and shared a delicious spelt based seafood pizza in a restaurant called Superfood - it was about $50 equivalent so pretty cheap. There is a real buzz down here in the touristy area.

Strolled back in the 29C evening, fed the sick looking kitten on our deck – they are everywhere here and apparently the locals feed them despite being feral. The street stinks of them unfortunately and they are all skinny and have mucky eyes like in Crete, but all appear happy little things and a little drink is nice on a hot night.

Crashed at 9 pm, which is 5am in Melbourne.😊