Flying to Croatia

I took a flight from Paris to Croatia on one of the discount airlines here in Europe, and fortunately got a window seat but unfortunately shared the row with a couple of loud French lovebirds.  So I leaned up against the window and did my best to fall asleep.

I woke to look out of the window and  breathe "oh!" At the view.  We were flying over snowcapped mountains, with glaciers below us.  I never understood the what people meant when they said the mountains were "cut by glaciers" until now.  You could tell the huge white masses were slowly sliding, not by their movement, but by their melting shape.

There were towns and roads clearly visible in every nook in the surrounding mountains.  It is the opposite of the wild Teton range I visited less than a month ago.  Every square acre of arable land had been taken, farmed or built upon.  Even the upper regions had roads that were visible from the plane.  I was surprised there were not roads up to the glaciers themselves.  There is no such thing as wilderness here.

A few short minutes later, we're over the foothills to the Alps, and then like a snap over flat farmland. Then, a few short minutes again and you can see the sea.  My cabinmate leans over and asks to look out the window.  "C'est Venice! (That's Venice)" He exclaimed, then, with more doubt, "Non, it's not.  I think Venice is over there." He points at a city surrounding a port.  All the cities on this coast are behind a strip of land, with even the wider parts of the sandbar fully populated.

Then, we're over the Mediterranean.

By the time I finish drafting this post, the captain comes on board and tells us in bad English that we have approximately 20 minutes before landing in Split.  Everything is so close here.

On to Croatia!

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The double-pane foggy plane windows made it hard to get pictures