Split, Croatia April 16 – Riva Promenade

After almost a week of grey overcast days, the sun peeked out and I took a break from daily mall walks to go to the Old Town section of Split, a short bus ride away. I understand now why this is such a popular destination for other EU members.

On the way to the water is an outdoor mall with a mix of large clothing stores, such as Zara, mixed with Ray-ban and ice cream shops.

At the end of the short walk is an explosion of coffee bars on both the left and the right.

Croatians LOVE their coffee and the coffee bar will be the most packed establishment, regardless if it’s 10am and the mall just opened, or if it’s a tiny local hangout with three chairs, it will be packed. They don’t eat when they have coffee. The coffee bars try, offering an insulin crashing array of pastries, cookies, baklava, even popcorn gelato. Some coffee bars offer sandwiches and filled filo-dough pastries called bureks, but only the tourists buy.

I usually gravitate toward the busiest restaurant when I don’t know where to eat, especially if it’s filled by locals but only the tourists were having lunch at 12:45 pm, when I arrived. I decided to walk from one end to the other and then head back to my apartment for lunch.

As with most touristy areas, you can find alleys and doorways to internal streets where locals shop.

Its shoulder season in Split, so many of the outlying bars were empty.

This ancient corner led to new construction and more office buildings as soon as I turned the corner.

I will need to take one of the many versions of walking tours to understand what these buildings housed.

I knew that Split was a large ferry hub but I also saw cruise ships, catamarans, private yachts and sailboats.

I was surprised that this private, not tour catamaran was so much bigger than the coffee bar once I got closer.

I snuck as close as the rough sea and glaring owners allowed to some of the smaller yachts.

There are sunset cruises from further down that I hear are stunning. I’ll have to check that out before I go to Albania.