The next morning we took an early bus to Dubrovnik. Although, it wasn’ really a bus, more like a little shuttle van. It didn’t have air conditioning and we literally bounced the entire 4 hours to Dubrovnik! I amazingly managed not to get sick, though there were times where I felt I would have done well to wear a sports bra - my entire body would leave the seat at the slightest bump in the road. Luckily, the amazing views of the countryside and later the Dalmatian coast made it worth it. The coast is pretty mountainous, and as we wound along the mountainsides I could see the sea and many small villages in each cove, all with bell towers and houses with red clay roofs.

When we got to Dubrovnik, we hauled ourselves and our bags up a substantial hill to our hostel, which was a private room in a family’s house. It was very nice, with a great view of the harbor. We then made the half-hour walk to the old town. It is very touristy, as many cruise ships stop and unload there for the day. The old town is surrounded by the city walls. Inside the walls are lots of narrow stone roads and little shops and restaurants. Most them are your typical souvenir stores but there were also some art galleries and jewelry stores. Rather than pay to access the city wall, we climbed the stairs to the very edge of the old town, against the wall, where we had a great view of the whole town. All day it had been sunny and hot, but at this point we heard thunder, so we hurried down and ducked into a cafe just before it started to pour. We waited out the storm, watching other people scurry for cover, then finished buying our souvenirs before heading out of the old town for dinner.

The next morning we got up early to go for a short run before catching our bus back to Split. It was warm again, but we ran up the hill back towards the old town and took pictures running up the stairs, with the city in the background. It was beautiful. For the ride back, we actually had a charter bus this time, so it was much more comfortable, and we spent some time talking with an American guy would had also just graduated and would be going to law school at UGA in the fall, so it was fun for he and Maggie to be able to talk about Athens. The cool thing about the drive to Dubrovnik and back was that we passed through Bosnia, only for about 10 minutes, but we did get our passports stamped both times, and since we got out for rest stop on the way back, we can legitimately say that we have been to Bosnia. We got into Split, had lunch, and then got on our train to Zagreb. While the train was newer than the one we had previously taken, the windows did not open and they did not have any air conditioning on. It was suffocating and we were dripping in sweat for most of the six hours. Not to mention that the ride started with me dumping my entire water bottle on my lap. Then, the train was delayed and since we only had a half hour layover in Zagreb we were worried that we would miss our train to Munich, but thank God there were enough people making the connection that the train waited. We did the classic running through the train station thing, which was interesting with our big packs, and I am sure that we got many strange looks (not the first or the last time, I’m sure).

When we got on the train to Munich we were happy to find an empty compartment, so we unloaded our bags, only to have the man next to us say that he wouldn’t recommend sleeping in that cabin because it smelled. And it definitely did, but we just wanted to be able to lie out and sleep. We started talking with guy, who was an engineering professor, originally from Bosnia. He was very nice and even gave Maggie the idea of looking for a job with the Olympic Committee. He also told us that in Croatia, they now call the US Obamastan, which we got a kick out of. It’s funny that when we say that we are from near Chicago, everyone also mentions Obama. The French kid even wrote out on his note pad "Yes We Can." When I was in France in 2001, and we said we were from Chicago, everyone always said, “Oh, Michael Jordan!”While Maggie was talking with the Bosnian man about job opportunities, I got stuck with the other man sharing his compartment who had pretty broken English but loved to talk about himself. He seemed nice enough at first, but then in the middle of the conversation he says out of the blue, "I am a Jehovah's Witness" and I thought, oh no I can see where this is going. And then he started talking about how we are living in miraculous times and about how he thought Christ was coming back soon and that there was paradise on Earth, and on and on until he finally paused to get my response, so I was like, well I am a Christian and have my own beliefs. Luckily, at this point Maggie heard me and since the guy she was talking to had already told her that this guy had been witnessing to him, she knew what was going on and came over to rescue me.

After passing through Slovenia and getting our passports stamped again, we were ready to go to bed and were minutes from lying down when a German couple came in saying that they had reserved two of the seats in the compartment. So they came in and our hopes of a good nights sleep ended since we would have to sit up most of the time or lie in a very crunched position. It was pretty annoying because there were other compartments with only one person in them and where the people didn’t have their luggage spread out all over like we did, but they were set on having their specific seats. So we passed a restless (and smelly) night on the train, ending our 24 hours of straight travel in Munich at about 8AM, where we were quite happy to see a Starbucks immediately after we got off the train.

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