September 29th – Dubrovnik

Everyone was packed up before breakfast so it was easy to pack up the taxi’s and head to the ferry for 9am.  We had a quick stop half way at Café Bella Vista, which hosts another beautiful view of a mainland bay.  We continued on to Cavtat, got everyone settled in their rooms and then head back to Dubrovnik for our 1pm lunch reservation at Arsenal. At 3pm Antonija, our tour guide for Dubrovnik, met us and we were off for a 2 hour tour of the old city.  After the tour, everyone had an hour and a half of free time, to do as they wished.  At 6:30pm we caught the last water taxi back to Cavtat.  What a fabulous view of the sun setting and the mainland cast in pink.  We arrived in Cavtat at 7:15pm for our 7:30pm dinner reservation at Galija. 

Our evening, and tour, ended around 10pm when we walked back to our accommodations, said our goodbye’s and good nights, and wished everyone  “sretan put” (good travels) .

Thank you everyone for joining Slikamilina Painting Tours for another successful trip.  We hope that you will return here one day either on another tour or just in your own travels. 

Dovidenja! (See you later!)

September 28 – Smokvica

It was going to be another beautiful day!  What a good way to spend the last day on the island.

This morning we headed to Smokvica about a ½ hour drive from Lumbarda.  Smokvica is built on the south side of a slope overlooking a valley of vineyards that grow a grape called Posip.  Given that it is built on a hill, we had a bit of climbing to do.  We heading up first and found a small church where a group of children were getting a history lesson. From there we plateaued for a bit, and made our way above the main street.  The vistas were great and the old houses surrounded us.  We crossed peoples porches, said hello and moved on.  After the rains, we encountered a lot of pomegranate trees, where the fruits were split wide open… birds were having a field day.  I just kept thinking how expensive they are at home and here people barely eat them!  We finally made it back to the main road and started heading downhill… by this time I had lost most of the group, as they had found nooks and crannies that they wanted to sketch… there were only 2 left with me.  No problem we continued to wander.  At about 11am we headed back to the main road and found a few of the group at a café.  It was coffee time, which then lead into pivo (beer) time.  We were on this patio for about 2 hours and had 2 groups of cyclists join us, one from Germany and the other from Norway.  Having just driven to Smokvica, we knew the roads they were going to encounter.  We did not envy them!

We headed back to Lumbarda at 1pm to have lunch on the patio at 1:30pm.  The group continued to paint on the patio for the afternoon.

For our last meal, Silvana presented us with a tray full of scampi!  We had a feast.  The scampi here is bigger then the small shrimp we get at home so everyone was thrilled. Some toasts were made and thank you’s said and I was presented with one of Karlyn’s paintings… I was delighted as it was the one she had done of my Aunts chicken coup.  I can tell you, it will be forever treasured.  Thank you Karlyn.