Day 91

20 July 2013

Bearing all.

I received and unintelligible phone call last night form the dealer who has my bike in his workshop. Just to make sure that I did not miss out on something important I set out to go to the shop, a fair task in itself.

I have been spoiled with second to none public transport systems in Singapore, Beijing, Moscow and St Petersburg, where just one ticket takes you anywhere and announcements are made over the PA and by lit up signs in the train/bus. Here in Croatia the maps are a bit vague and no announcements are made or maps in the bus. The only way to find out when to get off is by asking the driver to call you.

Changing lines means buying another ticket. Anyway I got to the workshop just before closing at 12 noon (Saturday) I found the bike in a corner of the workshop with its back end completely stripped and a broken bearing lying on the floor right next to it. The bearing had collapsed; the broke pieces had pierced the oil seal. Lucky no further damage was done. Mhmmm. The dealer told what the bill was going to be: a nice round figure of 2500 Kuna which translates to 350 Euros or 490 AUS dollars. Holy Sh…

I went back to the old centre of Zadar. There has been the odd day that I felt lonely and alone and this was such a day, then you miss talking to a friend. I needed to look and do something positive. Walking through the main square I started out by buying one of those magnificent ice creams they sell here.

I walked past the Old Town hostel and thought that I had been fortunate not to book there as the whole inner city is off limits to traffic, The place I am staying is on the water, a good place to wait and count beans.

After listening to the sea organ for a while I went back and spent the rest of the afternoon on the pebble beach. Now that was an (un) exiting or rather boring day, wasn't it. (but I could have been in a worse place)