Our second day in Komiža was very different from the first. The day was essentially a series of successive failures and thwarting of plans!

We had made plans to take a two-hour trip to see the Blue Cave and were supposed to leave at 9:00. At first we were told that we were just being delayed an hour by the wind, but when we checked back at 10 we learned that it was so windy that the cave was actually closed for the day.

We decided to just head to a beach, so we walked along the same part of the coast along which we’d paddled the day before. It turns out there is a very unassuming gravel road winding behind some abandoned buildings that eventually takes you to some of the coves. We ended up on Kamenica beach, home to the town’s only night club (again: accessible only by long, out of the way gravel road) which serves as a bar during the day. We settled onto the smooth pebbles and stayed there for several hours, until it was time to come back for what would become our other failed plan of the day.

We’d heard that the owner of a winery on the island would give tastings if you called in advance, so we’d called in the morning and arranged to come at 4:00. The next question was how we would get there. We didn’t know where it was, really, and our options were renting a car or a scooter or taking a taxi. Now, scooters are a very European thing, and eventually I’d love to know how to drive one, so we thought about this as an option although the idea of driving a scooter on the high and winding roads of the island made me more than a little nervous. It turned out that I needn’t have worried because the agencies won’t rent a scooter to someone without experience – fair enough! Next option was a car. Almost all cars in Europe are manual transmission. I am capable of driving one but decided that it would be legitimately dangerous to try to do so on the aforementioned roads. We tracked down the one agency that supposedly had an automatic, but it was being repaired, so option two was out. This left us with a taxi. We thought this would be pretty simple, and after our experience with Emil in Bol, I was excited for another potentially fun taxi experience. As it turns out, there are maybe four taxis total in the town, and they are neither easy to find nor easy to take; they book fast. The best we could do was to get one at 4:30, which meant we’d be very late. We tried calling the winery but never got through, so after an hour of trying to sort this out, we ended up just saying “screw it!!!” and hitting the cafe from which I wrote the previous post.

The one thing that went according to plan yesterday was our dinner. We arrived promptly at 7 and were soon enjoying a free glass of sherry and an excellent bottle of wine recommended by our very nice waiter. We also tried something called Komiža Pogača. I recognized “Pogača” as a type of bread (I’ve even baked a loaf!), and we learned that this local version has tomatoes and anchovies or sardines in it. It was a very tasty appetizer and made us even more excited for the main course.

Our octopus peka arrived on a huge platter and included four octopuses, a lot of potatoes, and a handful of zucchini, tomatoes, and carrots. It had all been stewing in red wine for two hours and smelled incredible. The taste was the same: so hearty and a great blend of the different flavors. We couldn’t eat all the potatoes, but we ate every piece of the octopus! Those of you thinking this sounds gross might be comforted to hear that the octopus had lost any sliminess and instead was more like chicken in texture. We were 100% stuffed afterwards, but it was so worth it!

After four enjoyable hours at the restaurant, we went back home and fell asleep almost immediately despite the heavy noise coming through our open windows. Nothing like an octopus feast to knock you out!

Greetings from the island of Vis!

We’re presently sitting at a cafe. It’s 5:30 in the afternoon, and people are starting to make their way back to dry land after spending the day at the beach. Our cafe is protected from the late-day sun by a building, so it’s a popular one. The others along Komiža’s “downtown” waterfront (about 150 yards long) will get their turn later tonight.

Komiža, improbably, reminds me a bit of Paris. Although this town has only 700 residents during non-tourist season, right now it’s hard to tell who’s an islander and who’s a tourist. Everyone is at the cafés, at all times of the day. There is a feeling (reflected in the tourism literature but also directly reinforced by our host) that time here stands still, or at least moves more slowly. It’s the most relaxing place we’ve been.

Our very antique apartment (in the best sense) looks out over the Riva, which our host called “downtown.” There are maybe 12 cafés/restaurants along its edge. From our end to the other takes about three minutes to walk if we remind ourselves to slow down and move island-style. It’s so small that we recognize the waiters at each place. You can’t help but get the sense that if you stayed here for a week, you’d know everyone.

We certainly felt welcome immediately. Our host Zrinka met our bus (the ferry took us to a different town on the island) and actually HUGGED both of us in greeting. Coming from our less-than-ideal experience in Split, this alone won us over immediately. We loved her even more when she showed us our room, with its old furniture and windows that looked out onto the Riva (partially obscured by large palm trees), and when she then spent 20 minutes taking us through a detailed orientation to her town. She produced a map on which she’d marked her favorite beaches (accessible by kayak) and written over recommendations, like which restaurants served locally caught fish.

The best part of this orientation was the language lesson. She said to us: “there is just one word you need to know while you are here, and when you leave and go back to your lives, I want you to think of this word and the time oh spent here. That word is ‘pomalo.’ It means ‘slowly,’ and we even say it that way: pomaaaalo. On this island, we don’t rush. We relax.”

I immediately envisioned affixing a note with this word to my computer in my future London office…

Rachel and I spent a few minutes just gushing to each other about how lucky we were and how much we were going to love our time here. Eventually, we pulled on bathing suits and set off to follow Zrinka’s suggestion to rent a kayak. We were able to get one from a tourist agency; when I asked what time we had to bring it back, she just waved her hand and said “oh, just come back before it’s dark, otherwise I’ll worry about you.”

Paddles and waterproof barrel (to hold our stuff) in hand, we grabbed a quick lunch at one of the cafés, where our waiter became person number one of three that day to think I was actually Croatian. Apparently I’m just really good at pronouncing “dobar dan,” because this was not the first time that I’d said that only to have someone launch into rapid-fire Croatian. This waiter was very amused when I explained (in Croatian!) that I actually speak English, and he said “well because you fooled me, I’m going to keep talking to you in Croatian!” It occurred to me that this would be a great place to come and do some language immersion – there are a lot of people who speak some as English, but it would be really easy to meet people with whom to practice Croatian.

We picked up our kayak down on the beach and set off down the coast. Komiža is set into a really big bay – it’s essentially at the bottom of a wide U coming in from the sea, so it’s a little sheltered. The water was perfectly flat, so it was more like paddling on a lake than the ocean. All along our route there were small coves where people were swimming, though we had no idea how anyone had gotten to these places on foot as they all seemed to be at the bottom of cliffs and unconnected to any visible roads. We stopped a couple of times in smaller coves and eventually ended up pulling the kayak up onto the pebbles of a lovely cove that we had all to ourselves. It was such a tranquil and beautiful way to pass the afternoon.

We paddled back to town around 6 and then went to find the restaurant Zrinka had recommended. She’d told us to have the octopus peka – cooked in a huge, covered earthenware dish for two hours – and said that the best thing to do would be to go and make a reservation for the following night so that it would be ready when we arrived. We accomplished this and then showered before coming back down to the Riva for a simpler dinner at another place Zrinka had recommended. It was a popular choice, so we had to wait a bit, but this was fine because the best sunset yet was going on, so we wandered a little further down the harbor to take some pictures.

Our waiter for dinner was a guy in his 60’s who also found my limited knowledge of Croatian amusing and continued to speak to us in a mixture of both Croatian and English. I tried to throw our a different word or phrase each time he came by, and eventually he said “how you speak so much Croatian good?” 🙂 this made me very happy.

We wanted one more dose of internet (our apartment here, in keeping with the whole “pomaaaalo” lifestyle, doesn’t have wifi), so we went a couple doors down to a cafe/bar for a glass of wine. The cute waiter there also started speaking to us in Croatian and then, when telling us that the wifi password ended with 23, said to me “your age!” which of course was very flattering. (He refused to believe I was 29.)

So, our first day in Komiža was pretty fantastic. It felt great to be back on an island and to be in such a small town. We had a lot of fun in Hvar of course, but I think my favorite moments of this trip are from our experiences on the much smaller, more intimate and genuine Brač and Vis.