Honest Homelessness Part 2

Day 6: “I really just want to be a caveman because they don’t have to deal with police”

For the first morning in awhile, the first thought I had when I woke up wasn’t “thank god no one found us.” We spread our stuff out to dry everything, packed and repacked our bags, and did a food inventory, all without feeling like we were about to get kicked out. Though the park that we wanted to spend the day at was only a few miles away, we were feeling pretty lazy and had had such good success hitchhiking in Croatia so far that we tried to get a ride along the way to the park. And it worked! Plitvice Lakes, which I had been anticipating most out of all places in Croatia, was surreal. We took so many pictures that even an old man, supported by his granddaughter and son (or that’s what I imagined anyway) passed us! I’m blaming David for most of it though- he’s worse than someone’s mom on prom day. But thanks to him, we did get some amazing pictures. The day was filled with waterfalls and raisins (the only food of sustenance that we had left).

We stayed at the park til closing, then hitched a ride with GP Guy (he was a doctor) and his mom. Actual age: somewhere around 30, though he could have been mistaken for a very mature frat brother. He cracked us up with hilarious stories from his childhood about throwing CD’s out the window after watching scary movies and complained that girls don’t go for nice guys anymore. Not only did he make us laugh, after overhearing us muttering about our dwindling food supply, he stopped and bought us dinner at a Croatian food hut along the side of the road in his home town, Imotski. Later, we explained to him that we were too cheap to pay for a hotel, so he took us to what he figured was the best camping spot in town- a Turkish fortress, which was apparently overlooking a huge lake that we could only just barely make out in the darkness of the night. What a guy. The spot was absolutely perfect, despite the fact that we switched tent sites three times. The first time, we heard footsteps and freaked out, and though it was only a flag waving in the wind, David was so nervous that we moved spots and got our Croatian letter explaining the hitch at the ready. Actually, I think the story goes that it was me who was so freaked out… Then, finally when we were all settled in with no thoughts of monster footsteps approaching us, it started raining. After a long debate in which we tried to muster up the energy to move by convincing ourselves that our cheap tent had essentially zero chance against the rain, we threw everything that was still outside into the tent and carried it up these winding, narrow steps praying to god we wouldn’t rip right through the thing. We selected a cave-like structure, felt for glass with our hands (there was some) and finally got to bed.

Day 7: Destination Dubrovnik 

What was the Blue Lake like in the light of day? Let’s just say that my morning pee was arguably the most beautiful pee spot I’ve had thus far. And I’ve been to some pretty beautiful places. After packing up, we wandered around Imotski, bought groceries (not enough, we ate everything all in one meal, plus the sub-par bland cheese put a damper on things) and made halfhearted attempts at hitchhiking, then got a ride with GP Guy to Split, which he had offered to us last night. Once in Split, we sat by the side of the road for awhile eating lunch, feeling more relaxed than ever about hitchhiking thanks to Brohannes. At one point, 15 or 20 cars pulled over on the side of the road and we thought we were getting surrounded by some sort of drug cartel- turns out it was only a funeral procession. But for those few minutes, I really thought we were about to get attacked by the Croatian Mob. Anyway, we then picked up another ride with Futsol Ref. I had never heard of futsol either, but apparently it’s like soccer juggling, played indoors. Basically, this guy’s life sounded awesome. He dropped us off at a restaurant on the side of a small road, but before he left bought us drinks and made us promise if he was ever in the states that we would return the favor.

 

Football stadium

The Blue Lake

The next few hours, we proceeded to get absolutely poured on and lost all shred of hope we had of making it to Dubrovnik, the southern-most city in Croatia and arguably the most beautiful one. Oh also, Dave got cheated out of 50 cents. But in Croatian money, it was a big deal (6 kuna)!  Luckily, I had just gotten a truck driver to agree to take us to Dubrovnik, so he simply glared at the cashier and ran out. This truck driver, I honestly don’t even know what to call him, ended up being our very last hitch of the entire trip. And he was probably our most favorite one of all. He gained our respect by telling some dirty Chuck Norris jokes, then later on in the ride explained that he had to pull over for about 45 minutes. It wasn’t because of any driving time restriction, it was to stop at his favorite beach, a stop he makes every time he does this drive. So there we were, with the sun setting, the waves lapping at the shore, skipping rocks and walking along the beach with a truck driver we had met only an hour or two ago. And he felt like an old friend. As Dave describes it, “he shared with us his most precious thing in the entire world.” Pretty much.

 

Skipping rocks with our truck driver friend

He dropped us off at a bridge leading to Dubrovnik, where it was pouring like mad. We knocked on the only building we could find, which turned out to be a sort of traffic control room. The only guy working, who spoke barely any English, turned out to be a life saver. He helped us find a hostel, called a cab for us, explained to the cab driver where we wanted to go, and set a price for the ride. He even showed us some of the traffic control devices. Though it wasn’t a lift, it was just as helpful, if not more.

When we first arrived at our hostel, I thought I had walked in on a family relaxing after dinner. Turns out the hostel was run out of the family’s home by an adorable older couple. We got cake and honey brandy, the next best thing to having dinner. We were exhausted and after hot showers went right to bed. And when I say went to bed I mean I actually got to sleep in a bed. A rare event in the life of hitchhiking Breann!

Day 8: Tourists at last

The shift from homelessness to touristness was nearly complete. We were clean, we had slept indoors (for the first time since London!) and we didn’t have to hitchhike anymore. As much as I missed hitchhiking already, it felt good to be on vacation. Though there were a few more illegal actions later in the day…

We spent the morning walking along the rocks next to the water (Dave’s idea), where I got 20% of the day’s cuts. Along the way, we found this unreal cave bar, it was just about the classiest thing I’d seen the entire trip. I cleaned my cuts, and more importantly we bought a milkshake. Once we wandered down to the old city of Dubrovnik, we honored our promise of swimming in Croatia and jumped off a dock. It drew up quite a crowd of old people, I guess it’s not very common plus it was still pretty frigid; two older ladies even gave us candies which was supposed to warm us up somehow? After napping in the sun to dry off we got yelled at and took that as our sign to stop sleeping and move on. Next up, breaking into the city walls! Walking the walls of the old city was something you had to pay for, I’m not sure why, but being cheap, young and able bodied, we hopped a fence (where the following 80% of cuts occurred) to get in within paying. I have to say the blood loss was worth it. The beauty of the city left me breathless, but even more shocking was the fact that we had gotten to it by spending nothing!

We had planned a wild night but instead got sidetracked by the internet and emails and life in general... I tried to be Brohannes about all my unread emails but failed miserably. On a positive note, I found out that I had gotten a research grant for this summer J

Day 9: Does it count as being homeless if all our possessions are in a shopping cart?

After another luxurious night sleeping in beds, we awoke, packed up our two backpacks worth of belongings, and headed out for one last excursion in Dubrovnik: riding a cable car up to a mountain overlooking a city. Maybe it was because of the gorgeous views, maybe it was because of the friendly couple we got wrapped up talking to, but we lost track of time up there and had to run through the city to make our bus to an island that left that afternoon. Damn you public transportation. Then, once on the bus, not only did we get yelled at for having our backpacks with us, we had to pay for said backpacks and stow them underneath. Oh, and on top of that, out of an entire bus full of people, we were the only two to get our passports checked. Clearly public transportation isn’t for us. Wait, there’s more: once the ride started, our sign which we had stored above the seats fell on a grandma! I was completely horrified and thought we were going to get kicked off the bus, so you can imagine my surprise when she replied with a smile and “it’s OK, I’m pretty tough.” That’s my kind of lady! And she turned out to be a huge help to us, telling us how long the bus stopped for each break, how the transfer unto the ferry worked, and finally once we got unto the island, which stop we needed to get off at. While Dave was busy entertaining her granddaughter, she told me about her life, how she had met her husband in Dubrovnik and how now she had retired on an island with him where they grew olives. So cool!

Anyway, she clued us in to something very important: the port that we were planning on leaving from at 6am the next morning was about 50 KILOMETERS from the main city on the island. Damn, it was a big island! Seeing as we had no intention of walking over a marathon’s distance at like 2 in the morning, we slightly changed our plans. Instead of getting off the bus in the main town, we took it across the island close to the ferry port. We didn’t arrive until the evening, so our island touring consisted of walking to a grocery store a mile or so away that we could see high up on a hill to replenish our food stock. We (I) went hog wild in the store, throwing various cookies and candy in the shopping cart before settling on 4 Kit Kat bars and a bag of cookies (I was hungry!). That night, we set up camp in a sort of farmer’s field near the grocery store and sat under the Croatian stars pigging out before heading to bed.

Day 10: Partying with the Croatians

We woke at an obscene hour, with hopes of making the catamaran out of the island. Trouble was, the catamaran left at 5:30am and we had given ourselves approximately two minutes to pack everything up. No catamaran for us. Instead, we took a ferry that left at a ‘more reasonable’ 6:15am. Since we knew (hoped) that we’d be sleeping in a hostel that night, we sadly said goodbye to our tent and left it near the side of the road in the hopes that someone who needed it would pick it up. Once on the ferry, we napped, ate sandwiches despite the fact that it was still very clearly not lunchtime, and planned out a few things to do in Split.

Upon arrival in Split, we found a hostel and showered immediately, hallelujah! Then we were off to explore the city, which consisted of napping in the sun, finding gelato, hiking up to a gorgeous viewpoint, shoe shopping, and encountering what I’d like to think of as an icon in Split, Bad Santa, so named for his big belly and white beard. We had heard that there was some sort of light festival going on that night with free food, so naturally we went to check it out. I can honestly say that after watching the parade, getting free food and drinks, listening to the band and watching the fireworks, we still had absolutely no idea what the festival was for. Better start reading up on my Croatian I guess! Another reason I wish I knew Croatian: that night at a grocery store when we were trying (and failing) to pick out drinks to buy a kindly man noticed our struggles and pointed to what was apparently the best one, amongst the laughter of the entire store.

Oh and of course, Bad Santa made an appearance that night, dancing in the moonlight and clearly loving the free food and drink.

Day 11: Home

Our last day in Croatia, sadly. We took a bus to Zadar, where our flight was leaving from. We were short about 25 kuna ($4) to buy two bus tickets to the airport, cue to act homeless once again. We tried to trade euros for kunas, but most people weren’t having it. Though one kind woman gave us her change of 5 kuna! Finally, at the brink of desperation, someone agreed to trade kunas for euros and we were able to buy the tickets.

The next order of business was giving away all our things that couldn’t be taken on the flight back home. Dave gave his knife to a kind taximan who then did a mini photoshoot of us (weird? friendly? you decide). I offered what looked like two backpackers the remains of our peanut butter and Nutella. Turns out they were about to fly too and couldn’t take it. Turns out they had just done the same charity hitchhike as us! We spent the bus ride to the airport trading stories with them about our crazy experiences. Once at the airport, we pooled all our kuna change together and had enough to buy one donut, which we split amongst the four of us. That, plus an apple, was all I had eaten that day. Also at the airport, we put our whiteboard sign to rest, after it had served us well on our journey. We split up from the other team after our flight from Croatia arrived in Somewhere in England, United Kingdom. Real name is East Midlands Airport, but who’s ever heard of that? Dave and I practically, OK fine literally, ran to a café once we landed and each bought and devoured 2 foot long sandwiches. I didn’t think I had it in me, but oh I most certainly did. We then had a connecting flight to Edinburgh where my bag got searched because I tried to smuggle/wanted to see what happened if I left my exacto knife and a more than 100 mL sized sunscreen in my bag. Livin in the edge! While the Croatian airport apparently doesn’t give a shit, the United Kingdom unfortunately does.

 

RIP, whiteboard

And after we arrived in Edinburgh, well that was pretty much it. My post hitchhiking days are certainly not as exciting. To spice things up a bit and to remind myself of my hitch days, I’ve made some questionable (according to my flatmates) snacks, most of which involve cheese and another food item that typically isn’t eaten with cheese. Finals, studying, blah blah blah snore have also been happening. Hopefully there’s more excitement in the near future!

Thoughts:

It took us 22 rides and 5 days to get the 1500 miles to Zagreb, Croatia. From there, we got 8 more rides over 2 days, taking us another 500 miles to Dubrovnik, Croatia.

On the morning we were about to set off on this trip, I woke up with the song “Home” by Phillip Phillips blasting in my ears, oddly. And on that morning I am ashamed to remember thinking, I just want the trip to be over and I want to be back home here in my room, safe. Despite the concerns from my parents, friends and boyfriend, I had assured them all that I would be fine, that nothing would happen to me. But on that morning, I couldn’t help but have a shred of doubt and think, damn I hope I’m right.

I just looked up the lyrics: 

Hold on, to me as we go/As we roll down this unfamiliar road/And although this wave is stringing us along/Just know you're not alone/Cause I'm gonna make this place your home/Settle down, it'll all be clear/Don't pay no mind to the demons/They fill you with fear/The trouble it might drag you down/If you get lost, you can always be found

Looking back, this song describes the hitchhike perfectly. Because of the kindness of all who we met, I found a home on the road, one that I love. Before this trip, I had no idea how touched my heart would be by humankind, by those who didn't know us, by some of those who couldn't even really understand us. In small ways, like mints or candies and in big ways, like driving us hundreds of miles through Europe, we were helped in some way by each and every person we interacted with. I want to thank Old Couple for being our first ride and making my start to hitchhiking a good one, that truck driver I saw with no pants who made me a bit more cautious about approaching you guys, our last truck driver for sharing with us something very special to you, Albert for taking us along a beautiful scenic road without it being creepy at all, the army wife for the lucky dollar bill you gave us, and lastly my friend David for doing this with me, and putting up with me the whole time :)

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