Mountain Climbing Anyone?

Today I had the opportunity to go see the summer house that belongs to Marina's parents, located about 45 minutes outside of Zagreb.  It was something of a mystery.  We left Zagreb with a bright and sunny day outside and as soon as we got closer to the hills it turned foggy.  It burned away some during the day but came back as the temperatures dropped back down towards evening.  It was really fun.  Since Marina's brother Daniel needed to practice driving, the party consisted of myself, Marina's parents, and Daniel.  When we got there we discovered that there was some sort of issue with the shower pipes flooding the bathroom upstairs and so after I swept their porch and Daniel finished picking apples for his dad, we went for a walk and Daniel showed me the village.

We walked to the new swimming pool, an old mini-golf area (just cement no astro-turf folks) and soccer field in the adjoining park, then over to the old swimming pool where there is a hot springs.  Then back up the hill past the house to a look out point, then back down to the house.

He made sure to show me the group of slightly feral cats that like to congregate around and sometimes inside the dumpsters down the hill from their house.  When we got there he counted 7 cats, he said they get in through the top slot when the dumpsters are closed for the rain.

That was a work out for me, I realized how out of shape I am when we climbed the hill and I was tired and had to rest halfway and Daniel said he didn't even feel tired.  We had fun exchanging info on learning languages and my attempts to learn Croatian so far.   Then we all climbed into the car and went to eat lunch at a local restaurant where three of us had pork chops and I tried a bit of her dad's black sausage.  We all laughed when Marina's mom took the carrot and salad leaf garnish off of Zdenko's plate and offered them to Daniel.  Daniel who is more of a vegetarian most of the time said, "Finally some food!"

It was pleasant to drive back (I fell asleep, from my mountain hike I think) and come home to Mirna and Gabby, Marina's daughters (essentially they are my nieces).  Mirna and Teta Ana made apple streussel with philo dough and some of Zdenko's apples, that was super yummy.  I feel really blessed to be able to have such a fun and relaxing day.

~ Fraise