Today was a better day... it only took some climbing and a snake

After rain comes the sun. Or at least after one day of pretty boring hike comes a fantastic day.

Today we were hiking in the Bojin mountains, up to Velika Rujno. My expectations before the hike was not very high, but I knew one thing – the nature would be beautiful. It was even better than expected. The grey oddly shaped cliffs against the blue sky or sea was breath taking. I found myself constantly oooing and aaaing at the view. It was absolutely amazing.

But then the whole hike turned out to be better than expected. Today the slowest hikers were walking in the back with our Swedish guide and the rest of us could keep a higher tempo in the front. Of course we had to wait for the others once in a while, but that is at least better than to walk slowly the whole way.

The hike itself was filled with climbing challenges, both uphill and downhill. It was several times when the guide needed to tell us both where to put our feet AND hands to have a safe climb up or down. That is like an amusement park for hikers – a lot of fun and very challenging.

We skipped our lunch packet from the hotel. Instead our Swedish guide arranged a fantastic picnic. See picture below. We ate local cheeses, sausages, ham, bread, cookies, pate, fruit..... and it all tasted extremely good. To all these local dishes we drank a local red wine. I think it is the first time I have drunken red wine, during a hike (I have of course been drinking after the hike earlier), but I don’t think it will be the last. It tasted great with the food and we only took a small glass. No one wants to be drunk while hiking, especially not since we were also semi-climbing. This was one of the best lunches I have ever had while hiking. FANTASTIC!

But the great things with the hike didn’t end there. We also saw the most dangerous snake in Europe – the horned viper, see picture below. It is funny with snakes – you both want to see them and not want to see them. I hate snakes and am scared of them, but still I’m fascinated about them. This one we could really see up close. But unfortunately I didn’t have the best lens to take a picture of it.

When we came back to the hotel we enjoyed the one thing I have never had the opportunity to enjoy after a hike before – a swim in the ocean. We have only around 100 m to the beach, so we quickly changed from our hiking clothes to our bathing clothes and went for a swim. It was a bit cold at first, but then it felt great.  Then it was just nice to sit in the sun and reflect on the day. Today was amazing.

Fantastic picnic

Oddly shaped rock against the blu sky and sea

Look close and you will see the snake on the branch