VAN LIFE Croatia // The Further You Venture, The Better It Gets

Welcome back to CombiLife. This chapter of our World Overland Tour has seen us drive through Europe in search of some of the best off-grid camp spots on offer. We've just explored all of the incredible island of Sardinia and have now crossed mainland Italy headed for Croatia. We are driving around the world and you guys are invited too, so subscribe and buckle up. It's one heck of a ride. Checkout time. Hey you've got your croissant. We're the last people off the boat. Typical. Volkswagen doesn't like to be rushed though. Oh they're pushing this line off. Looks like they're getting the next cars on before we're even getting off the ferry. If we don't hurry up we're gonna end up back in Italy. Good morning Split, Croatia. Croatia's gorgeous isn't it? I can't wait. It's gonna be stunning. Oh so good to be in Croatia. I think first port of call is we need to make a plan and we need to get some coffee. Two excellent ideas. Croatia's second city Split is pretty cool but we weren't planning on staying here too long. Just long enough to get some fresh supplies and some breakfast. Which one do you want? Shopping complete. We have bread, tomatoes, lots of things dried and fresh, peppers, oh and a new basil plant. That smells amazing. Yeah courgette, raspberries, olive oil and olive oil. Grapes. Free grapes because the lady felt guilty because she ripped us off. She did yeah. And then she was like take some grapes. Here's some grapes. I'm sorry for ripping you off. I'm not a bad person. Got to thinking that my friends Marlee Mish are here in Croatia. Unfortunately they're not here in Croatia. Those are the guys by the way that were stuck in Morocco the same time as me last year and they were trying to get out and they shared their story with us and luckily they were able to get out of Morocco on one of the rescue ferries. We got stuck for a while longer but they made it to Croatia where they spent the lockdown of 2020. They're now traveling but they've made a recommendation for us to come to Paulina's. There it is. Nice. For cevapi. How do you say it? I don't know. I feel like I'm not saying that right. They reckon that this is a must have before we leave Split so let's go in and see. Oh there's a bit of a queue as well. Must be good. Let's go and have a look. It's really hot. Okay this is my one. It's small. Okay that probably looks more dainty. It does not look dainty. Look at this. Open it up. We've got pork dumplings, onion, sauce, cheese. Oh that's amazing. I want this recipe. I think you need the bread as well to make it special. Oh that's good. That's really good. Out of 10? Probably a nine. Oh really? That's high. Eight and a half, nine? That's a solid recommendation. Oh our belly's full. Maybe a little too full. That was a feed wasn't it? That was so much food. Far too much. Delicious. We also got a recommendation from those guys to go to Hvar, the island which is a stunning place. I've been there previously but we were thinking about getting the ferry. It's really quite pricey to get over there from Split so they suggested that we drive down the coast 72 kilometres and then we can get a very short, very cheap ferry to the other side of the island. So we're going to go do that now. Let's go for a drive. This is such a beautiful drive down the coast of Croatia but before we hit the road I need to thank the sponsor of this video which is Anker. They kindly sent us this Anker 757 powerhouse or silent generator if you will. If you haven't heard of Anker they are recognised as the number one mobile charging brand. They've been around for over 10 years and sold more than 200 million products. We've looked at other Anker power stations like the ultra portable Anker 521 powerhouse with the same long-lasting LFP batteries but smaller capacity. This is the big daddy, the 757. The Anker 757 power station packs 1,229 watt hours of premium lithium ion phosphate batteries which is good because they are much lighter and they will remain healthy after 3,000 complete charge cycles which is six times longer than other similar sized battery power stations and it's backed by Anker's five-year warranty which is pretty sweet. Now you can charge this from a normal 12 volt cigarette lighter style outlet in your vehicle as you're driving but it also has hyper flash which means if you plug it into an AC outlet it can go from 0 to 80 percent in 60 minutes. This is a serious solution for an off-grid portable power station ideal for campervan so you don't have to invest in that huge electrical system. Everything is in one box and if you spend more time in a house there's also a great backup power solution in case you have a blackout and you need to power something important like the wi-fi. It's got multiple AC outlets for your laptop or home appliances like a coffee maker or a microwave. It's also got six USB ports covering all your devices including two quick charge USB-C style ports to enable you to charge your devices or the power station. It's also got a solar port on the back so you can charge from 0 to 80 percent in around 3.6 hours so this is a truly off-grid power station solution. It's very reasonably priced and comes with all the build quality you'd expect from Anker like this fantastic smart display showing remaining battery capacity current input and output status as well as recharge time. This is the kind of product you'll be very happy you bought. The quality is amazing. If you want to know more i will leave a link in the top line of the description. Thanks to Anker and thanks to you guys. Now let's hit the road and just wait until you see what we discover at the end of it. Oh the coast here is absolutely stunning. What a drive. We're going right along the coast going south towards Revnik. A little town and we should be able to get a boat to Havar but this drive down this coast is stunning. Go for a swim George. Oh that's so good on my bike, my mosquito bike. Is it? I'm never gonna get out of the sea. I'm sorry I can't go with you to Havar. I'm staying here. I don't remember Croatia being quite so mountainous but like there are huge mountains coming straight up on the coastline. It just basically goes mountain straight down a tiny tiny sliver of a beach and then this unbelievable gorgeous water. Temperature is just the kind of temperature where you could stay in all day. Clarity, oh I can't wait to go snorkeling in that and hopefully a little climb on something around here too. Looks too good to pass up. What boat number is this? It's boat number seven that's just coming. Boat number seven. Oh here we go. Hopefully the shortest boat but not the cheapest boat. Wildly fluctuating prices on these European ferries. Least value for money is the one leaving Jersey but we had the most adventure for that ticket. You're gonna get squashed. He's gonna get squashed. That's it thank you. How was that? That was you know just so enjoyable I had a great time. Jon are you ready to go? You can't really wild camp too easily on this island apparently and also the campsites are around 40 euros which is crazy crazy crazy crazy expensive so we are therefore going to get an airbnb and try and get another apartment or something for a few days because we have got laundry to do and boring things like that and working stuff that's how we sustain our life on the road. Excellent quality roads on this tiny Croatian island. A little bit of a mishap with the with the airbnb. It was about 30 euros for the night which is pretty reasonable and about the same price as the campsite however she wanted to charge us an additional 20 euros a night for the two dogs so no just no. So now we're going to go find somewhere. Plan B is to back to van life and try to find something we can sleep on the island because all of our accommodation options are out and we're out of luck. Well hang on are we gonna make it back up this? No. That's really steep. Committed now. The peaches. This is it. This is it. This is it? This is it. That's our view. Yeah you're right it's a bit annoying there's a tree blocking half of it. Just kidding it's so beautiful. This is our spot for the night. This is where we're staying. It's about eight meters long maybe 10 meters long and the little area behind is right by the side of this road. We haven't seen anyone else come past in the last half an hour so whilst there's still a little bit of sun in the sky we're gonna go and check out the beach. The little private beach. It won't be the best of the beaches in Croatia but it is just for us. It'll be a nice little spot for a skinny dip. Skinny dip? Who's skinny dipping? You're skinny dipping. I'm not skinny dipping. That's why they subscribe. Hey What are we having? Betty Couscous With basil right? Obviously, we already know it's basil, we've got to eat some This is the largest healthiest basil plant that's ever been in the Kombi, it's ginormous You're hungry Cajun chorizo Let's go, come on, I'm so hungry So alive and tonight I'm thinking that I don't wanna go