Welcome to Croatia... country #47

We could easily have spent more time in Slovenia, but the incoming colder weather motivates us to continue heading further south. We knew this was going to happen, and it was part of the plan. But it's still frustrating not to be able to spend more time in these new-to-us countries.

And I don't think we're going to spend much time in Croatia either. The warmer weather is certainly along the coast, but wild camping (boondocking) is strictly against the law in Croatia, and the €400 fine is a bit of a turn off!

And that leaves staying in campgrounds along the coast, which are ridiculously expensive. In some situations, it is literally cheaper to book an Airbnb and park Max! 

Yes, we have heard... the Croatian coast is supposed to be beautiful. But, we are quite happy inland provided that the weather stays warm enough. Besides, we will have lots of time on the coast when we get to Turkey.

So yesterday, we stayed away from the main toll highway and took the backroads to a small border crossing. It was a bit of a long drive... it took just over three hours of driving to do 175 kms (108 miles). But there wasn't much traffic and it was a lot more scenic and certainly more relaxing than an hour and a half on the motorway would have been!

Scenery along the way.

It was overcast all day, and spit with rain on and off. Temperature about 14C (57F), but it warmed up to 17C (63F) by the time we arrived at the border.

This area of Slovenia is known for the number of sink holes.

You can see one just to the right of that fir tree.

The fall colors are quite pretty.

This area reminded us of driving through parts of Ontario.

More sink holes.

Interesting.

Just an old house.

We are really close to the border now.

In fact, that's Croatia on the right side of this valley.

Curvy road.

It's really pretty in this area.

We pulled into the Slovenia border station and the guy was just going to wave us through. We have German licence plates, and Croatia is part of the European Union so he was just being lazy and assumed we were German citizens. However Croatia is not part of the Schengen visa zone, so as Canadian citizens we need to be checked out of Slovenia and checked into Croatia on the other side of the bridge. 

I rolled down my window and handed him our passports.

"Oh..." he says... "you're not from Germany".

I explained the situation, and he took our passports to stamp us out, and then wished us a safe trip.

Going across the Kolpa River which forms 118 kms (73 miles) of the Slovenia/Croatia border.

Entering Croatia.

The Croatia border guard was very pleasant and took our passports and scanned them into his computer. They do not stamp your passport as you enter. Then he asked for our vaccination certificates (or negative test results) which we provided.

And that was it, we are now in Croatia... country #47 for us.

I had read of a restaurant only five minutes from the border where they have allowed motorhomes to spend the night in their big parking lot. Ruth was due for a break from cooking, and we hadn't eaten out at all so far this month.

My first Croatian beer!

Ruth had a glass of red house wine. No idea where it was from!

We had roast suckling pig with rice and grilled vegetables.

Total bill including one beer, one wine, tax and tip was 177 kuna ($34 CAD, $27.50 USD) for the two of us. Not bad. We were stuffed.

Slept fine last night, even though we heard the rain coming down really hard at one point.

Heading towards Plitvice National Park today. 

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