Croatia - Palmizana

We quickly discovered that whist surrounded by incredibly clear water, Hvar does not have the best beaches. Conveniently, there was several water taxis waiting to scoot us off to some deserted islands for the small price of £3 - about the same as a bus trip in London!


So we hopped on to our little speedboat and were whisked off to the island of Palmizana - pristine, beautiful and near empty, it was like our own little slice of paradise.


Jelly shoes are a good idea for Croatia - although the water is amazingly refreshing to swim in and the clearest I've ever seen, there is a lack of sand and quite a few sea urchins bobbing about inbetween the rocks, as I found out! (but they only live where the water is cleanest!)

There was a small sandy section on Palmizana though, and I recommend getting down there early to secure one of the sunbeds - or reserving ahead for Langini beach bar which looks incredible, but all the sunbeds were booked up a day in advance!


We soaked up the sun before retiring for my favourite lunch of the week, at Zori - one of the three restaurants on the island.






Cheap prices for incredible food, whilst overlooking your own (relatively) private island - what's not to love? A definite must stop if you go to Croatia.

Then it was back to Hvar for another night of dancing under the stars before jetting off to an even more amazing island tomorrow - more next time :)

Barbados 2

So we kicked off 2014 by learning how to surf... 

I stood up on the first go! however almost immediately got hit by a giant surfboard in my leg - surfing is pretty dangerous, even for me! I got back on though :) 

We went and saw some animals at the Barbados Wildlife Reserve, which was so nice as they were free to roam around a giant jungle with the benefit of being fed daily! 

ginormous tortoises!

then kicked off the boat trips... for some reason my dad decided to book two different catamaran trips! The first one was Cool Runnings - a really fun day where we swam with sea turtles, dove down to ship wrecks and watched a beautiful sunset. We ate some great food and ended with everybody dancing on the deck under the stars!

The second catamaran trip was with Calabaza (below). They were a little bit more informative and peaceful as there were less people to accommodate, and the catamaran was so luxurious! The people on the boat were really lovely and took lots of pictures (underwater too!) for us to (cry over) look at when we were back home. We did essentially the same things on this trip as the one before, but the whole experience was completely different! We were really lucky to be able to experience both! 

 

my brother feeding the fishes! 

 

Another day we went to Hunte's Gardens, down the road from our hotel. It was one of the most magical places I have ever been - built in 2 years, in a sink hole by a very eccentric man of about 70 who lives in a little hut overlooking the beauty. There was classical music playing and you could just sit and listen to the birds singing and the music, it was amazing. 

I took the opportunity to try and work out how to use the macro lens my boyfriend bought me for Christmas here - took a few goes but eventually worked out the (very) basics! 

And that concludes Barbados! Literally the best place I have ever been in my whole life, everybody was so lovely and caring and everything was so beautiful! The food and drink are all amazing - basically it is an unspoilt paradise, and I hope to go back there someday!