A few days in Zagreb

The train journey to Zagreb is really pretty so the trip doesn't seem as long, when we arrive we are greeted by our host who shows us round her swanky flat, definitely one of the nicer airbnb bookings we've had. As it's late we stay in ready for tomorrow.

The next day we follow the guidebook and do a tour of the upper town as well as visiting a few local markets. One lady is determined to sell us something and tells us how nice her doilies are, when we say no thank you she goes in to sell overload pointing at all of her stock "This is nice and this is nice and these are nice, this too expensive but this is nice and this is nice, this hat is nice..." thankfully we escaped without parting with all of our money.
We brave the fruit and veg market next to the apartment and choose a very traditional looking old lady to buy some things from. There is a bit of a language barrier and instead of 4 carrots we get 4 kilos! It's a good job we like carrots. At least we don't get as many parsnips.

A new friend for us

It seems sensible that the next day is time for a tour of the lower town. It's a mad dash round trying to spot all sights on the tour route before settling in a bar for some traditional grub, a mixed grill for James and sausage and overcooked beans for me (I'm not being mean, that's what they were called), very nice.

Nikola Tesla - Electrical Genius!

Zagreb's first 'skyscraper'. Count the floors!

The next day we went back to the upper town to see what the "surprise at 12pm" is that our host told us about. We got to the top of the hill just in time to hear the cannon being fired. It wasn't as much of a surprise as we were hoping for but it was loud, and it did mean we were around the corner from our next destination - The Museum of Broken Relationships. People can send in mementos from their broken relationships and tell the story behind them, some were sad, some were bad, some were silly and some were revenge! It was an interesting museum and it gave us a good laugh.

After James devours a huge burger, we plan to head home but notice that there is a very lively bar full of football fans (it's Croatia vs Iceland tonight). We decide to join in the party and before we have a chance to get a beer we are invited to join a table full of very friendly, very merry, fans who buy us beer and even a shot of some strange local stuff, mmm. There are a couple of language issues (mainly due to how many drinks they've already had) but it's still really good fun with them. Suddenly there are cheers from all of the men, a Brazilian woman has arrived to entertain everyone with a feathery dance. She's really good and manages to finish her dance while fending off the drunken advances towards her and maintaining a huge smile the whole time. Our last night has proven what we thought from day one, that Croatian people are wonderfully friendly and like a good party!

Mmm...