Exploring Mljet
Knotty Girl
Tanya/Roberto
Mon 7 Jun 2021 19:08
On Saturday morning, it was time to move on from Dubrovnik, but not before Tanya took us on a tour up the river in the dinghy as far as a weir. The new engine with its “Tanya button” (the easy-start button) started first time and now seems to be behaving itself after the threat of getting an engineer out to look at it, and we enjoyed Tanya guiding us through the calm dark water of the river which had magnificent reflections of the mountains above.
Our next stop after Dubrovnik was around 30 miles away and the wind played games with us as it dropped off totally then no sooner had we rolled in the genoa (our big sail at the front of the boat) it would start to pick up again, and we would unfurl the genoa again. One of many reminders when sailing that the wind is always in charge.
On our way we had a couple of false promises from the fishing line but there were no tuna to be caught on this day trip.
Picking up a mooring buoy off the beautiful Adriatic island of Mljet, the peacefulness was breathtaking. Around a third of this island is set aside as national park, and from our mooring spot we could see the lush vegetation. The island is long and narrow (37km long, 3km wide) and the inhabited parts of the island are pretty quiet too with the total population being only around 1,000 people. We didn’t notice much birdsong and the story goes that mongooses were introduced in the early 20th Century to kill the venomous snakes on the island, but having done this, they then started eating the bird population which hasn’t recovered. Around us we could see layer upon layer of island and mainland which took on a different appearance as the sun rose and set… it was hard to stop taking photographs.
The afternoon and evening passed very agreeably, with a swim in the crystal clear waters followed by dinner ashore at the local family run restaurant. The menu was simple but tasty - locally grilled locally caught fish with vegetables and salad with local wine.
The kayaks stacked up outside the restaurant gave us the idea, and the morning we kayaked around the local islands with a guide from the restaurant, giving us a different perspective of the surrounding islands and also a good upper body workout! Tanya was the only one of us up for abseiling down and even managed a smile as she stepped over the edge of the 300m cliff face. Check out the ‘no hands’ photo when Tanya demonstrates her trust in the equipment! The morning finished up with an excellent light lunch of local handmade produce at the restaurant and we all agreed the expedition had been really worthwhile.
Tired but keen to see more of Mljet, in the afternoon we hired bicycles and covered the ~15km around the lakes (a misnomer, they are actually coastal inlets but you wouldn’t know it from looking at them) in the national park. Our mountain bikes proved a great way to get around the park and for the most part the tracks were fantastic and the hills just about manageable. The one exception was when we cycled along a walking track and the three steps in a row proved a bit much for one of our crew, Julian, who somersaulted over the handlebars but fortunately without any damage. We could have easily spent longer exploring the national park, but other lovely places were also beckoning us and on Monday morning it was time to up anchor and move on.