Safe Return Doubtful

Yesterday I shared the paths with more than a thousand other visitors. Today, instead of turning left into the lakes area, I turned right and followed the river Plitvice up to its source, and saw nobody at all during the three hours or so, 12 kilometres, that I was out. The route didn’t have quite so many ‘slaps’, or waterfalls, but was still pretty spectacular.

Yesterday I paid 40 euros for the privilege, today to pass nobody, was free. Such are mountains.

I had thought I’d spend three nights at the farm I was camped at, but while out this morning I found a great place to stop, up at the end of a dead end road to an old derelict villa, overlooking the higher mountains of the Park on the Bosnian border.

The Villa Izvor has an interesting history. It was constructed for President Tito (of the then Yugoslavia) between 1948 to 1953 by hundreds of WWII prisoners, though after its construction Tito rarely visited, preferring his residence in the Brijuni National Park and hunting in Bosnia.

Plitvice Lakes was one of the first areas to be hit by the military actions of rebel Serbs even using this villa as their headquarters. After the war it was abandoned and has since fallen into disrepair, now nothing more than a venue for raves and parties of teenagers. I’m a kilometre or so below it, about to indulge on another evening of rugby World Cup..