Thursday, May 26th
Morgan leaving Split, Croatia...
I have to admit, I hate buses. After 4 years of commuting back and fourth between Madison and the twin cities, I think I am allowed to have a distain for them. I feel that buses are fairly inefficient mode of transportation when you compare it to a car. (Natalie Note: My bus took 5 hours, his train took 8 hours...now whose mode of transportation is inefficient?! :) ) The thing I like about trains is that there is a novelty about them. In a train you have the ability to sit down and converse with fellow travellers; you can even get up and stick your head out the window, soak up the fresh air, and scenery. My favorite thing about trains is that there is a life to them. Who knows, maybe my parents let me watch a little too much "Thomas the Train Engine" growing up. However, there is something about trains that the moment you board it a sudden sense of excitement takes over and the train no longer is a mode of transportation but a gateway into an adveture in itself.
Some of my favorite memories from this trip and past travels take place on trains. One of the first times my roommates and I in Barcelona bonded was on a train to Madrid. It was only a week into the program, and we had decided to go on a trip together by train. When we first started we each did our own thing (ie reading/music listening...the usual), about an hour in Rodrigo grabs my sketchbook while I'm writing in it and starts making a doodle. Nick then took his turn and finished off the sketch. When they finally finished it, it had turned into a charachature of a corn-dog person. After a confused glance and a classic sarcastic "really guys?," Rodrigo turns to mean and states matter of factly, "it's you!". It was in reference to the fact that earlier that week I thought I heard them call me corn-dog and I answered to it. So from that train ride on they nicknamed me corndog. The funny thing is that the nickname actually caught on to the point that other students and professors from the program started calling me corndog or cd for short by the end of the program. To this day Nick still calls me corndog.
After so many of these types of train situations, I've come to be excited about riding in them. After multiple never-ending and rather humerous debates over what mode of transportation we would take from Split to Ljubljana, we finally came to a conclusion that it didn't have to be one or the other since both are extremely safe to travel alone on. So Natalie caught an early afternoon train to Zagreb and I stayed around Split for the evening to catch the night train with the hostel manager's girlfriend.
I'm actually pretty glad I stayed as I got to meet some awesome new people who arrived at our hostel that day. Two were girls from Indiana, one of which now lives in Madrid and is sending me a detailed list of things to do in Sevilla. There was also a 26 year old graphic designer Aussie, who had been traveling around for 16 months. The stories he told of all the places he'd been were phenomenal. The last interesting person I got to talk with was Rory, a 31 year old Irish university student majoring in spanish and marketing. He and I talked about a multitude of things ranging from U.S. college towns and European soccer to corporate social responsibility. These people made the seven hours I had to kill interesting and fly by.
The time came to say goodbye and head to the train station, where I became incredibly anxious. While I have taken numerous trains through out Europe, this would be my first overnight train. Like always, I worried about the possibility of not finding a cabin for Chelsea and I to share to be able to collapse the chairs down. I was also a little worried about how you make sure that no one grabs your bag while you're sleeping. Luckily I had Chelsea there, having traveled by train alone throughout Europe and southeast Asia, she knew her stuff. After taking one of Chelsea's Valium I conked out. The only thing that was not exactly pleasant about the night train was that my back and hamstrings were severley sunburned. Each time the train moved ever so lightly, my body would shift and cause me to hit the sunburned areas up against the grooves in the seat cushions. Let's just say it wasn't the most pleasant experience.
Friday, May 27th
Zagreb, Croatia...
When Chelsea and I arrived in Zagreb at 6:30am we had two hours before Natalie was to meet us at the train station for our train to Ljubljana. Since Chelsea also had a few hours to kill before catching her train to Budapest, we decided to put our bags in a locker and walk around Zagreb for a little bit. She'd been there before so she took me down the street from the station was, and all of a sudden a sprawl of comissioned graffiti was in sight. This was one of the coolest things I'd seen and an ingenious way to prevent pointless street tagging. Essentially it was a mile long wall of graffitti esque murals, don't worry I took lots of pictures (speakig of which I'm actually fairly surprised I haven't used up the first of three memory cards yet).
After seeing the street art, Chelsea headed back to the station and I continued my exploration of Zagreb. While I only spent two hours walkig around I can honestly say Zagreb is an incredibly beautiful city. I kind of wished we would have spent more time there. Having just been in a very touristy beach town, in a hostel managed by an Aussie surfer type, I felt like I was not able to meet the locals and I think I might have had that opportunity in Zagreb. Don't get me wrong Split was cool but I wish I had met more Croats.
By the time I got back to the station at 8:30, Natalie was here waiting for me. We first set our bags with Chelsea, then bought the tickets and were met with a concluding dilema....what to do with the ten euros worth of croation kuna we had? The answer was pretty simple for me: FOOD! I went to the stations bakery counter and bought a giant cured ham and chess sandwich, a pretzel roll, and a double espresso. They were all delicious.
Train to Ljubljana, Slovenia...
So if you didn't get it from the train post. I freaking love them. And this journey was no exception. When we first got on the train most of the cabins were full, so we decided to sit with a nice couple that looked liked they might speak English. Sure enough, they were Canadians. Can I just say I love the Canadians; the accent just makes me right at home and they are always incredibly happy and outgoing. As usual, we exchanged the normal traveler information about where we'd been and where we are headed.
After about an hour of conversation we each settled into our own things. The Canadians and Natalie read, while I put on some headphones and listened to my iPod. After about a minute I turned to my left to look out through the window. I was captured by the sight of these small, beautiful villages resting alongside a river that was cutting through the mountainous terrain of Slovenia. Wanting to remember these sights, I grabbed my camera, left the cabin, opened the window, and started snapping some pics. I lost complete track of time and ended up standing there with my head out the window soaking up the fresh air. I'm sure the sight of me there to anyone was reminiscent of a dog with their head out of a car window with their tongue and ears flailing about as the vehicle speeds down the road.
Ljubljana, Slovenia...
Upon arriving in Slovenia, we followed the Canadian couple to the same hostel I failed to book the night before. After arriving at the hostel they luckily still had two beds available for that night. So we got the keys, a map, a few suggestions on what to see, where to go, and left the hostel to grab lunch and walk the town.
For lunch we went to a traditional Slovene restaurant called "Number 6." We were seated in a quaint little courtyard area at the back of the restaurant and began searching the menu for something appealing. It really wasn't all that hard as everything sounded delicious. They had pictures of most dishes and let me tell you, these pictures were the types of menu pics that cause your mouth to salivate with just a glance. Feeling adventurous Natalie chose veal soup and grilled veggies, while I chose a buckwheat dumplings rolls made with cottage cheese and walnuts.
Having some spare time while waiting for our food, we began plotting our future travel plans. We realized that if we took the night train to Budapest, cut a day off Krakow and Budapest, and skipped Vienna, Austria altogether we would be back on our original schedule. After a few conversations about how crazy it was that we were in Slovenia, (Cut to Natalie saying slow-vain-ya, krinkling her nose as she stresses the "vain" in an igor from Frankenstein like fashion) and repetitive immitations of the British chick in split saying "literally" our food finally came. Like always we broke out my camera and took pictures of the food and then demolished our plates. The dishes we chose were absolutely delicious and artfully presented. As we began talking about how great the food was, a local man from the table next to us said he noted us taking pictures and wondered if we were doing a food blog as he has friends who do that. We explained that we were just typical dorky tourist wanting a picture of everything. He told us that we chose very traditional and brave dishes for our first meal. He then began to tell us about all the places to see and eat in and around Ljubljana including a local wine town called Madonna, that had about 20 vineyards. He also wrote our on map places to buy good wine, and the famous horse burger butchery and restaurant. We never sought out this burger place though...Maybe next time. Even with this daily conversations with locals, it still amazes us how incredibly friendly the people from the Balkans are.
After about 15 minutes the local man said he had to get going and wished us luck. We asked the waiter for the bill and were pleasantly greeted with a shot of wine liquor on the house. It was a traditional Slovenian drink and the waiter taught us the Slovenian "cheers". The liquor was delicious! It was similar to mulled wine but instead of hot it was cold. The waiter called it Teranova Liquor with a dash of cinnamon, sugar, and lemon. We wondered who had deemed us worthy to have this concoction. Was it the waiter because he saw us mingling with a local? Or was it the local himself? Either way were incredibly grateful.
After lunch we wandered the city, took photos, climbed a steep hill to a castle and went to hippy area where all the buildings in this hippie square are plastered with street art. Ljubljana truly is a beautiful city.
When we got back to the hostel, we cracked open a bottle of wine and chatted with our fellow hostel guests. The conversations went every which way. Some how we started talking about cinema which led to a discussion about Spanish and European cinema. Then this Macedonian started spewing loads of bullshit. He was extremely anatagonistic and would continue to be so as the night progressed to the bars. He even tried to tell a polish person what her culture is. All in all we were not a fan of Alex the Macedonian. The bar drinks did not help the situation because Natalie and Martyna's drink apparently contained no liquor! So after one nonalcoholic drink out Natalie, our new Canadian friend Martyna, and I decided to grab some food and call it a night as we were going to Lake Bled the next day.
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