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Swiss chocolate and cheese

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Swiss chocolate This post is related to our trip to Switzerland in early spring. Who hasn’t dreamed of being in a chocolate factory? The Swiss chocolate industry is similar to fashion houses in Italy or champagne houses in France – there are chocolate houses in Switzerland. Our Swiss chocolate tour was booked at Cailler Chocolate House (Maison Cailler). This brand has been owned by the Nestle Group for a while now, however, it has managed to preserve its historical values and traditions. Like many interesting sights, the chocolate factory is a bit off the main road. The Cailler factory, which produces Swiss chocolate (one of many), is in a town called Broc. During the visit, it was possible to get acquainted with the history of making chocolate, which, as it turns out, is not so old, as well as to taste a variety of Swiss chocolate. Just to note that, although you can eat chocolate in huge quantities, it is not recommended to eat chocolate too for the benefit of your health. The exact...
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Autumn in Bulgaria – 2024

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Autumn Adventure in Bulgaria This was our second adventure to Bulgaria, a destination that had piqued our interest since our first visit in 2007. Back then, we drove through the country in early spring, admiring the stunning Belogradchik cliffs , the serene Bachkovo Monastery, and exploring the picturesque Black Sea coast . The memories remained, but we were eager to return for a deeper exploration in the fall of 2024. There is also a video about this trip on my YouTube channel . A different way to explore Bulgaria Unlike our previous journey, this time we flew from London to Sofia, ready for a weeklong adventure. No more long drives from Riga to Bulgaria, we were here to savour every moment. After landing in Sofia, we rented a car from CarRent Bulgaria, a local company we booked through DiscoverCars . Having used DiscoverCars for car rentals in Riga and Greece, we knew we’d get a great deal. Their service was reliable, and the pricing was better than other platforms like Booking.com. ...
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Grebastica in Croatia

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Dalmatian town Grebastica Grebastica is a small town or more precisely a town-type village by the sea some 15 kilometres from Croatian town Sibenik. When it comes to Croatia, in general, especially about Dalmatia , most of the seaside settlements are villages, but the impression that it could be a city. It’s because the houses are very close to each other and these villages have relatively good infrastructure to serve tourists. They usually have several small shops and a lot of bars, restaurants and cafes located along the seaside. They also have many private hotels, some larger but a lot of small ones. Grebastica is quite well-known tourist destination because of the sunny weather, the clean sea, which is actually a bay, and its beaches. The beaches, of course, as in most of Croatia, are with small stones but not rocky in Grebastica. It should also be noted that this place is especially attractive to Germans, Swiss and Austrians and you will hear a lot of German language around. Our ...
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Split in Croatia

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Dalmatian city Split Split is the second largest city in Croatia and you can see it from far away as you approach the city. It is also the largest city in Dalmatia and the largest Croatian city on the Adriatic coast. The city has become popular with tourists, especially in recent years after episodes of the well-known TV series ‘Game of Thrones’ were filmed in the city. Split was founded by the Greeks several centuries before Christ, but a Roman imperial palace was built in the city already a few centuries AD. Around the middle of the first millennium AD, Split became the capital of the Roman province of Dalmatia. In the following period, the city passed from the Byzantines to Venetians, but also existed as an independent city-state, so its cultural heritage is impressive. Today, more than 160 thousand inhabitants live in Split, but together with the suburbs, the number of inhabitants reaches almost 350 thousand. Places to see Most of the sights are located in the old town near the se...
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Sevid in Dalmatia

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Croatian town Sevid Sevid was our destination for a summer vacation on the Adriatic coast in Croatia. I already wrote before that we arrived at Zadar airport and spent a couple of days in a small town Grebastica and on the way to Sevid we stopped in Dalmatian town Primosten. Sevid is great place for quiet vacation, the nearest town with an active tourist life is Trogir, which is about 20 kilometres away. The beaches of Sevid, of course, have many people like everywhere else in Croatia, but they are not overcrowded. People go there with their private cars, because the village is located a short but not walking distance from the D8 road, there is no motorway nearby, and it is difficult or even impossible for tourist buses to pass through narrow local roads. Another peculiarity, why there are no bigger hotels in Sevid is that the village does not have a central water supply. Houses use their own boreholes for water, but in many places water is even supplied by vehicles in water tanks. We...
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Croatian towns Rogoznica and Primosten

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Primosten After spending almost two days in Grebastica, we went to our final destination in Croatia , Sevid, but on the way there was another stop – Primosten. Primosten is another picturesque town on the coast of the Adriatic Sea, right next to the D8 highway mentioned in the previous description, some 15 kilometres south of Grebastica. The town’s name is associated with a drawbridge that was once built for defence purposes, but is no longer there; part of the city is on an island now connected to the mainland. The city beach is considered one of the ten best beaches (depending on source) in Croatia and even has stationary sun umbrellas for holidaymakers (such thing is not very common in Croatia). The surrounding region is famous for its wine, and there is a vineyard right near the town. which is even included in the UNESCO world cultural heritage list. Just outside the city on the other side of the bay is another interesting sight, the statue of Our Lady of Loreto, which can be seen ...
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Croatian town Omis

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Seaside town Omis Omis is a small town in Croatia at the estuary of the Cetina River into the sea, about 25 kilometres (30 minutes) south of Split. Omis is known for being used by pirates around the fourteenth century. The river is surrounded by mountains and was a good place to hide to rob the sea-going merchant ships that operated between Dubrovnik , Venice and Naples. Not only the ability to hide played a role, but also the fact that sea vessels could not navigate the river. The pirates had even built a fortress and concluded an agreement with the surrounding villages on non-aggression and ‘cooperation’. There isn’t much to do in the town itself, although it has its own charm and a large parking lot, which is essential when traveling by car. However, we did not go to Omis to look for pirates – the purpose of the trip was to ride one of the longest zipline tracks in Europe. The track consists of seven descents of different lengths with a total cableway length of more than two kilomet...
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