We had been advised that we should go ashore here and climb the mountain. I can’t say that I was overly enthusiastic at first. It looked like a long and potentially difficult climb, but it had to be done. So we set to getting the tender out to go ashore. Our old tender has been consigned to the rubbish bin as it was starting to fall apart, and we are currently using one that we have borrowed. This one has many benefits over the old one, being bigger and much more stable. The downside is that it takes rather more effort to inflate it. I am sad enough to have counted and know that this one takes approximately 3000 strokes of the pump, compared to a bit over 1000 for the old one. However, it is all good exercise and we are getting quicker at doing it, now that we have got to know what works best.
Two things happened while the pumping was happening, the
rangers came round to check that everyone had paid their park entry fees. These
are very reasonable, and allow you to use the buoys anywhere in the park. As
yesterday, they did not need to actually stop at our boat as they had records
that we had paid online. The second occurrence was a practice run by one of the planes that drop
water on forest fires. It came round and skimmed close to the water, presumably
collecting some, and then circled round and dropped the water between us and the
next island. Then it went round and dropped down to the water level again,
before disappearing from sight.
We were the third party to set off for the summit, and fortunately
the first was just returning as we started. This helped us to find the path,
which was not easy to spot from below. It took a bit under an hour to climb the
267 meters to the summit, using the rocky path. Several times we were presented
with choices of route, but we must have picked correctly. As we neared the top, the path became better
defined and easier to follow. We passed
the second group descending, and they said that it was worth going to the top,
so encouraged we pressed on. At the top
the views were spectacular. We could see for miles across the islands and
mainland of Croatia. These pictures will
speak for themselves.
 |
| We were glad the temperature was not in the 30s for this |
Kornati is a National Park, and has many unique aspects. We
understand that it was once forested, but the local farmers burnt the trees to
improve the grazing, and built the walls that run across the island. We suspect that without the trees, the
topsoil washed away, leaving the comparatively barren moonscape that exists
today.
The trip back down was a bit easier than we had expected. I don’t
know if we used some different paths or it was just easier to descend, but we
made it safely, before rowing back to Equinox in time for a slightly late
lunch.
Miles Today - 10
Miles 2022 – 1351
Steve (and Tricia)
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