Day 168: Tuesday 2 September – Serbia to Croatia In The Rain, by Ken

It was raining heavily while I prepared Mabel for the road by emptying her toilet cassette, filling the fresh water tank and disconnecting the electricity supply. Sod’s law prevailed and the rain had just about stopped by the time I plodded over to take a shower in soaking wet clothes.

During our time in the camping ground we had seen a herd of cows in the lane outside each morning and evening. This morning the herd had already passed but as we turned into the lane we had to stop while a few late risers passed on the way to join their mates.

Cows Late For Work
(Apologies for the picture quality - taken through a wet windscreen in poor light)

Pedestrian Bridge Over The Danube

River Danube At Stremska Metravica

We rejoined the motorway at the interchange we had left it at on Sunday and ran into heavy rain almost immediately. We reached the Croatian border after about 75km of driving on a very wet motorway. At the border the queues were short and a quick glance at passports seemed all that was necessary to move from one country to the next. We were disappointed to find there was nowhere to change money at the border and we entered Croatia with a fistful of Serbian dinars and not a single Croatian Kuna.

Approaching The Croatian Border

It was immediately apparent that Croatia had invested money in its roads. The motorway was completely transformed into almost billiard table smoothness with clear signage and good road markings. We soon reached the first toll plaza which was of the take-a-ticket type. We pulled into the first filling station we reached to try and get cash from an ATM. There wasn’t one and neither was there at the next filling station where I was told I could find one in Zagreb! However, there was no need to worry as toll booths and filling stations would be happy to accept credit cards. So we filled Mabel with diesel and paid by card.

Wet Wet Wet

The rain persisted all day. We stopped at a service station for lunch in Mabel of bread, cheese and salami. The toll booths we came to were happy with our credit cards. We left the motorway just north of the town of Karlovac where we crossed a very swollen Danube yet again. From Karlovac we took a two lane road with channels full with water almost up to kerb level. We skirted round the village of Duga Resa and then crossed a very swollen River Mreznica which was obviously well out of its banks and what would have been riparian vegetation was now part of the river.

We reached Camping Slavic a short distance after crossing the Mreznica. I checked in and was told not to park on low lying ground by the river as that was likely to be overtopped during the night. The receptionist also cautioned against using grass pitches which were very soft after a lot of rain. I was asked if I had a dog to which I replied "Yes, but it's in New Zealand". There wasn't a flicker on the receptionist's face, I guess humour doesn't travel. (Later when recounting the story to Jane, she said it wasn't funny, so that probably explains it). Both sides of the main camping ground road had motorhomes parked on the verges that were reinforced with Terram. We found ourselves a spot between motorhomes and set ourselves up for the night using the camping ground’s electricity to warm up Mabel.

Jane cooked an eclectic dinner medley of potatoes, capers, garlic, sausage, sun dried tomatoes and mayonnaise which tasted a lot better than it sounded. Afterwards we had a game of scrabble which Jane won hands down (305 to 231) thanks to the clever use of triple word scores.

Today's Trip (408km)