This post is a difficult one for me. My dad and I stayed in Korana, Croatia for two nights. We visited two amazing national parks, and Korana was probably my favorite place to stay in my nine months of European travel. The difficult part is that most of my photos look terrible. I don't know if it was the weather, or if my lens was dirty, or if the camera software just got overloaded from the bright vivid colors. Regardless of what the cause was, I've got a folder of almost 250 photos and most of them look awful.
Korana is a tiny little village right next to Croatia's most popular national park. The village contains only a handful of buildings and a lovely little river that runs through the middle of it. The river is clearer than what you would find in an amusement park.
This is the whole village. I believe we stayed in Sankorana or the house next to it.
I'm not sure what I loved about this village so much. We didn't have internet for the whole time we were there, and there wasn't much to do in the village besides walk and read. But something about it made me fall in love. There was a certain tranquility that I felt immediately as we got out of the van.
The air was brisk and fresh. The babbling river was perfect. The houses were charming and rustic. And a little baby lamb came to greet us.
The neighbor next door owned the lamb and was letting it out to get some fresh grass. He also had a vicious guard-pony that kept harassing the lamb while we talked with its owner. The pony kept chasing the lamb around and around. The lamb just wanted to eat grass. The pony just wanted to eat lamb.
I'm not kidding about the pony being vicious. I caught a picture of it when it bit my dad.
The neighbor who owned the animals was an interesting and friendly guy. He talked about the animals and then told some stories about the war in the 90's. He told us about being captured and tortured. It sounded like a real shitty time for the whole country. I guess that's true of all wars.
We arrived to Korana after a long day of hiking in Velká Paklenica National Park. The park was pretty cool, but I'm not really a fan of hiking.
I'm not real sure why I dislike hiking, I guess I just get bored pretty quickly. Like I get it, trees and mountains. Cool. Can we move on now? No, six more hours of more trees and more mountains. I know I'm supposed to have some sort of special feeling when I "get back to nature", but I usually just feel tired, hungry, hot, and sweaty.
Everyone else in the group seemed to enjoy it, so if you're the type who likes hiking, this is probably a good place for it. For me, I would have preferred being in a boat or raft. Or being on a bicycle or motorbike.
Our lunch stop was awesome though! And it was probably worth the long hike to reach it. Up on a mountain is Paklenica Hut. All the the food and supplies have to be brought in by mule.
Our host made a traditional meal that is cooked by putting coals on top of a cast iron shallow cooking pot with a stone lid.
The food was meat and potatoes along with some other vegetables and seasoning. It was fantastic!
Not a bad place to have lunch!
This is how the supplies were brought up to the hut.
After lunch we were given homemade schnapps.
After lunch we hiked for a few hours to get back to the van. I was exhausted from the hiking.
The national park is also popular with mountain climbers.
After spending the day hiking through the national park, we loaded up into the van and drove to Korana. The next day we went to National Park Plitvicka Jezera. I think I'll save those photos for tomorrow's post. I didn't think I had enough usable photos for two posts, but I think I do. This one filled up pretty quickly.
