plitvicka...when push comes to shove

Our first glimpse of the sublime, clear, cobalt-coloured water of the Plitvicka Lakes

I am at the Plitvicka Lakes, one of the most exquisitely beautiful places in Croatia, and I am distressed and disappointed.

At the end of a long day, I am one of the first people waiting for the bus, which transfers people between locations in the park. The bus arrives, but hundreds of people surge forward, blocking the doorways, and filling the bus before I can climb aboard.

A sullen mouthed woman in a blue uniform says, “No more,” and the doors close. “Excuse me,” I say. “I have have waited over an hour for two buses now and I can't get on because people push in front of me.”

She is unmoved. “That's our rule here,” she says “You push.” Her eyes are insolent.

I am a 63 year old woman, tired from four hours walking around the lakes on a warm day, and there is no way I can push past the 7 foot tall German Heidis with their thick plaits or the groups of athletic young Croatian males. I have never been good in crowds. Dave says he will push for me next time, the way he shielded me in Hong Kong more than 30 years ago when I first experienced a human crush, while catching a ferry. But I won't wait for another 30 minutes and it is getting late so Dave and I walk for nearly two hours to get to the boat to take us across the surreal turquoise lake.

Sometimes emerald green, sometimes turquoise waters 
of the lakes.

On the shore, a tour group of Italians waits for the boat with us. As soon as it moors, an elderly Italian man elbows me out of the way, shoving me in the ribs. By now I am close to tears.

Why are people behaving like this? Our hotel manager nails it. “There are too many people.” She sighs. “The tour groups. Too many people in July and August.”

By listing the Plitvicka Lakes as the number one attraction in Croatia, 'Lonely Planet' has ensured that it will never be lonely. It has been a popular tourist destination since 1951, when it became a national park. UNESCO declared it a world heritage site in 1979.

In 1991 tourism was rudely interrupted by the Civil War which, ironically I reflect, began here when rebel Serbs took over the park as their headquarters. The first casualty, a Croation policeman, occurred here. There is something almost obscene about a war beginning in such a natural paradise.

Tranquillity and peace...

Like so many other people, I came here to commune with nature, to hike around the wondrous system of tiered lakes, cascading streams and waterfalls with their clear waters and forested mountains. I hope to glimpse the wild animals, wolves, deer, bears, boar or lynxes, or at least to feel their shadowy presences in the woods of beech, fir, spruce and flowering ash.

Instead, I see people. Tens of thousands of them. They are crawling in single file along the 18kms of paths and board-walks and narrow footbridges, like ants. I can't go at my own pace or stop to stare. Sometimes I flatten myself against a rock wall and wait for half an hour until there is a little space. Koreans, South Americans, Italians, Chinese and Russians file past. It is hard to even see the lakes, but I can hear waters rushing beneath the board-walk in places.

'Humant' behaviour.

It is more crowded here than at the Alhambra in Spain. There are queues for food, for the boats, for buses. I overhear some young people from Spain and the Netherlands expressing their disappointment. They can't see the lakes or the wild boar. They note the number of Russians with “big bellies and cowboy boots.” They see the Russians in every country they visit. “Just because they have money, they think they have rights.” It is a sensitive time, economically, in Europe and these young university graduates are feeling it.

When we reach a waterfall, I see a steep stairway cut into the rock leading to a lookout high above. To escape the crowds we huff and puff our way to the top to find spectacular views and a forest track with only a few young hikers. The scenery is spectacular and apparently almost unchanged since the last Ice Age.

I know that in every culture there are people who believe in 'dog eat dog', a survival of the fittest mentality, but now that we are rapidly moving towards a one world consciousness, we need to find a more humane and pragmatic set of values. I see a lad wearing a TEAM [Together We Achieve More] slogan on his T-shirt.

I once heard Tim Costello, an Australian social commentator, say that the measure of a society's robustness is the way it treats its frail, elderly and marginal citizens.

Surely there are better ways than 'push and shove.'

Splendid solitude...

We are leaving Plitvicka for the Dalmation coast. A diminutive young Parisienne notary engages us in conversation at the bus stop. Her gentle brown eyes brim with tears as she says, “I don't like this country. The people look unhappy. They won't help you. I don't understand a touristic place being like this.”

She has travelled a lot, particularly in Europe and Asia, but like me, she has sensed something harsh in Plitvicka.

After driving through wooded country, where the trees suggest that summer is morphing into autumn, we pass through a long tunnel cut into the pale limestone hills and reach Zadar, our first coastal destination.

We have entered another world. A Croatia which delights us!

A final reflection...