I really am getting slack at this!!

Day 33 – spent another day wandering around Dubrovnik, headed up to the fort opposite the walled city. There really wasn’t much there other than a great view of the walled city.

In the afternoon I went to visit the Europe’s oldest working pharmacy, originally opened in 1317, and the Franciscan Monastery. Unfortunately, I could not take photos of the old pharmacy, books and amazing old religious artifacts but here a few photos of the courtyard

Day 34 – I took a day trip to Montenegro to see Kotor. Have to say the tour guide was one of the least personable people I have ever met, especially for a tour guide. Everybody enjoyed what we saw but nobody seemed to like the guide and also the bus was ridiculously uncomfortable and tightly packed. In saying all of that it was really nice day and Kotor is a beautiful town.

In Kotor there is a church halfway up a hill with a fort at the top, it is around 1500 steps to get right to the top. Maya did the full round trip and said it was amazing but I don’t think I could have made it in the 1.5 hours we had in the town, perhaps if we had a few more hours there I would have tried.

After Kotor we headed to Budva, according to the tour guide it is a very popular beach destination with the Russians, personally, I couldn’t see why you would want to go there as the beach was nothing special and there were much nicer beaches and cliff side towns further along the coast.

Day 35 – Headed into the old city to discover there were two cruise ships in town, adding around 5000 people to the tourist numbers. Lets just say I would hate to see what it is like here in Summer! I pretty much just ate lunch and left the old city as I hated the crowds. Later in the afternoon, after the boats left, I headed back in to go and have a few drinks with some people I had met the day before.

Day 36 – transit day, flew from Dubrovnik to Munich and then to Athens. Arrived in Athens quite late and stayed at the Sofitel at the airport as I was leaving the next day for Metsovo.

Day 37 – well another adventure driving day!! I was originally supposed to fly up to Ioannina, hire a car and drive to Metsovo, however, my flight was changed from 8 am til 6 pm and I decided I didn’t want to waste a day, so I hired a car and drove up instead. This time I choose a manual as it was about 200 euro cheaper!! The drive was amazing, Greece has such beautiful scenery. Driving a manual was not as bad as I thought, I did have to mentally keep reminding myself to change gears with the right hand, I found first and second the hardest to use, which was not good when I got to Metsovo. Not sure what the go is here with all the speed cameras, but nobody seemed to care as everybody was doing at least 20km over the speed limit at all times, was very strange. Plus some of the places chosen by some drivers to overtake were terrifying for me, if I was their passenger I would have asked them to let me walk! Stopped to grab a couple of photos on the drive but there really wasn’t many places to stop.

So the drive went well until I got to Metsovo, I misunderstood the instructions the hotel gave me and ended up on very small laneways almost at the bottom of the valley, Metsovo is built down the side of a mountain. The poor old hire car’s clutch was probably not very happy with me by the time I got back up the mountain to the town centre. I think I stalled it close to 20 times trying to get up really steep cobbled roads, and there were a few times reversing with a stone wall on one side and cliff on the other that my heart was in my mouth. Luckily I know where the hotel is now so I will not be doing that again!!

Day 38 – it is pouring rain today, hoping it lets up a bit soon so I can have a wander around the village. Tomorrow I am off to Meteora for the day, super excited about that!!