Vanlifers journey to Croatia

My friend Laura and I jumped into Janis, our van and home for the next 20 days, with nothing but the road in our minds, and getting to Croatia as a goal. It took us four good days to get all the way there, driving across Italy and Slovenia, until we reached our final and not yet defined destination.

The best thing about travelling living off a van, is that you have all the freedom in the World. It changes your mind set, and you are “forced” to live in the Slow Life movement, living in the present, with no rush at all, just enjoying whatever the day brings you. And so we did! We took this by heart and made it our life moto, we explored all the places we could, driving through Northern Italy, we stopped by the Alps, drove through them on their winding roads, with all the Fall colours showing off the beauty of the place. We got to Slovenia and decided that the Soča Valley would be a pretty place to spend a couple of days. We camped out, near the Soča River and the mountains behind. Probably one of the prettiest places we ever camped at. It was freezing cold outside, so we cooked some delicious warm meals to warm us up.

We continued our way toward Croatia, making another thousand pit stops along the way. When we got to Premantura, Croatia, it was already dark, so we camped at a place we thought was the woods. But when we woke up the next morning, we got to see the Sun rising over the sea, we camped by the shore. Such a magical moment, we couldn’t even say a word to each other. We made our way to the interior part of Croatia, visiting the turquoise waters of the lakes and waterfalls located in the National parks of Krka and Plitvice followed by the Dalmatian mountains, and thought we would spend the rest of the trip wandering around, exploring and meeting the locals.
There came the time when we had to drive back home, and so we did, but of course, we took the scenic route. We could not go back home without stopping by the Italian Dolomiti. We drove over to the Lago di Braies, where we thought of having a wonderful vegan meal sitting on a rock by the lake and the mountains behind it.

We thought this was the perfect way for us; enjoying the wonderful little things, like having supper watching the sunset, or camping under the stars. Because that’s whats it is all about, the little things.

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