Chronicles of Leisure

So on Tuesday the 2nd I boarded a 7 p.m. overnight ferry to Rijeka. I paid a few extra Kunas for a cabin, figuring I would want a place to lie down for a few hours at some point. After many Jack & Cokes at the bar, I ended up playing gin rummy with an Aussie and his Croatian wife and father-in-law. After their patience in reminding me how to play, I proceeding to win the next two games despite being intoxicated. The father-in-law, Giga, the rummy master, grew short with me and eventually stormed off claiming exhaustion. I think I stumbled to my cabin around 2 a.m.

At 7 a.m. I was awakened by a cabin steward in my cabin screaming “Rijeka! Rijeka!” Apparently we had arrived and the entire ferry had disembarked. I had slept through the ship-wide announcement and my alarm. As I disembarked, I discovered the Croatian heat wave had come to a crashing end. It was about 20 degrees cooler and pissing down rain. I immediately developed a fondness for the hated heat wave. Feeling a little rough around the edges from the night before, I was unable to resist the golden arches, drooling at the thought of a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit and hash brown. No such luck, the only breakfast fare was toast with a piece of cheese on it – unacceptable. So it was a Royal with cheese and fries for breakfast, which was delicious, cooked upon order, and delivered to me at my table by a stunning McDonald”s employee. Perhaps a more prestigious job here?

On to tourist info. where I was informed that the next ferry to Rab was a 5 p.m. high speed catamaran, a quick 1 hour 45 minute journey. Alternatively, there was a 10:30 a.m. bus that drives down the coast for a few hours, drives onto a super ferry over to Rab, and then drives across Rab to Rab Town – which was where I was going. Currently it is 8 a.m., and I realize that short of hanging out all day in the rain in the port town of Rijeka, I am going to have to get on another Croatian bus. I rationalize that in this horrible weather the bus driver will be cautious.

A few hours later the bus driver is flying around sharp turns with nothing below me but a thousand feet to the ocean. Talking on mobile phones and smoking cigarettes while driving appear to be standard here, and I wonder how good the treads are on the tires and what hydroplaning over one of the cliffs would be like. None of this prepares me for what comes next, when our bus driver begins overtaking other vehicles in no passing zones while winding along the cliffs. First a dump truck, which in fairness wasn’t going that fast. I thought the car towing the caravan was doing decent speed, but we overtook them. Finally, as our bus overtakes a motorcycle and then must break heavily coming into a turn around the cliff, I laugh out loud uncontrollably, realizing that Metallica Fade to Black is blaring on my iPod. “I have lost the will to live” Damn it, no I haven’t, this is ridiculous! There is a bus ahead of us which has passed all of the same vehicles, and apparently our driver feels he must stay on the pace. I begin to suspect that the blond, attractive Croatian girl sitting behind the driver and constantly yapping with him has brought out some sense of Croatian bus driver machismo, and I am not happy about it. If ever a Xanax would have come in handy. Fortunately, we stop soon to let off passengers, and the bus ahead of us does not, creating enough separation that we are no longer following. After what seems like an eternity, we arrive at a ferry port where we drive onto the ferry for a quick 15 minute crossing to Rab. On the other side, it is a quick 15 minute ride to Rab Town, where it is raining heavily, and I do not care. My time on the Croatian bus system is done. Never again I vow.