Some people think that I’m a bit crazy for adding in countries and cities that they’ve barely heard of. Heck, I admit that I didn’t even know quite where Croatia was when I first grabbed the Lonely Plant off of the library shelf and added it to the stack of considerations. All of my route-planning research was done at the public library around August and September; I literally checked out a stack of 20-or-so Lonely Planets and guidebooks on every location that looked both remotely interesting and was near my roughly planned route.

Sunset in Milna after the rains cleared.

And it was the pictures that did it for me. Croatia has miles of stunning coastline along the Adriatic in addition to a lot of hiking opportunities – that’s what kind of sold me on the location. Then, as a happy little coincidence, when I ran the Croatia idea by Helen, she shot an email off to a family friend and confirmed that, yes indeed, there was a small cottage in Milna (on the island of Brać), just begging us to rent it for a nominal fee. We couldn’t pass up the opportunity so we planned out a solid six days on the island with the Jenn, H, and I relaxing, taking is slow, and soaking up the sun.

The only problem? There wasn’t any sun!!

We arrived in Milna in a bit of a drizzle and that progressed into a full-out storm over the following few days. The rain came and went though so we were able to take the three minute walk to the harbor’s edge, buy some groceries, and cook up hearty “winter” food…H made a fantastic five-bean soup that simmered on the stove all day and made the cottage smell divine all day long and had my tummy gurgling in anticipation for hours.

Notice the look of pure joy on Jenn?!

The first days in Milna were spent cloistered inside to stay dry and warm with only brief outings in the evening to stroll the harbor, pick up more food, and get our favorite treat….gelato!

It really didn’t take the three of us very long to sniff out the gelateria; we became instant friends with the owner and at every parting he gave us a hearty “see you later” rather than a “see you tomorrow” because we made it a habit to buy gelato at least twice a day. Gelato-man was my savior throughout the days of dreary rain. The sun came out very briefly and we would all grab raincoats (just in case) and run outside to soak up any possible sun and fresh air…plus get in a bit of exercising to keep our legs from atrophying.

The rain was a bit of a big downer for us. I know that Jenn had visions of heading back to LA with an awesome tan from hours of laying out on the beach but those plans were shelved as the storms raged on for the first three days.

A quick hike between rains.

We had two consolations though: internet and home-cooked food. The gods were smiling on us in some ways because we managed to pick up a Wifi internet signal from the front stoop of the cottage.

Actually, the faint signal was available in three key places and this is where we camped out for the first three days: J upstairs with her tiny net-book perched on the front windowsill, H sitting at the porch table with her laptop facing one particular direction, and me, shoved in a tight corner behind the front door…sadly I had to actually face into the corner like a child in time-out to get the signal.

Call me a technology-addict if you please, but I was sooooo grateful to have Wifi for the week on Milna. Julie, the woman from whom we rented the cottage, told us that we would have to walk 25 minutes every day and pay huge fees to access the internet on the island. Thank the baby Jesus that we didn’t have to do that!! Although…on the flip side, I probably would have read a lot more without the Wifi!