I was insomniac during the night so I read off and on. When dawn came, I leant out of the window and took this picture of the delicate shades of the sky.
Breakfast was very ample. Besides the usual bread and jams there were cold meats, cheese and yoghurt. I am going to take it easy today after all that driving around the island yesterday. A dolce far niente day.
Above the village there are vineyards and an old church. The path led down to the water again near the Feral restaurant and boats in the marina. I heard English being spoken by some crew. I suspect that the holiday apartments on the opposite side of the bay are occupied by tourists in season.
From here one can see the stark mountains of the mainland.
The water is very clear, I can see the fishes and plants in it.
The colour of the water is the shimmering pale aqua characteristic of this region. This shot is looking back towards the mainland. In the distance, hidden around the corner, is Korčula Town.
I sat near the water, reading. When that got too warm, I adjourned to the patio of the Pansion, and when that got too warm, I went up to my room to siesta. I had thought that a room just under the roof would be too warm, but there is a constant flow of air through the open windows that keeps the heat down.
Croatian table service is attentive but not servile. Dalmatia has been receiving tourists for a long time. The industry is recovering from the hiatus due to the war. I get the feeling that Croatians would rather earn their living from some other way than tourism, but this is the best for the moment.
At breakfast I chatted with the landlady. They have visited Sydney before during the 2000 Olympics. They know Croats in the my home suburb and the next one. And then my usual question: Why didn't Serbia let Croatia leave Yugoslavia peacefully? Well, she said, they were used to lording over us and they wanted the coastline. Yes, terrible crimes were committed by both sides.
At the rental office they wanted to hold Diana and Laurie's passports as security and that was not acceptable so they went to another car hire company. They first drove me out to Lumbarda where I had difficulty explaining to the matriarch at the Pansion that I wanted a room. I found that German worked better than Italian. Anyway I'm booked in for 3 nights.
Lumbarda is at the south-eastern tip of the island. We drove west along the southern coastal road and reached a vantage point where we could see Lastovo island, and in the distance, Mljet island.
At the western end we found a nice restaurant in the postcard scenery town of Vela Luka. (Luka means port in Croatian and similar languages, so it's common in place names.)
On the way back, we wanted to take the northern coastal road, and succeeded, after a few false starts. Unfortunately the road petered out after Babina and we had to retrace our way to the backbone road. The maps we had were too optimistic.
Back in Korčula Town, we enjoyed an afternoon break of coffee and cake at a cafe. These cute kittens were playfully tussling on a nearby window ledge. We enquired at a travel agency about excursions to Mljet. Yes, they did run on Wednesdays, such as the day after tomorrow, but the agent could not sell us tickets until Tuesday.
The view from my Pansion is so clear and the air is so fresh that I can understand why German tourists want to come all the way here.
Dusk slowly descended on the town and tranquility ruled.
After dinner at a nearby family restaurant, I settled to reread Jan Morris' Fifty Years of Europe. I enjoyed her delightful observation about European eating habits: The Italians eat most sensibly. The British eat most unhealthily. The Spaniards eat most abstemiously. The Scandinavians eat most fastidiously. The Greeks eat most monotonously. The Belgians eat most indigestibly. The French eat most pretentiously. The Germans eat most.
