Off to Artaturi

The Italians are coming, the Italians are coming!!  Sounds like a cry that should echo about the sentry posts of the world. The summer holidays start on the 15th July in Italy, and every man and his dog jumps on a boat and heads for Croatia. I'm not kidding, the harbours here are just packed now, predominantly with Italians. Many of them are naked too, so Megan has made up big score cards out of 10 to hold up and rate them after a performance. Its mainly for men who like to show off their pink bits to the whole world from the sugar scoop stern of their boat. She felt that they deserved some kind of feedback for the impressive shows they put on.

Anchorage at Brbinj

Sun and Sea

Quiet and peaceful anchorage

After Zadar, Megan and I wanted to get away from the crowds for a bit, so we headed for Dugi Otak, which is a long island north of the Kornatis. It is also a national park, but unlike the Kornatis, it is lushly forested. We spend some peaceful few days at Lucina/Brbinj on the north-east coast. It was one of the few harbours that did not charge for anchoring on this island. We walked across the island to the next bay, and generally just unwound. Next, it was off to a small channel between the islands of Morat and Ist. We initially chose the Morat harbour of Zapuntel, but when the man turned up wanting mooring fees, we told him we'd leave. It was on dusk, so we motored across the small channel and anchored behind some other laid moorings. Sure enough, a little man appeared and asked for money as we were "too close to his moorings", even though it was dark and these buoys were unused. We asked how far we had to move, and ended up moving 10 metres nearer the shore. Every one now happy.

Island hopping

Island of Ist! Ist was?

Light and shade

More deserted islands, that's a church on the top of the hill

Really a stunningly beautiful maritime environment

From Ist, we headed up to a rather unusual town built on a small channel that passed between two islands. The islands were Ilovik and Sveti Petar. It was a charming anchorage, but we stayed on a buoy only long enough to pick up some bread. We were still wanting peace and quiet, so we headed for the large island of Losinj. We tried three anchorages, at Luka Cikat, Koludarc and Mali Losinj before finding what we were looking for at Artaturi.

Townlet of Ilovik

Shady parks and gardens

Main street of Ilovik

Ilovik garden

The town sits on a narrow channel between two islands.

Artaturi is a large but sheltered bay, open only to the south. The holding is great on sand/mud and there's lots of room to swim. Although there's a lot of boats anchoring in here, its a 'family atmosphere' and quite friendly. The swimming is great off the boat and we feel really secure here. We're almost at the height of summer, the daily temperature is hitting 32 - 34 degrees and its HOT! The main goal is to do as little as possible, and stay as cool as possible. Megan has even invented some shade awnings suspended from the boom to stop the hull heating up so much inside. Clever girl!

Great anchorage at Artaturi

A great swimming site with good holding and crystal clear water.

Our days of island hopping are over however. Tomorrow, we're heading for Istria, the northernmost mainland district of Croatia. We plan to leave Pavlov in a marina near Pula, and catch the bus into Slovenia. Its a lot easier to cross the border that way rather than take Pavlov in, which would involve paying for a new cruising permit. Once we get to Ljubljana, we plan to rent a car to visit Bled and other places Megan knows in Slovenia. See ya then.