How We Came to Croatia

Moving Away from Our Hometown to Croatia

Get rid of all our belongings, sell our house, quit our jobs, get in the car and drive to Croatia. Search for a boat, find it and explore the Mediterranean. That was our rough plan, and that's pretty much how we ended up doing it. We actually wanted to leave for Croatia in the fall of 2021. Unfortunately, that didn't work out because the house sale took longer. Therefore, we couldn’t hand over the house before March 2022 and after a few days in which we stayed with a good friend, we finally left with our small car. This is where our story begins.

So, it was a beautiful sunny spring morning, and finally, we set off. Having never driven abroad by car before, I had a few concerns despite my anticipation. After all, we were embarking on this journey with a small car, not exactly known for its quality—a Dacia Sandero, stuffed to the brim with all sorts of items we couldn't part with or that we truly needed. This included a foldable cat litter box with litter, a child seat with a child, the large cat transport box for our Maine Coon, two sizable travel backpacks, a vacuum cleaner, and an assortment of children's toys to keep Amelie entertained.

Not to mention the strange feeling that remained when I looked at my keychain. I hadn't had such a light keyring for what felt like an eternity. Only the car key was on it. None for a house door, a garage or the work. It looked simply empty. Symbolic also a bit for all that we had left behind. Actually, we had nothing left except a few belongings and the car. That also meant that we would have to sleep in the packed car in case of an emergency. A small car as the center of life, even if only for one day.

We set off. I was already familiar with the route between central Germany and Munich, but the rest was virtually uncharted territory for me. The first two-thirds went surprisingly well. We covered kilometer after kilometer. Both the cat and the child were uncomplicated. Well, we took more breaks than originally planned, but everything was fine. As we approached the border with Austria, I felt a bit nervous since I had never driven abroad by car, and I didn't know what to expect. My relief came after crossing the border. I realized I was on a normal two-lane highway, so apparently, everything was fine.

Everything went smoothly until we needed to find a gas station. After approximately thirty kilometers, we found one, but soon realized that it wasn't the best choice. As I pulled onto the exit lane, I suddenly found myself in the middle of a construction site. Feeling lost, we approached a worker to ask for directions on how to get back on the highway. He advised us to reverse in the direction we had come from and accelerate quickly. This was a bit risky, as other cars on the highway could be traveling at speeds of up to 130 km/h, but luckily, the highway was empty, so we had no issues getting back on track.

Two more border crossings lay ahead of us, from Austria to Slovenia and then finally to Croatia. Both went without major incident, and since we are all EU citizens, we had no problems crossing the border. All we needed were our identity cards. When we were in Slovenia, I was happy about the cheap gas prices and took another opportunity to fill up the tank. At this point, I realized that we would not arrive until nightfall because we had taken too many breaks. Nevertheless, I was very happy when we crossed the Croatian border in the evening.

I thought that we would soon arrive in Split, as we had already covered the longest stretch of the journey. Unfortunately, the joy did not last long. Despite the ultra-modern toll roads, it felt like it took us half an eternity to reach Split. The long, unvarying drive with little traffic made it feel like time was dragging on. The relief was even greater when we finally arrived after 14 hours.