[OnyxCougar]

Day Seven (Saturday)

We pulled into Zadar at about 7am Saturday morning. We grabbed our stuff and walked from the Kolodvor to the harbor. At was about a mile. Along the way, buildings here and there were studded with more bullet holes and I tried to imagine what it would be like to live in that kind of environment. It's that kind of moment when I realize how fortunate I am. I've lived outside the US for years, off and on, and occasionally I'll have a moment of clarity, and I'm very thankful for what most Americans take for granted. Americans that haven't been outside the US (and I don't mean heading to TJ or Vancouver) just don't have the rare opportunity to appreciate what live is like in the rest of the world. It's a very humbling feeling, and at the same time, it inspires pride that I live at the standard that I do. I live just a hair above the poverty level in America, but even this is quite a step above the middle class of Croatia, where the average income is 1000 kunas a month, which is a little under $200.

We arrived in the harbor at about 8am, and Hrvoje checked on the ferry. It departed for Preko at 9:30, so we had 90 minutes to burn. Ivan and I went potty at the ticket station while Kelle and Hrvoje went across the street to a little shop that had a table and four chairs out front. We met there, and had a coke while we waited.

Time passes as it always does, and soon it was time to board the ferry. I had been on ferries before, (most notably the one from Dover, England to Calais, France, crossing the English Channel) so I wasn't too excited about the trip to the island, but I LOVE the ocean. The guys kept reminding me (over and over) that this was NOT an ocean, it was a SEA. "Yeah, yeah," I replied. "Ocean, sea, what's the difference?" They looked at each other and I realized they didn't know the difference, so I made it a point to call it an ocean just to spite them. If they can't tell me the difference, they don't deserve to correct me. So NYAH. (I went and looked it up.

The ferry trip took about 30 minutes, and I snapped some great pictures of the harbor and the island on approach. There is a little island on the way to Ugljan, off to the left, and Kelle and I decided we wanna buy that island, kick off the current inhabitants, and build a great big mansion there. So it's "Our Island" now. We never actually set foot on it, but it's ours.

We got off the boat in Preko and there was a little restaurant slash ticket office for the ferry there. There were buses lined up facing the village, so after a few discreet inquiries by Hrvoje (who felt like he was home), he bought us bus tickets and we got on. This was another of those buses that were the big chartered kind. There were so many people packed in the bus that the four of us stood, and Ivan was leaning against the closed door of the bus and would have to lean in and squish me while the doors were open, and then he could lean back after they closed. Ivan and I would get out at every stop that people were exiting, then get back on. When I say full bus, I mean full bus.

We got off at the fourth stop, which was basically a side road jutting to the right of the main road the bus was on. Down the lane to the right was a beautiful church. As we walked past it, people were gathered around in the side area, dressed in dark clothes, singing. We were walking past a funeral. Hrvoje was carrying the 2 huge bags and Kelle's backpack, I had my backpack and Ivan was pulling my suitcase along on the rollers. The lane went slightly downhill past the church, and then made a little left hand curve. On the left hand side of the road just down from the church, there was this little booth that looked like a white telephone booth. When we got closer to it, it turned out to be a statue of Mary, and there were rosaries and flowers and other little tokens that had been placed on her hands and on the wood around the statue. The lane then curved right and we saw a sign for food and a castle to the right. That piqued my interest, but we kept walking. We passed the soccer field on the left, a little harbor beyond it, and houses.

Up the lane we went, and we asked several times, 'Is it much farther?' 'Are we there yet?' 'I gotta pee!'. We were going up a pretty steep hill, and soon it became pretty evident that the natives did NOT walk around on this island, because we saw 9 year olds and above riding motorscooters everywhere, eliminating the need to trudge up the little back lanes between the houses. We don't know how Hrvoje did it, with all those bags on him, but he walked up the hill like it wasn't a big deal and didn't even break a sweat. Ivan wasn't winded, but was getting tired. We passed this foul smelling bend in the alley that had trash standing, and we held our noses and kept walking. Kelle and I were gasping for air, sucking down our inhalers and sweating and hot and just seriously ready to lay down. We had to stop for about 30 seconds and then roll our eyes dramatically and trudge on, our calves screaming for mercy. Finally we got to a set of wooded doors that looked like the gate in the movie Romancing the Stone. Remember when Joan Wilder and Jack are in this village and they are at the gnarly old wooden gates? They turn to leave, and Jack says, "Write us out of this one, Joan Wilder." This columbian or whatever behind the gate says, "Joan Wilder?! You are Joan Wilder? The writer?" She nods and the guy is like "Well, in that case, mi casa es su casa!!" and he opens the gates and it's this luxurious courtyard and so completely NOT what you imagined? Yeah. The gate was like that.

Hrvoje unlocked the gate and opened it up. We all peered in. It opened into a courtyard. To our right was the communal bathroom. A little down from that was someone's front door. Further up from that was a little area with a basin and a short garden hose. Directly in front of us was a steep staircase leading up to a door on the left, a small walk to the right and another door. The door at the top of the stairs turned out to be the one we wanted. It took Hrvoje about 5 minutes to open the door, accompanied by helpful remarks like, "Don't snap the key off, Hrvoje," and "You have to be smarter than the lock, dude," and "Just say no, man." Eventually the key turned and Hrvoje stood and triumpantly opened the door. It swung open to reveal a kitchen table directly inside, a door to the left, and a stove, fridge and sink past the table. The door was open, and there were two twin beds pushed together with heaps of pillows and blankets, a wardrobe, a table, and several windows.

Now, Kelle has one phobia. Spiders. This is an island, and an apartment that hadn't been used in months. One of the small windows in the bedroom were broken, probably from the children next door throwing rocks or something. The bottom line is, no one sat until Kelle was satisfied that all the spiders were dead. Spider corpses were also not acceptable. And there were spiders everywhere. Hrvoje opened the window and shook the blankets and pillows out, and Ivan and I looked around for live crawling ones. Kelle stood in the kitchen, supervising.

Once the "all clear" was sounded, Hrvoje laid one of the mattresses down on the floor, and made the bed. Ivan and I would get the twins, and Kelle and Hrvoje were sharing the mattress on the floor. It was about 11am and I was tired, but eager to explore the village. We set our stuff down and went downstairs, out the gates, and walked down the lane to the intersection. The sign said stuff about food and a castle with an arrow pointing left, and to the right was a street with houses and a little market on the right and a soccer field to the left. We were hungry. Kelle wanted "BEEF!" None of us had eaten since the train the night before. We turned left toward the castle. I never saw a castle, but there were so many trees that it could have been there and I just didn't see it. We came upon this little restaurant that was actually this guy's house, and it looked closed. Hrvoje explained that we were way off season, and we turned to go when the proprietor stepped out and spoke to Hrvoje. After a few seconds, the man walked away and Hrvoje said, "He's opening for us." I was stunned. The man came back. "Do you vant to eat outside?" He indicated the covered patio. It was warm. "Sure," we said, and he washed down the plastic tables and put a nice table cloth on it, and set the table.