Day 16: From Split to Milna (a boat trip then 6 km, 135 vm) - like a rest day

Today is somewhat of a rest day. I slept in until about 7 had a slow breakfast and checked out my options for today. I still was not sure what I wanted to do or which direction I wanted to go. I checked out various travel blogs on Bosnia and was drawn to the idea of cycling east towards Sarajevo. Then I thought again about the overall detour on the way to Greece, about 400 kilometres and lot of mountains. At the end I decided to leave Split to take a ferry to the island Korcula to the town of Vela Luka. From there I would cycle through the island next day and take another ferry to the close by peninsula which would get me back to the main land.

Once I packed up and arrived at the port there was a boat to Korcula via the island Hvar. I quickly bought a ticked and got on. As you know things don’t always go as planned when you rush. Once on the big Catamaran I realized that it is not going to Vela Luka but to the town of Korcula which is on the other end of the island where I wanted to cycle through tomorrow. First I thought “That’s easy kilometres made” but then I felt almost a bit guilty of skipping distance. When the boat hat its stopover in Hvar and people were already getting off I quickly jumped up, got my bike and got off, too. I decided I would stay around here somewhere and cycle Hvar instead. It is longer and a more mountainous but after 80 kilometres I can take a ferry back to the mainland.

Once I arrived in Hvar, a beautiful but very busy and touristic town with all sorts of tourists from all over the world I found a café where I hung out and checked my options for today. I didn’t really want to stay in the town itself but find a smaller placer somewhere right at the sea where I could go swimming and just spend the day on the beach. I found a little town called Milna about 6 kilometres outside of Hvar.

The cycle to Milna started with a very steep 120 meter climb to get out of Hvar. With the midday heat I was sweating after 30 metres like I had been cycling all day long. I arrived in Milna and found a nice little Airbnb place right at the ocean. The private room even has a balcony looking out across the sea. I went swimming, breakfast shopping for tomorrow, then rested a bit. After that I went for a walk and found a little bay with no people, very rocky but good to jump in and get out again. I spend quite some time there before I headed back and rested some more before I went to dinner where I am writing this blog entry at a little restaurant right next to the beach. A real holiday.

So tomorrow definitely needs to be one of these early starts again. The road here goes up to 400 metres above sea level then drops down to almost sea level just to ascend to the same altitude. In the middle there are many little ascents. I hopefully will arrive on the other side of the island by noon to avoid the biggest heat. You never know, maybe I will get blessed with some clouds.