We arrived at Split on Saturday. We passed two weddings while walking to the restaurant for a group meal. We had preordered either fish or lasagna – we had the fish – it was good – had a tomato, olive, caper sauce. We tasted Katie’s lasagna, which was outstanding. There was a wonderful strolling area called the Riva – maybe 1.2 mile long. Saturday night it was crammed full of locals.
There is a walking tour while “cool”. We returned to the waterfront riva. This is a new polished stone tile with stylish masts supporting retractable awnings over matching tables and chairs. The locals don’t like the modern look blocking the front of the old Roman walls and current shops, or they don’t like the increased cost of the food available (double to pay for the improvements). The increased cost has been reduced due to the pressure. We have a lecture about Diocletian’s palace at the 3-D model and the 2-D paper map. That still does not prepare us entering the Roman ruins under and in the existing buildings. We proceed through the walls that used to be the sea wall – between souvenir shops and descend into Roman ruins. Through the maze of rooms, broken rubbish and multiple foundations, we emerge above to see museums, churches and more shops. Here we still see the North-South and East-West Roman layout.  We visit the public WC and continue the tour/orientation to the Golden Gate for the remainder of our walking tour. These ruins were crouded and sometimes we had to wait for them to leave a standard lecture place before we advanced. The tourists wore all kinds of costumes, every street has tables and chairs under umbrellas providing many gathering places.

For lunch we found a bakery in the wall that made hot panni sandwiches for our picnic lunch. Bill ordered the ham and cheese. They heated the bare sandwich in the special heater then added lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, hardboiled egg, and other stuff for a very good take out sandwich. We find a park bench and read the guide book to plan for the remainder of the day.

Meštrović gallery and nearby Kaštelet Chapel was a long walk up hill or a short bus ride. The chapel had a great view of the sea and beach. It housed the 28 wooden panels showing the life of Christ. They were watering the grass to keep it from burning up. The museum was not air conditioned. We can see the marina at the edge of town and decide to walk back down the hill. We pass kids cheerfully climbing up the hill in their swim suits ready for an afternoon of play in the sea. We passed gardens and flowers in greenhouses on the expensive sea view property. We pass the marina and reach the riva. We find the first place to get gelato and stop for a sit.

We decide to head on over to Maslina and have a beer before supper. Dale and Katie come in just a few minutes. Later nine more come into this recommended restaurant. We ordered brochettes and a cheese plate with our drinks while we read the menu. These were super, like hot small individual pizzas with basil, tomato slices and melted cheese. For dinner Jola had a tuna salad so large she could not finish it. Bill had seafood alfredo that was excellent. Katie had the 4 cheese lasagna that was extremely thick. Dale had a rather plain risotto. We all traded samples. We ask the waiter to split the bill half on each credit card, but he would not. We divided with cash from Dale and credit card from Bill as we would need more cash for the extra days beyond the trip.

We walked through the green market to arrive at the group meeting place. Today we are taking a smaller passenger ferry to the Island of Korčula with a stop in Hvar. We put all our luggage on the bus and it will go by car ferry straight to Korčula.

Gelato

Green market

Beach

Ferry to islands