Split, Croatia Laundry for the Long Haul

My epic purge in Seattle came after a few longer trips with a carry on, so I’m familiar with packing in layers for varying climates. As a general rule I spot clean as I go and air out clothes a few times before washing. When laundry is inevitable, as with most Plan A – Z personalities, I don’t have just one laundry option. I have three.

Option 1: Book accommodations with a washer (and dryer when you are REALLY lucky outside the U.S.) and always bring laundry soap sheets. As dryers are rare, most accomodations have drying racks and I have to count on 1-2 days drying time.

The Split Apartment has a tiny Whirlpool washer with an even tinier capacity inside.

Given the hot water tank above heated exactly 2 minutes of shower time a day, I wasn’t sure I wanted to waste it to wash clothes when the cold water setting wouldn’t engage.

I tried a small load and then waited literally 4 days for my one hoodie to dry on a rack in the entryway.

Option 2: Scrubba bag. I brought this along for any rural travel where I can’t count on having a washing machine, such as my 4-6 week Kiwi Experience tour in New Zealand, where I will be both bus and hostel- hopping.

The key to scrubba is to pre and post soak for 3 min with the scrubbing in between. This helps pull out any pre-treated stains and gets clothes cleaner. Big downside to scrubba is there is no mechanism to squeeze water out like you would have in a spin cycle with a machine.

The downside to both Options 1 and 2 is time. With such a minimal wardrobe, waiting 4-5 days to get heavier items dry means making do with too many layers if its cold.

Option 3: Find a laundromat (or laundry service as a last resort). You save time because you can do full wardrobe in one go AND it is dry the same day.

After being cold for 4 full days with my hoodie out of circulation, I decided Option 3 was the only option for my remaining time in Split. Lucky for me, 4 short stops on the bus away from the apartment was the Music Laundry, a tiny laundromat with a whopping 3 washer/dryer combos.

The short blurb I could find on Google said I needed 1 Euro coins and that all detergent was pre-loaded into the machine. WIFI was available and a rather decandent coffee machine, a complete necessity in coffee-mad Split.

I exchanged a 20 Euro note at the local bank and set off jingling a full pocket of change so I could get a full reset on my wardrobe and enjoy my day trip to Mostar and Herzegovina on Saturday.

In addition to WIFI, the owner has a nice pop mix playing in the background and stacks of sticky notes that patrons can write messages on and share their thoughts as they wait on their laundry.

With the help of Doris, a college professor who happened to be a regular and spoke impeccable British English, I navigated my first load. As it happens, Doris was mostly a Project Manager at her college and had recently attended a workshop on AI (I’m noticing a trend here with my new travel friends). We talked about hallucinations and how to train a tool and the 90 minutes to complete the wash/dry cycle flew by. I wrapped my fully fluffed capsule wardrobe back in the waterproof scubba bag for the rainy/windy trek to the return bus stop and gave her a quick hug.

A little later that day, Doris emailed me links to a few foreign instructor english teacher jobs I could peruse if I felt Croatia was a contender for a later stay. She was the first person I had had a full conversation with since arriving in Split and I look forward to maybe meeting up with her again on a future laundry day.