Trip Review - Rome, Toarmina, Yacht Week Croatia

3RD STOP: CROATIA

I spent 9 days in Croatia total. 2 days prior to Yacht Week in Split, and 7 days for Yacht Week. We started Yacht Week in Trogir, and went to Vis, Palmizana, and Hvar. I pretty much skipped all exploration of the destinations - although we did walk around Hvar for a while. The focus of this week was throwing down on the 40 ft Catamaran and trying to survive the night parties. Half of our group members did not sleep the first 3 nights. The night parties did not begin until midnight and often did not end until 6 am. I struggled here, but I thoroughly enjoyed the day raft parties. I honestly would not recommended more than stopping by any of the destinations for more than a day or 2. If you're young and like to party, Yacht Week is the way to go if you're visiting Croatia.

SPLIT

As I said, we spent 2 days here. We rented an apartment through hotels.com. The apartment was fine. Modern deco and it had everything we needed. Short walk to the Diocletian Palace where everything is at. The palace is old but has been converted into a shopping district. It was pretty strange. Outside the palace, you can see a lot of graffiti - such as the demon family that welcomed us back each night:



Plaza outside the entrance to our apartment:



Diocletian Palace:












Yacht Week:

This was the main event and it lived up to the hype. I initially was afraid that event would be very structured and kind of corporatized. I was wrong. Our skipper was very flexible and really we only stuck to a loose schedule of where to be on what day. We were free to do as we chose otherwise. The festivities usually began around 10 or 11 am each day with a raft party and the nightly clubs would end around 6 am (or so I'm told. I usually passed out at 3 am or earlier). They purchased a castle on Vis - Fort George and threw one of the nightly parties there. That was a pretty cool sight to see. Anyways, here's a compiliation of all the pictures. Feel free to ask more.



This was during the height of the first raft party. If you count the people on the roof, I believe it totals 30 with about 20 more on the first deck. It was wild. I'm surprised other catamarans were telling people to GTFO, so most found refuge with us and that's how we accumulated so many. We were lucky and only had to pay 200 kuna (~30 usd) for a lost oar at the end of the week. People were doing all kinds of aerial tricks off the top deck from the back (front flips, back flips, double gainers, etc.). Sound system usually stayed at max capacity. My ability to sleep evolved into something that I found to be quite amazing by the end of the week. I fell asleep at times in the main parlor amongst 30 people partying with the music blaring. It seemed to be pretty uninterrupted sleep too looking back.



Skipper took off auto-pilot, and let me drive then promptly asked if I would like a beer .



^we switch places with the other half of the group and went to the marina the day after the first raft party. Our skipper was cool enough to let us take the dinghy to the 2nd day's raft party since we wanted to go back. Shenanigans ensued. I became known as the dinghy skipper.




Circle raft party - somewhat subdued since it was early, only lasted for a couple hours, and people had stayed up late the night before. It originally was cancelled, but then we ended up doing it on the last day for a short period of time. The skipper called it "just for the picture raft."



I represented TX, but we did spend the 4th in Palmizana. I woke up around 8 am to a guy drinking beer adorned in an America flag yelling "USA baby!" (pronounced bay-bay). The locals and foreigners ended up hating us by midday from all of our shenanigans. I taught the Fiji girls on our boat how to shotgun a beer:



Picture from the first night's party:



Shore nearby on the 1st day's raft party:





Marina at Palmizana:



I met our crew through their crew finder forum. They were all really nice and we got along well except for the older lady who joined last minute and didn't know what she was getting herself into. The separate parties did their own thing for the most part outside of the day parties, but it was a good balance in the end. Love these guys:



Misc:











That sums it up. If you have any questions, just ask. Maybe I'll see you out on Yacht Week Greece next year.

Serious camel toe in the coliseum pic. Iwnhi

Take the pictures with you out immediately brother. Trust me.

Bump for completed Croatia review.

(no message)

I'm not privy to the connection here. This I assume was some sort of landmark marker as it was at the peak next to a pile of rocks in which people took turns making the mountain taller.

Thanks man . I can't recommend Taormina enough for anyone who wants to relax, eat good food, drink good wine, and experience the local culture. Conversely, if you're looking to party, it's hard to beat tyw Croatia as well.