When we are not on the water in Croatia, we like to escape Split by heading into the hills behind the city. Our favorite trail is up from the village of Sitno Gornje to the peak of Mosor. On the way is Planinarski dom Umberto Girometta at 868m above sea level. (A planinarski dom is [...]
The finishing touches are being completed on the leut, including her name been painted on the stern. As mentioned previously her name, Labud – which means ‘swan’ in Croatian – is a reference to the river which runs through Perth. From my parents’ house on the river the Swan Yacht Club can be seen. Its [...]
The leut is close to completion, finally. All the benches and the galley are in, as is the engine. Currently she is being painted – mostly black. Traditionally boats were painted in whatever paint was at hand – all the available paint was poured into a big pot – so the end result was usually [...]
Our crazy picigin (a type of Dalmatian water-based handball)-playing friend Julio Žuvela (pictured above playing the sport) was mentioned in the Daily Telegraph for a bicycle tour through the Croatian Islands that he leads. The article can be found here. Maybe ‘sport’ is the wrong term for picigin. It is not a competition – more [...]
Yesterday the forecast was for snow in Bosnia, so we piled into the car and followed Morten and his girls to the small ski resort of Kupres. Kupres is the closest decent lifts to Split (only 1.5 hours drive), and on the weekend is a busy place with many Split number plates in the car-park. [...]
This week we have been doing a little catching up with various people involved in different types of paddling in Perth. Firstly we met up with David Stevens who runs Western Paddle Sports. David offers a range of kayaking courses, for everyone from beginners up to instructors. I had to lodge my log books with [...]
While in Australia we desperately seek and jealously protect any tiny thing that can have a ‘historical’ label slapped on it, in Croatia ‘history’ just exists. A short time ago I was walking along the waterfront at the shipyard and saw the sunken boat below. Its now just another of the rusting hulks tied to [...]
Yesterday I joined Cape Dive for the morning to complete two dives on the HMAS Swan. The Swan was a 107m long RAN River class Destroyer Escort; she was launched on 16th December 1967 and decommissioned on 13th September 1996. After decommissioning, the Australian government gave the ship to Western Australia, who decided to sink [...]
Today Jules and I went diving on Busselton Jetty – its one of the best little dive sites in the south-west of Australia. The original jetty, started in 1853, was continually added to until the mid-1960s, and finally finished 1.85kms long – the second longest in the southern hemisphere. A jetty was needed for local hardwood timber export [...]
After many years, it was finally time to get my dive ticket (Julie got hers long ago.) so I went along to a 4-day Open Water Dive Course organized by Australasian Diving Academy on Stirling Highway, Nedlands. With 5 other students, our instructor Rhys ran through all the basics. I would highly recommend the ADA and Rhys [...]
