Welcome to Chez Cliff!

All seven of us sat in complete silence, not exactly sure what to say.

Matko, our boat captain, had pulled up in some small hidden bay.  His best-friends mom, who is arguably the toughest woman I ever met, hauled the boat into the dock and helped us out.

Not understanding a single slavic word, she grabbed my arm in hers and thus began our march to her home.  She quickly arranged a few tables for us to sit at and then opened her home.  A few apertifs were served, along with samples of her own home-made olive oil.  A berry, called Forrest Berry, was used to produce this other type of beverage very similar to a port.

She showed us her olive orchard, located on the opposite side of the bay on a mountain.  “No one is left to pick the olives,” she said.  “Young people only want to live in the city.”  When the harvest needs to be done, she grabs her burlap backpack and heads up into the mountain to pick her own olives.  Then, as her mother, her grand-mother and countless generations did - she makes her own olive oil.  What she can bottle and sell goes to help pay the bills.  She shows no sign of slowing down.

It was an all too familar scene, something us Americans just weren’t use to.  Time and time again a short conversation in Croatia would lead to a dinner invitation or their equivalent of “let’s get a beer”.  Always warm, always open and friendly these people were always willing to share whatever they had even if it wasn’t a lot.

Into day four of our trip, we were emotionally spent.  The seven of us who prefer to go as local as possible had a chance to meet many locals on this trip.  The locals, in returned, shared with us their homes, their lives and their stories which could easily fill the New York times best-seller listing.

As we stood up to leave this lady’s house, I could feel something inside of me had changed.  This vacation had touched me on a deep leve, resonanted with something perhaps I was lacking.  It wasn’t so much the place or the things we had done but rather the constant string of people we had met in this beautiful and captivating country called Croatia.

Yes, I’ll definitely be going back.