Tuesday, 10^th May, 11 and Wednesday, May 11, 2011; Kornati Islands

Kalani takes us to the small fishing village of Murter on the edge of the Kornati National Park. The warden, Simon, is there to greet us and with him is a Park biologist. Simon is a tall and calm about 35 years of age but balding; we decide to call the small, wiry biologist “prof”. Initially there is some tension between us all as Derek, who has taken-on the role of film director, tries to get everyone to listen and not all talk at once. Michael is chatting to the biologists about the birds when Derek drags him forcibly away – this gets his full attention. Finally we make some sort of plan but I am unsure if we really understand one another. The launch shoots off at 30 Knots across the eight miles of choppy water that separates us from the main group of islands.

They have a 35ft launch to take us at speed around a few of the many islands in the group. The Park covers 70% of Kornati but most of the 180 islands are still privately owned. The poor farmers and fishermen of Murter bought them about 100 years ago from a rich Zadar merchant. In those days these barren islands were considered worthless. The locals marked their land boundaries with carefully built dry-stone walls that run for hundreds of meters in straight lines across bare rock and scrubby garigue vegetation, seemingly going nowhere. Given the work involved, it is hard to imagine why they took the trouble to build them. On close inspection, the walls are seamlessly constructed to a high standard with level tops and sides; it is as though the farmers who made them decided to create a work of art. They must have taken pride in their work. From a distance, they look like the raised seams on a garment. They graze a few sheep and in the sheltered valleys, grow olives and little else. The islands are used seasonally at harvest time when the olives are ripe and ready.

The islands and rocks have a stark, barren beauty as they glisten in the sunshine scattered among a dark blue sea. The slopes slip gently into the water around them, the limestone rock strata expressed by wind erosion. Lines of plants gain a foothold in the lee where they can find a place to put their roots. There are low mounds of the Mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus), Tucreum and other lime-loving garigue shrubs.

Amongst the clumps of Salvia I notice a fragrant bush with a cannabis-like leaf that I later identify as the Chaste tree (Vitex agnus-castus) so called because the fruit was eaten by priests and monks to reduce their libido; unfortunately it clearly didn’t work. Everywhere the coastal rocks are worn and jagged making landing difficult. The land is stony everywhere and my feet slip on the pebbles and sink into the cracks between the ancient boulders making walking perilous.

A few scattered trees, Holm Oak (Quercus ilex) or Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) manage to survive and even thrive when conditions permit. It is probable that parts of these islands were forested once until the Venetians cut the forest took the wood for their ships.

The Bora wind whips the sea into a foam at a moments notice, scouring the rocky slopes and bending the stunted bushes to its will. Not much can live here but on a hillside in a sheltered cove, I see a row of beehives; these tiny workers collect the pollen from a myriad of wild flowers in springtime to make a delicious honey suffused with the scents of lavender and thyme.

Unsurprisingly, there are few birds in these wild islands, some Yellow-legged gulls, a small cliff-nesting colony of Shag, rock doves and a pair of Peregrine falcons that predate on them. Swifts nest here late in the season choosing the safety of rocky crevices in the cliffs and crags.

High on a promontory lie the ruins of a small stone fort built by the Romans as part of their defense against the Illyrians. The Liburnian tribe of Illyrians, who lived in this area in the centuries before Christ, were noted seafarers who harried Roman shipping and fought their legions.

We leave this barren, enchanted, place with the feeling that we have found the wildest of the wild shores of Illyria.

Thursday, 12^th May; Zadar

Zadar is a typical Mediterranean fortified port town. Built on a small rocky island close to the shore, it was originally an Illyrian settlement that became a Roman fortified town. Not much remains of the Roman walls but parts of the Roman forum can be seen and some of its stones are incorporated into the famous church of St Donats. The streets are still laid out on the original Roman gridiron pattern with long decumani bisected by the shorter cardo; the forum lies at the center.

St Donat’s church is an imposing edifice; externally the architectural style in pre-Romanesque and redolent of northern Europe but the ground plan is Byzantine. The trio of semi-circular apses rise high punctured only by a few small, round-headed window openings near the top of the building. The whole has the appearance of a fortified tower rather than a church. It dates from the early 9^th C at a time when Croatia was being converted by first the Latin Church of the Franks and later by the Orthodox missionaries Cyril and Methodius who used the local lingua franca to disseminate the gospel. They invented a new script, Glagolithic, to encompass the strange diphthongs of the Slavic language. This church seems to epitomize the power struggle between Rome and Byzantium; Rome favouring the Latin liturgy exclusively while the orthodox services were in the local language, of course there were liturgical and doctrinal differences that meant so much at the time but now seem so pointless and irrelevant. It was also a power struggle between the Pope in Rome and the Patriarch in Constantinople. It was a struggle that was only resolved in 1045 with the great schism when these two great branches of the Church went their separate ways.

Our guide is a young local girl, Paola, who works as a free-lance guide knows her history; she shows us the Venetian land gate and the Venetian 16^th C fortifications. Zadar was captured in 1202 by the 90 years old Doge Dandolo at the start of the fourth crusade. The Venetians had agreed to transport the crusaders to the Holy Land for a substantial fee but, even so, managed to divert them into capturing Zadar and then sacking Constantinople. Zadar reverted to the Hungarian (Angevin) Monarchy soon after and finally became Venetian in 1409 when King Ladislaus sold his Dalmatian possessions to Venice for 100,000 ducats. Zadar remained a Venetian possession for nearly four hundred years until the fall of Venice. Thereafter, a short period of Napoleonic rule ensued until the town became Austrian under the terms of the treaty of Campo-Formio. The history of this place followed the same pattern of changing imperial masters as most of the Illyrian shore. While the Venetians were in charge, the pervading fear was the Ottoman Turk who lurked only a few miles inland; an ever –present threat with which to frighten naughty children.

We get back to the boat, now safely moored in the marina, to find Bruce cooking a delicious dinner of venison steak and roasted vegetables with a demi-glaze jus. We sit around the aft deck table eagerly awaiting the arrival of Alex and Bruce’s bearing the plates. Bruce describes the menu with such love and enthusiasm; he is really a talented chef. We all fear we are putting on weight although Bruce is under instruction to provide healthy food and small portions. The rule is no starters and no wine when we don’t have guests aboard.

Friday, 13^th May; Zadar and Paklenika National Park

Our guide a Park ranger, Zlatko Marasovic, is young, attractive and informed. He comes to pick us up at the marina and we drive through heavy traffic to the park entrance some 45 minutes away. Just before we get there, in the foothills, we come to the abandoned-looking village of Marasovici. It is the village where our guide’s grandfather was born and it gave him his surname. The buildings are in a run down state, the yards are full of weeds and rusting equipment; there is no sign of farm animals in the stables or stalls. The village is picturesque; especially a fine ornamented stone doorway lintel and pediment; it is a curious design unlike anything I have seen before. We speculate as to the influences that led to such a creation, it feels oriental, even Chinese; we conclude that the curious swag-like element is probably a Turkish influence from central Asia.

We try to gain access to the yard of the main house but it is bolted and locked; I go round the side and find a small lane and some steps; then I hear a woman’s voice and call our guide. The elderly lady is smiling and friendly and talks non-stop. She wears an old apron, a headscarf and black tights under a faded blue skirt; I guess she’s about 75. Then an angry older lady appears on the balcony above; she’s dressed all in black with a lined face and hands on her hips as though issuing a challenge. Zlatco talks to her for what seems an age, and finally turns to me to tell me that the lady in blue is his aunt and that the older lady is 95 and was married to his grandfather. A house that seemed run-down and abandoned is now full of life. These two old ladies are living in great poverty in a house that anywhere in northern Europe would be condemned.

We jump back into the car and go up into the hills behind. Our destination is the larger of the two limestone gorges that cut into the mountains behind. The scenery is spectacular; sheer walls of rock and white hillsides seemingly devoid of vegetation. There are climbers on many of the rock walls and some learners close to the path we are on. This is not a way I would choose to find recreation. On the rocky slopes of the canyon, mauve Window Bellflower (Campanula fenestrellata) grows in showy clumps.

There is a chorus of birdsong in the gorge but few birds to be seen. Michael says that he has never heard such a wonderful sound, his three favourite songsters all singing together; the nightingale; blackcap and blackbird; their song amplified by the enclosing walls of the gorge.

We head back to the park headquarters and change vehicles to a four-wheel-drive. As we climb up into the hills, we pass through three different climate zones in an hour; Mediterranean maquis on the lower slopes moving up to Continental above 700 meters and then Alpine moorland above 1200 meters; each has its own plant species and dominant vegetation type.

In the continental range, we pass through a number of different forest habitats such as Beech woods on the more shady slopes, Black Pine and Holm Oak. On more open land we see bushes and low growing trees such as Manna Ash (Fraxinus ornus) with its feathery white blossom; Turkey Oak (Quercus cerris); Hornbeam (Carpinus betulus); Green Alder (Alnus viridis) and Buckthorn (Rhamnus intermedia). Apparently, this park has 2,700 species of plant.

The real glory is left to last; the Alpine meadows vibrate with fresh green grass set against split and fissured limestone crags. Because of the cold up here, spring is later and we see a profusion of rare alpine flowers; yellow wild Tulip (Tulipa sylvestris); Brilliant blue Gentian (Gentiana acaulis) and best of all, the plant I had been hoping to see, the intensely blue-mauve Illyrian Iris. As we crest the road and come out onto a mountain plateau, we see four Alpine Choughs tumbling and clowning for our special delight – the perfect climax to a perfect day. We head back to the boat for a long hot bath and a nice cup of tea.

Saturday, May 14, 2011; Zadar

Mike and Lucinda Waterhouse leave in the morning. We have a break from filming and will stay in Zadar until 20^th May when our next guests arrive and filming resumes on 21^st May.

Tuesday, 10^th May, 11 and Wednesday, May 11, 2011; Kornati Islands

Kalani takes us to the small fishing village of Murter on the edge of the Kornati National Park. The warden, Simon, is there to greet us and with him is a Park biologist. Simon is a tall and calm about 35 years of age but balding; we decide to call the small, wiry biologist “prof”. Initially there is some tension between us all as Derek, who has taken-on the role of film director, tries to get everyone to listen and not all talk at once. Michael is chatting to the biologists about the birds when Derek drags him forcibly away – this gets his full attention. Finally we make some sort of plan but I am unsure if we really understand one another. The launch shoots off at 30 Knots across the eight miles of choppy water that separates us from the main group of islands.

They have a 35ft launch to take us at speed around a few of the many islands in the group. The Park covers 70% of Kornati but most of the 180 islands are still privately owned. The poor farmers and fishermen of Murter bought them about 100 years ago from a rich Zadar merchant. In those days these barren islands were considered worthless. The locals marked their land boundaries with carefully built dry-stone walls that run for hundreds of meters in straight lines across bare rock and scrubby garigue vegetation, seemingly going nowhere. Given the work involved, it is hard to imagine why they took the trouble to build them. On close inspection, the walls are seamlessly constructed to a high standard with level tops and sides; it is as though the farmers who made them decided to create a work of art. They must have taken pride in their work. From a distance, they look like the raised seams on a garment. They graze a few sheep and in the sheltered valleys, grow olives and little else. The islands are used seasonally at harvest time when the olives are ripe and ready.

The islands and rocks have a stark, barren beauty as they glisten in the sunshine scattered among a dark blue sea. The slopes slip gently into the water around them, the limestone rock strata expressed by wind erosion. Lines of plants gain a foothold in the lee where they can find a place to put their roots. There are low mounds of the Mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus), Tucreum and other lime-loving garigue shrubs.

Amongst the clumps of Salvia I notice a fragrant bush with a cannabis-like leaf that I later identify as the Chaste tree (Vitex agnus-castus) so called because the fruit was eaten by priests and monks to reduce their libido; unfortunately it clearly didn’t work. Everywhere the coastal rocks are worn and jagged making landing difficult. The land is stony everywhere and my feet slip on the pebbles and sink into the cracks between the ancient boulders making walking perilous.

A few scattered trees, Holm Oak (Quercus ilex) or Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) manage to survive and even thrive when conditions permit. It is probable that parts of these islands were forested once until the Venetians cut the forest took the wood for their ships.

The Bora wind whips the sea into a foam at a moments notice, scouring the rocky slopes and bending the stunted bushes to its will. Not much can live here but on a hillside in a sheltered cove, I see a row of beehives; these tiny workers collect the pollen from a myriad of wild flowers in springtime to make a delicious honey suffused with the scents of lavender and thyme.

Unsurprisingly, there are few birds in these wild islands, some Yellow-legged gulls, a small cliff-nesting colony of Shag, rock doves and a pair of Peregrine falcons that predate on them. Swifts nest here late in the season choosing the safety of rocky crevices in the cliffs and crags.

High on a promontory lie the ruins of a small stone fort built by the Romans as part of their defense against the Illyrians. The Liburnian tribe of Illyrians, who lived in this area in the centuries before Christ, were noted seafarers who harried Roman shipping and fought their legions.

We leave this barren, enchanted, place with the feeling that we have found the wildest of the wild shores of Illyria.

Tuesday, 10^th May, 11 and Wednesday, May 11, 2011; Kornati Islands

Kalani takes us to the small fishing village of Murter on the edge of the Kornati National Park. The warden, Simon, is there to greet us and with him is a Park biologist. Simon is a tall and calm about 35 years of age but balding; we decide to call the small, wiry biologist “prof”. Initially there is some tension between us all as Derek, who has taken-on the role of film director, tries to get everyone to listen and not all talk at once. Michael is chatting to the biologists about the birds when Derek drags him forcibly away – this gets his full attention. Finally we make some sort of plan but I am unsure if we really understand one another. The launch shoots off at 30 Knots across the eight miles of choppy water that separates us from the main group of islands.

They have a 35ft launch to take us at speed around a few of the many islands in the group. The Park covers 70% of Kornati but most of the 180 islands are still privately owned. The poor farmers and fishermen of Murter bought them about 100 years ago from a rich Zadar merchant. In those days these barren islands were considered worthless. The locals marked their land boundaries with carefully built dry-stone walls that run for hundreds of meters in straight lines across bare rock and scrubby garigue vegetation, seemingly going nowhere. Given the work involved, it is hard to imagine why they took the trouble to build them. On close inspection, the walls are seamlessly constructed to a high standard with level tops and sides; it is as though the farmers who made them decided to create a work of art. They must have taken pride in their work. From a distance, they look like the raised seams on a garment. They graze a few sheep and in the sheltered valleys, grow olives and little else. The islands are used seasonally at harvest time when the olives are ripe and ready.

The islands and rocks have a stark, barren beauty as they glisten in the sunshine scattered among a dark blue sea. The slopes slip gently into the water around them, the limestone rock strata expressed by wind erosion. Lines of plants gain a foothold in the lee where they can find a place to put their roots. There are low mounds of the Mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus), Tucreum and other lime-loving garigue shrubs.

Amongst the clumps of Salvia I notice a fragrant bush with a cannabis-like leaf that I later identify as the Chaste tree (Vitex agnus-castus) so called because the fruit was eaten by priests and monks to reduce their libido; unfortunately it clearly didn’t work. Everywhere the coastal rocks are worn and jagged making landing difficult. The land is stony everywhere and my feet slip on the pebbles and sink into the cracks between the ancient boulders making walking perilous.

A few scattered trees, Holm Oak (Quercus ilex) or Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) manage to survive and even thrive when conditions permit. It is probable that parts of these islands were forested once until the Venetians cut the forest took the wood for their ships.

The Bora wind whips the sea into a foam at a moments notice, scouring the rocky slopes and bending the stunted bushes to its will. Not much can live here but on a hillside in a sheltered cove, I see a row of beehives; these tiny workers collect the pollen from a myriad of wild flowers in springtime to make a delicious honey suffused with the scents of lavender and thyme.

Unsurprisingly, there are few birds in these wild islands, some Yellow-legged gulls, a small cliff-nesting colony of Shag, rock doves and a pair of Peregrine falcons that predate on them. Swifts nest here late in the season choosing the safety of rocky crevices in the cliffs and crags.

High on a promontory lie the ruins of a small stone fort built by the Romans as part of their defense against the Illyrians. The Liburnian tribe of Illyrians, who lived in this area in the centuries before Christ, were noted seafarers who harried Roman shipping and fought their legions.

We leave this barren, enchanted, place with the feeling that we have found the wildest of the wild shores of Illyria.

Full diary now a book

The full text my travel diary is available at amazon.co.uk in the Kindle store entitled "Two Men in a Boat - Illyrian Shores" on sale for a token amount. Also the companion book, "Two men in a boat - Chasing Spring.

Friday, 10^th June; Rovinj

We decide to spend our last day in Croatia exploring the beautiful Venetian town of Rovingno (Rovinj) that lies just across the marina from where Kalani is moored.

As Mediterranean seaside towns go, Rovingno is in many ways typical; there is a substantial cathedral, with its tall Venetian campanile (bell tower), at the top of the rocky outcrop on which the town sits. Around the cathedral are clustered a romantic looking jumble of old houses of every different size and shape. They are plastered and painted in muted colours of brick, ochre, pink and mustard with the odd gay example of pastel blue. One thing they all share in common is that they look as though they were last plastered and painted twenty years ago. Almost every house has an ugly satellite dish on the roof.

Between the houses the narrow cobbled lanes twist and turn as they rise up towards the apex of the hill towards the flat cathedral square. The usual mix of tourist shops and fashion boutiques line the main routes up the hill but if you turn down a side lane you soon find yourself in a romantic courtyard with old stones, ancient wooden beams and geraniums scenting the air. The buildings seem to have grown organically and fit together like the pieces in a jig-saw; some are dilapidated and nearly all in want of some repair. The feel is of an old Venetian town gone to seed rather more completely than a similar place in Italy.

The harbour sits at the foot of the hill in the lee of the wind; around its sides are the usual pavement cafes and restaurants with large umbrellas to shade their patrons from the sun. Tourists stroll along the waterfront and board the ferries bound for other places and even for Venice where we will be soon. Gnarled fishermen, wearing yellow oversize waterproof trousers, stand on their boats sorting through their nets and lobsterpots, mending their equipment. The boats go out at night and fish using powerful lamps to attract fish; it must be a hard and unrewarding life. Pleasure craft; sailing boats and flash contemporary motor cruisers outnumber them along the quayside leaving them as mementos of another, simpler age.

We choose a lively looking café and sit at a table next to a couple of English girls on holiday together; we chat to them and they tell us that they are from Bristol and have come here on a package. Their slight west-country burr seems homely but incongruous. Mostly, the tourists are German, a language you hear spoken everywhere. Timot loves ice cream and he is always trying to persuade me to have one, he doesn’t like to appear greedy by being the only one to indulge. I consent and go up to the ice-cream counter to order. The handsome man serving does a little show with the ice cream cones similar to a barman with the bottles, flinging them and balls of ice-cream in the air with magical wizardry – finally we get our ice creams and he doesn’t even charge us for them.

We get back to Kalani in time to welcome guests on board for drinks. Our lovely new friend, Cecilia Mc Ewan, whom we met in Portole (Optalj)), comes with John, Freiherr von Twickel, a retired banker and his wife Charlotte who ran Christies in Germany. They seem to divide their time between England, Germany and here. I don’t get the chance to talk to the Freiherr or his English wife. Derek chats away to her about art and design. The Frieherr talks to Timot while I chat to Cecilia about her life in England and her house here. We chat away like old friends about people we both know such as Podge Bune in New York.

Saturday, 11^th June: Rovinj to Venice

We left early and had a smooth crossing. We stopped and swam from the boat in the middle of the sea about half way there. I swam for the first time this season and found the water quite warm. The crew loved their swim and of course Bruce and Alex had never before swum in the open sea miles from land. The thought is at first a bit scary but soon seems quite normal. We are all excited about the end of our journey and seeing Venice. For most on board it will be the first time in that magical city.

We got there at about four in the afternoon. Tim was nervous about the approach as he didn’t have up-to-date local charts and his computer charting system is down thanks to an electrical surge. We creep into the lagoon slowly past an island that doesn’t even appear on the old paper chart we have. It looks to me as if they are constructing a sea defense system across the mouth of the lagoon and that this artificial island is part of that project. The depths in the lagoon are shallow and we approach the small marina, Lio Grando, with caution. The marina answers neither the telephone nor the radio. Finally, someone sees us from the mole and directs us into our berth.

Derek and I can’t wait to launch the tender and we speed into Venice in the late afternoon. It seems like coming home.

Sunday, 12^th June 2011; Venice

Timot, Derek and I take the tender into Venice to get some footage of us in that memorable setting. We go ashore at St Giorgio where there is a small marina next to the magnificent Palladio church. We discover that the couple from Buckler’s Hard, Nigel and Annette, we met in Croatia has their yacht moored here. Roberto, the marina harbourmaster, tells us that we can have their berth if they are prepared to move across the marina and if we are happy to bring our 25meter yacht into such a small space. We decide against, as the berth requires maneuvering in too tight a space. There is a waiting berth by the entrance that would take a boat of our length. Roberto says we can have it on Tuesday night but we must be away by 9 am on Wednesday. We thank him and say we will take it. It is about the best spot in all of Venice to be moored. Roberto allows us to climb up into the small tower that is his office so that Timot can shoot from a higher vantage point looking directly across the basin at St Mark’s.

We get back into the tender to go across to Salute only to find the engine won’t start. They ignition key is broken. We finally manage to contact Tim back on Kalani and he says he will try to get to us on the jet-ski. We sit disconsolately in a café at the side of the church and eat a rather tasteless meal. By now it is hot and we are thirsty. We chat to a young Swedish couple; they are clearly very much in love. The girl offers to lend us her bike key and that might just work. They are so sweet, kind and trusting that we rather fall for them and I buy them lunch telling them that no one under thirty who is pretty should have to buy their own lunch.

By now the annual regatta is in full swing and the waterways are closed to traffic. We get a good view of the passing races from where are. It is a colourful affair. Oarsmen of every description from canoes to eighths and even one boat with eighteen oars bedecked on flags and pennants row past in perfect co-ordination. The four great maritime cities states of mediaeval Italy, Amalfi, Genoa and Pisa compete against Venice; the whole City is en fete and St Mark’s Square is cordoned off. It is great to see the Baccino with only rowing boats, canoes and gondolas. The only anachronism is the police boats patrolling to stop anyone entering the race area. The sun is out, the day hot and the water calm – a perfect day for the regatta.

Tim has advised us to try and borrow a screwdriver and to use that instead of the broken key. Just after he calls, I spot a small private motor launch pull alongside at the quay of St Giorgio, just outside the cordoned-off area. A beautiful lithe blond boy jumps off to secure the lines followed by a young dark haired one. I take the opportunity of asking them if I could borrow a screwdriver but my intention is just to meet them and find out who these adorable boys might be. They look so like Sebastian Flight and Charles Ryder in Brideshead Revisited.

The dark one is English, Mark Silver, and the blond is Parisian, Tibot. He tells me his daddy has a palazzo here and that is why they have their own boat in Venice. Sadly they are leaving tomorrow to go to the Basle art fair. Mark looks Jewish with dark hair and eyes, he is young handsome and speaks like an old Etonian. Tibot tells me his name is T with a bow and he mimes the action of pulling a bowstring. He doesn’t say what his surname is and I don’t feel able to ask. I suspect it might be a name I have heard of; clearly his parents are very rich. His hair flops over his eyes and he is constantly flicking it away in a seductive and sexy fashion. His blue eyes shine with life and love; I am sure the two boys are lovers of more than art. They disappear into St Giorgio to see an art exhibition and with them my fantasy evaporates.

Tim arrives on the jet-ski having miraculously got through the police cordon by feigning ignorance and gesticulating wildly. I can do nothing more to help, so I go across to Salute to admire the pristine white statue of a naked young boy holding a frog in his outstretched hand; he is like a modern figurehead to the Dogana point. It brings Gerald Durrell to mind; a fitting image to take away at the end of our adventure for he has been with us in spirit all the way.

I walk across the Acadamia Bridge and push through the milling throng to the Piazza to brave the crowds in St Mark’s. I am hot and tired by now; there is nowhere to sit down except a café that has run out of orange juice. I take time to look at the returning oarsmen in their skin-tight Lycra shorts; some are really hot and hunky. It is a very gay and festive occasion, crowds pressing against the barriers, flags and banners waving. The dignitaries of Venice are seated on scarlet-covered bleachers erected in front of the Ducal Palace. I imagine the Doge leaving on his golden barge to marry the sea in the 14^th or 15^th Cs, he would have seen young men in parti-coloured hose as skin tight as these oarsmen’s shorts with their parts accentuated by a codpiece tied with ribbons – nothing is new. Boys like that are often depicted in the art of the period especially in the work of Sodoma.

Eventually, the barriers come down and I can cross to the vaporetto stops on the Schiavoni side to find one to take me back to the Lido and Kalani. I return to find that Tim has arrived before me and has hot-wired the tender outboard so the others can get their shots and then get back.

Before the night falls, I stand in front of the backdrop of Venice and declaim the immortal words of the poet Wordsworth, written to mark the extinction of the Venetian Republic by Napoleon in 1798. I have memorized the first verse; it begins, “Once did she hold the gorgeous East in fee and was the safeguard of the West. The worth of Venice did not fall below her worth; Venice, the eldest child of liberty”. Etc. It is a fitting panegyric to the 900 year-old Serene Republic and a fitting finale to our wonderful one thousand mile adventure.

Monday, June 13, 2011; Venice

Thanks to Derek’s smooth talking; we have secured a berth alongside the entrance to the tiny marina at St Giorgio. Kalani can only just fit and Roberto, the marina manager, has told us that we will be on the waiting place and so can only stay one night.

St Giorgio is a beautiful Palladian Church (by the master himself) next to a former monastery, now the Cini Institute and library. The façade is white marble of an exceptional purity, it is a classical temple with both complete and sculpted columns and Palladio’s trademark double pediments; there are niches for statues and more statues adorn the top surface of the upper pediment at either end and midway between the apex and the side points in fine Roman tradition. It dates from the early 16^th C. It sits on its own on a small island right across the Baccino from St Mark’s Square – the primo place in all of Venice regarding St Mark’s and it’s seat of temporal power, the Doge’s Palace.

We arrive at just after 1 pm as arranged and slip into our assigned place by the mouth of the marina. Roberto allows Timot to film us arriving from his little watchtower. The day is glistening, the water calm and light fluffy clouds dot the horizon – a perfect Venice summer day. The panorama as we sail down the Riva degla Schiavoni is almost perfect, just marred by a few adverts on bridges and a large canvas to one side of the Doge’s Palace advertising Mario Testino, what a place for Mario to have his name in lights. It hides some scaffolding and the works behind but it is sad to see such a fine building disfigured by crass modernity.

Derek and I stand on the top deck at the rail watching the panorama of Venice float by; we have our arms around each other, happy to have achieved our objective but also looking forward to some time alone just with the crew on the ten day passage home. Bruce leaves tomorrow, as does Timot. His wife, Sue, and his son, Justin, are coming aboard tonight and will be with us for dinner and lunch tomorrow and then they all leave.

Derek, pushing his luck as always, wants Tim to make one more pass in Kalani for Timot to film. The shots taken the other day were in flat, dull light and will not match the light conditions of our arrival shots today. Timot, being a cameraman and wedded to good light, understands and agrees, even though he has packed away his kit.

Our lovely friend, Taryn, an art historian who lives in Venice, arrives bearing a huge bunch of flowers and a box of Venetian cakes to have dinner with us. We watch the sun go down over the city and drink cocktails on the aft-deck watched by a few remaining passers-by. Bruce excels himself, producing a great last supper for us to enjoy. Taryn has a few glasses of wine and becomes jolly and talkative. We brake after dinner to walk the few steps onto the large terrace in front of the church with the water behind to watch the full moon rise behind St Giorgio. Derek and I hold each other and waltz by the light of the moon just like Edward Lear’s “Owl and the Pussycat”.

Ó Jeremy Norman June 2011

Blog Ends:

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Wednesday, 8^th June, 11; Limski Kanal.

We are entering the beautiful and deep drowned river valley or “Ria” of Limski; a strange Polish sounding name for a very Istrian place. It is a major tourist attraction on account of its natural beauty but inaccessible by land. It is long and winding, about nine kilometers from the coast to the highest navigable point. There is little sign of human habitation, just mixed deciduous forest coming right down to the shore with little or no inter-tidal zone. Its beauty lies in its depth and in some places, its sheer limestone cliffs, and the fact that it is pristine forest, unspoiled by human presence. There are some mussel farms and ever-present day-tripper cruises plying their way at too fast a speed along the narrow waterway.

At one point, about halfway along the ria, a large tourist cruiser decides to turn to go back and, without any thought to us, starts to turn right across our path. They are entirely in the wrong on many counts, we are on their starboard side which gives us right-of-way, to name just one. None-the-less they continue, only to reverse at the very last moment as if they were playing “chicken” with us. They shout abuse and gesticulate wildly. It is clear that their captain had either no knowledge of the rules of the sea or chooses to willfully ignore them.

We launch our tender and spend half an hour with the kayaks having fun; it is still a bit too chilly to swim without a wet suits. By five o’clock it is getting chilly and the sun has gone, so we carry on to Rovinj; it will be our final port of call in Croatia.

Thursday, June 9, 2011; Rovinj and Motovun.

Today, we hire a car and drive inland to visit one of Istria’s ancient hill towns, Motovun. The day starts wet and rainy, hardly an auspicious day for filming. After about an hour we crest the top of a mountain pass and see a green valley laid out before us; it that splits into two to form a “Y”. It is a patchwork of well-tended agricultural fields, mixed forest and isolated farm buildings. In the middle of the valley stands a tall hill atop of which lies our destination. It looks like the background to a 14^th C Italian painting. The church on top of the hill surrounded by low houses and a city wall; a winding path rising up to the town gate with cypress tress standing sentinel along the route. The sky is dark and brooding, thunder and rain threaten. We stop to admire the scene from our vantage point, Timot managing to shoot a time-lapse sequence of the clouds scudding overhead. Rain fills the distant valley and threatens to come our way but breaks in the cloud lend patches of sunlight to illuminate the scene.

We drive on to Motovun, a typical 15^th C Venetian town. The lions of St Mark are depicted in a number of places but always with the gospel of St Mark closed – a sign that Venice was not at peace when the image was carved. The town is full of eager German tourist, some Italian is still spoken; older people remember the period between the wars when Istria reverted to Italy. Every road sign is in German, Italian and Croatian.

There isn’t much to film as every potential shot is marred by modern signs, umbrellas, ice cream stands, souvenir shops and the like. There is an austere town square with a typical early venetian well-head at its center and opposite a pretty 17^th C church. It is closed but we sneak inside to find three girls painstakingly restoring a late 18^th C fresco that has been recently revealed under 19^th C over-painting. Looking at the images, I am not sure the result will be worth the trouble and expense. The best part is the view from the ramparts over the valley below.

Timot calls to me urgently and I hurry towards him. He is filming a swift lying on the gravel not moving but clearly alive. I go to it, pick it up and it is alive and trembling. I release it into the air and in flies away with no signs of injury. We wonder what led it to fall to earth? I can only presume that it was a young bird not yet confident of flight and that, once grounded, it cannot re-launch itself. Swifts only land on cables or ledges and never on the ground – now I know why.

On our way back, we drive through lovely countryside with wild flowers and butterflies along the verges and in the fields. We stop to shoot some great film of marbled white butterflies, shimmering burnet moths and great green grasshoppers glistening and bright on yellow, blue and white flowers.

We pass through the village of Oportji, a smaller village on a hill. As the sun has now come out, Timot wants another shot from the edge of the village. We drive down a lane no wider than our car along a rough stone path and park outside a rather grand gate to a walled garden. As we are chatting outside the house, an older lady comes to the gate and asks us who we are. She speaks perfect educated English with a trace of a German accent. She is dressed for gardening in old clothes, a pair of secateurs in one hand and a cigarette in the other. She asks us in for a drink or a cup of tea. Intrigued, we accept.

It transpires that she is recently widowed. Her husband was a Scotsman but she was brought up in Austria before the war. The two of them bought this property as a ruin and restored it but shortly after the completion of the project, he died. We quickly discovered that we had many friends in common both in England, America and Austria. Her brother in law is Rory McEwen, the accomplished artist, we even have an example of his work at home. Timot is amazed that we can discover someone in the middle of nowhere who knows friends of ours – we are quite surprised too.