41 hours later...

...I've made it to Athens! I'm at the hostel that Catrina and I stayed at last year (right at this time actually!). Yey for free internet!

So. I should explain the "living in a palace". In Split, the old town is actually within the walls of Diocletian's Palace...built in 305 AD, get this, as a RETIREMENT home! At the north wall is the golden gate, and there is a large statue of a bishop (Grgur Ninski). He looks like an angry wizard, but in fact it is depicting him arguing with the pope to introduce the national language into the church...this was in the 4th century. Latin was still the language of the church up until the 1960s! Pretty progressive guy, eh? Outside the west wall is a fish market. It's located there because it's near where the sulphur baths used to be, and the smell of the sulphur keeps the flies away! Clever! The south wall used to be right at the water, but now there is a huge promenade with shops and restaurants and benches and palms, all making for a nice view of the Adriatic. The west wall is pretty much non-existent, and is instead lots and lots of shops. Some people still live within the walls of the palace. If they do, they must keep their place restored. Archaeologists have to go into the home first and check things out. One place had some artifacts that were dug up displayed in their front garden! So that's my little points of interest that I learned on the walking tour Thursday...

After the tour I hit the beach. That's when I met some people to chat with - 3 guys (one Canadian and two Aussies, I think), and a girl from California. I saw the guys again on Friday at the beach. The water is really shallow for a really long time. It's very clear, and the bottom was sandy smooth. Very refreshing. On Friday I checked out some other beaches, but they were rocky so I went back to the sandy spot. Thursday for dinner I ate at the same sandwich shop I had found Wednesday. It was just too good not to go back. My hostel seemed pretty quiet. I was wandering the streets and kept popping back in to see if anyone was around to do anything. At last I met a guy from London (England), staying at my hostel so we went out for a drink. After the beach Friday is when I met two Aussies, two Kiwis (more Oktoberfest company?), and a Ukrainian gal at my hostel, so we spent a social evening together. Saturday morning there was a huge thunderstorm. It didn't last too long though, and it was early enough that it did not affect my day. After booking my train to Zagreb for the following day, I ended up at an Irish pub to watch the Australian/South Africa rugby game (as my hostel friends were there). It amuses me greatly how into rubgy all these folks are. I suppose it's like Canadians and hockey - everyone reacting at the same time. When the game was over we stayed behind and chatted some, then I took another stroll around the palace. It really is like a maze. The streets are so so so narrow and it's fun to try and get lost...

Saturday evening involved hanging out with the same group, minus a few, plus a lot of English boys, at the hostel. It was lots of fun. (Guess who was convinced to do the splits in Split? haha) Sunday I packed up, had lunch with Veronica (one of the Aussies), and hopped on my 3pm train to Zagreb!

From Zagreb I caught an overnight train to Belgrade (and slept pretty well), and then from Belgrade, I didn't have to switch trains until Thessaloniki, Greece. So I got to see lots of Serbia and Macedonia. The train people got to know me. I think I am the only one who did the 14.5 hour stretch. At one point there was a pretty sketchy character sitting in the same compartment as me...but two of the train workers sat in the next compartment over and were constantly checking in on me (and him?) to make sure I was ok. Serbia and Macedonia are significantly run down from what I am used to seeing. The houses are all shades of yellows, oranges, browns, and creams. The countryside is very lush. From Skopje for about an hour or two, three Macedonian people around my age sat with me. One particularly liked chatting with me to practice his English, so that was nice for a little (I had finished my book Monday afternoon). The train was late picking them up and he seemed especially concerned that I would be alone in Thessaloniki and wouldn't make my train to Athens (the last one I knew of was at 11:30pm, and I was supposed to get in at 10pm. Didn't get in until 11:40pm but turns out there was a 1:40am train to Athens. Yey!). It was sweet of him. He said he wants to see me again, but we didn't swap any information so I guess we'll have to leave that one up to fate...!

Ok. Now I must nap, or something. Then I'll call Anthony! My bed will be available shortly at the hostel, as I didn't sleep very well on last night's train! I got lucky on my previous trains with the compartment-style seating...it allowed me to easily stretch out and sleep! Athens today, and potentially Paros tomorrow. That's the plan for now anyways! Thanks to all those posts out there! I love getting them!!! xo