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This Week

Sunday 26 September 2010

Well it's Sunday, so it's time for the weekly round up. This may be a little bit holiday focused. Ah, who am I trying to kid? It's ALL about my holiday. You have been warned.

Visiting:

Dubrovnik! Oh my gosh, what a wonderful place. If you haven't been then you must go. Immediately. I will lend you my suntan lotion, or a brolly (more on that later). It's utterly beautiful, very welcoming to tourists and has the perfect mixture of things to do and places to loaf round in. We did lots of sightseeing but equal amounts of sitting and people watching.




A ceiling inside the Rector's Palace. I would dearly love something like this in my house.
Detail from a statue of St Blaise, the patron saint of Dubrovnik. He's always pictured holding a model of the city.


The view from a wonderful bar reached by going through a little gate in the city walls

A slightly psychotic owl and a mural at the Natural History Museum where we had much fun trying to decipher the Croatian labels. Some boring so-and-so had written in the visitor's book that it would be much better if the labels were all in English. Firstly, insular much? Go to English museums if you want English labels. And really, isn't it much more intriguing to play "guess the skull"?

Eating:

In quite an array of really good and inexpensive restaurants. I always feel odd taking photos of my food so here are some details from a couple of the places instead.




Sunbathing:

On the island of Lokrum. I haven't lazed around on a beach since about 2002. It's quite fun isn't it? I couldn't do a whole holiday of it without being bored out of my mind but I did very much enjoy a lazy day on the rocks with several dips in the Adriatic. My feet are now very slightly browner than they appear in this photo. The rest of me has just gone freckly.


The island also has a wonderful abandoned monastery. Apparently Archduke Franz Ferdinand was due to go there on his summer holidays in 1914 - if you remember any of your WW1 history, you'll know he got assassinated instead, poor man.

Listening:

To the Dubrovnik Symphony Orchestra. We were wandering around one night after dinner and stumbled across the concert being held in the atrium of the Rector's Palace. Tickets were only £15 and it seemed like a perfect discovery, so we went in. We liked it so much we went back two nights later!


No photographic evidence of it unfortunately, but one of the trumpet players was the absolute spitting image of Sylvester Stallone. Spooky!


Getting:
Drenched on the last day. I don't think I've ever been so wet in my entire life. It rained all day and we were coping ok with waterproofs and brollies but then about 6pm, whilst we were stuck outside in it, the heavens absolutely opened. The water was running practically knee high through the streets at one point.

6pm on the main street. It's not a blurry photo, it really was raining that hard. For purposes of contrast, here's the same road taken at roughly the same time the day before.


Buying:

A new hat. Green, obviously. A somewhat random purchase but I rather love it.


Drinking:

Prosek, a local dessert wine. Mmmmm, it's delicious! Also quite a lot of coffee and white wine. I was on holiday...


Reading:

This little lot. I have a couple of hundred pages of the London book left to go but otherwise they've all been read and enjoyed.


Finally:
I am a little cross about the fact that I only went and won VIP tickets to London Fashion Week and then couldn't bloody go because I was on holiday!! Probably a blessing in disguise though as I would have felt like an unfashionable fraud every moment of the time there had I ended up going. I wouldn't have missed a moment of my holiday for the world though.

31 comments:

  1. Holy cow. Can I just tell you I am so jealous of your life?? All of this looks amazzing. I've never been to Europe and I'm dying to go!! America is so dull compared to all of this. Plus, I've seen the ocean maybe twice in my entire life. It's ridiculous. And those ruins?? Stunnnnnning. I'm so envious :)

    London Fashion week sounds kind of, a little bit amazing too. Too bad you couldn't go:(

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  2. l am really enjoying reading your blog, could you do a post about how you feel now after losing all the weight ? how has things changed in your life ? your really inspire alot off us larger women maybe it be 1 stone or 5 stone over weight, l have always been slim size 12 untill l had my last child now l am size 16/18 so l am the other flip off the coin how do l dress for a larger women ?

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  3. What a delicious bundle of books!!!
    O,darling,how divine it all looks!!! Glorious holiday bliss!
    So glad you're having agreat time!! So many delightful things to see!
    And I totally agree about the museum labels!! I actually love being in places where I can;t understand anything.It's amazing what a smile and a few appropirate gestures can get you!!!
    LOVE!!!
    (and take care out there!)

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  4. What a wonderful holiday! Such a shame you missed LFW but I bet the holiday was WAY more interesting. Your hat is absolutely gorgeous, and I love that green. Want one! xx

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  5. It looks gorgeous, i love the photo of the steps the most xx

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  6. Looks gorgeous, the detailing on buildings and ceilings is amazing. So pretty.

    Glad you had a good time.

    xx

    p.s LOVE the new hat on you.

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  7. I love your green hat! Awesome purchase if you ask me. I love my floppy hat - I wore it again today. They are just so 'casual cool' I feel. Yours reminds me of something Blair Waldorf would wear - so chic! Who needs fashion week when you have a view like that over the water?! Well done for reading so much! I've decided I want an iPad or kindle so I can read on the go :p xoxo

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  8. Oh my goodness, Dubrovnik looks so much like my kind of place, that decaying grandeur really gets me going. It looks rather similiar to Valetta and M'dina so maybe you should pay a visit to Malta next time you fancy a bit of cultural jet-setting.
    I adore the peeling door, that's one thing I take photographs of in the hundreds.
    Tags in English? Pur-lease! Half the fun of whiling away hours in foreign museums is making up your own historical commentary.
    That hat looks divine.
    Jem and I had a blast at LFW but only because we enjoyed each other's company so much. To be honest I can't say we spotted many particularly fashionable folk just sad clones with identikit hair. xxx

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  9. All these sunny pictures are making me miss my own holidays! Sad that the weather's all rubbish now :(

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  10. I want your hat! Its divine. Your holiday looks amazing, well apart from the monsoon obviously. Glad you enjoyed it. x

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  11. These pictures are lovely, such an interesting trip! You seem to have done so much and seen so much. Sounds like a pretty amazing holiday, and I think the hat is a wonderful purchase x

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  12. Wow, it looks amazing. Comgrats on the vouchercodes comp too- shame you missed out but doesn't take the winning away from you!
    And wow, you read almost as much as me!

    xxx Maddie

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  13. sorry, typo-CONgrats! xxx

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  14. Holy crap Alex! It looks amazing.

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  15. loving the holiday pics alex !!
    looks like you had a wonderful time, and hopefully did plenty of relaxing :) xx

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  16. OMG, I've always wanted to go to Dubrovnik (and Croatia). Love your pics and your post - and of course your lovely hat.

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  17. Oh my word! That looks like such an amazing holiday. The photos are gorgeous, Alex, I am on the verge of death by envy here! :-)

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  18. Oh, it looks stunning. This has to be my next holiday destination. Gorgeous.

    Can't believe how many books you read! I'm a super speedy reader and always take a least 3 on holiday with me but you definitely beat me on that front! :) x

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  19. Dear Alex, I really enjoyed reading that. Your holiday looks fantastic and so does Dubrovnik. I have friends who have a villa in Zadar further up the coast. They host a festival called The Garden. We've always meant to go.

    I love the Rector's Palace and the pale green is beautiful. My ceiling in my sitting room looks a bit like a wedding cake, but not as interesting as that.

    You look gorgeous in that hat, what a great find. I love floppy hats. I could go on for far longer than there's room about Peter Ackroyd's London, needless to say I didn't want it to end. Glad to have you back Cxx

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  20. That ceiling is amaaaaazing!

    Isn't Moab is My Washpot fab? And aren't you just dying to go on to The Fry Chronicles? Please say yes!

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  21. Alex this post is brill! I love the photos, I want to go now :D x

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  22. Your pictures are great, I'm sooo jealous, I want to go there too. Loving the hat BTW it really suits you. xxx

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  23. How fabulous!!! I'm DEFINITELY jealous! I wish I could go :(

    CLOTHED MUCH, a modest fashion blog

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  24. I've wanted to go to Croatia for so long, really need to persuade the boyfriend around to it - I think your pics may help! Love the hat!

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  25. Gosh it looks so beautiful. Your photos are lovely.
    And you read HOW MANY BOOKS?!

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  26. Ah it looks so beautiful, Alex. And that big pile fo books look brilliant too. I'm afraid I'm stuck with my guilty pleasure YA books at the moment. And thanks for the sweet comment :) xxx

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  27. Ah that looks like a fab holiday, even the rainy part, Im jealous! Great book choices too :)

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  28. What an amazing holiday and photos. I love the steps one. Thank you so much for sharing. Dubrovnic looks like the most amazing city, stunningly beautiful and a lot more inspiring than LFW! But fun that you won the ticket. I am also taken with the amount of books you read, it is something I would like to do more of. I love 'how to'-type books, cooking, clothing, cleaning etc, but never read 'stories' as such. Maybe a New Years Resolution in the making!!
    Z xx

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  29. Hello! New person here.

    I HAD to comment when I read about the people who'd written in the guest book about the displays being in English, I came across the exact same thing in a guest book at the museum for the national resistance in France!! It was by Betty and Norman (no joke) and they said something along the lines of "It's shame none of it's written in English, after all we were your allies in the war!" It was shockingly embarassing. Not to mention idiotic, how many of our displays in England have French and Croatian translations?! Morons.

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  30. You're back Wooohooo :D I've missed your blog whilst you were away!

    Looks like you had an AMAZING time - It looks like somewhere I would love to go to!

    I love the model of the patron st with his model of the city!! So cute :D


    Sal xXx

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  31. Looks like you had a fantastic holiday, you have made me miss foreign lands and discovering little villages!

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