After six months from leaving the UK to go on our travels, we’ve decided it’s time for a holiday. We are therefore making the most of our few days on Pelješki as we seem to be having so much fun on this trip currently staying at Mali Ston in an amazing large, comfortable ground floor apartment.

Both Steve and I are naturally tidy, we agree everything has a place and is in its place, neither of us treading on the other’s toes.  However, walking into this spacious apartment it took just moments to bring in our bags and have the contents explode into every available space.  This was only our third night away from the caravan. When we woke up from a brilliant night’s sleep in our Super King bed, to a wet day we changed our minds about today’s anticipated itinerary.   As usual, Steve made the tea (we bought supplies in town yesterday), brought the mugs to bed and we delayed getting up spending a lazy morning planning our day. Having lazed enough Steve had his shower and got dressed and then whilst he was taking Stella for a walk, I had the place to myself to potter about, have my shower and also got dressed.

Yesterday, we thought that we would either spend today climbing the Ston Walls or in Dubrovnik, but decided to save those trips for another time.  Instead, we would visit the Salt Plains of Ston and the Edivo Winery.

Our drive from Mali Ston is only a km and we were there in no time.  As we parked up the Attendant at the Salt Mine was over the moon to have a tourist visitor, especially Brits.  Us Brits are incredibly short on the ground in these Covid times.  He was so excited he didn’t stop talking, telling us all about the Salt Plains which are the oldest and biggest preserved ones in the Mediterranean, showing us the way to watch the 15 minute video and see the items for sale. Unfortunately through his excitement he spoke half English and half Croatian so it wasn’t easy to understand him.

Saltworks Ston – Home (solanaston.hr) – We took a few photos whilst we did the tour.

When we had finished the tour (the weather was exceptionally cold and damp) we returned to pay for our tickets and buy a souvenir. The guide told us he would only charge for one ticket, mine was complementary, and when we bought a salt souvenir, he pilled additional packs into Steve’s arms. I expect he couldn’t remember the last time he had visitors. Who knows? Steve cheekily said that we we were now stocked up for several fish and chip dinners.

From the Salt Plains we drove to the Edivo Winery in Drače, Janjina.  The drive was full of more signs for Wineries, Wine Tasting, Free Wine Tasting, Wine with Free Accommodation, Accommodation with Free Wine and wild boar signs.

We looked at the weather and it reminded me of a phrase I heard often at school – ‘should try harder’.

At Edivo, their wine is bottled, the bottles are sunk into water to a depth of 18-25metres for three months, and later sunk into the sea for one to two years.  They call it “Navis Mysterium” – The Sea Mystery.  We’ve never seen anything like this before and think this is most certainly unique and definitely to be shared. Visit their website for more explanation – Undersea Wine – Edivo Vina – the pictures will do the product more justice than me trying to put descriptions together. 

We admired all the very special bottles and displays, we toured the winery, bought a bottle of wine in regular packaging, as the encrusted ones were from £50, and drove down the adjacent path to the sea front at Drače.

We couldn’t believe our eyes, yet another picturesque bay with houses as colourful as their boats and crystal clear sea. It was gone three o’clock by this time and we were hungry. Sadly the two bars that were open in the bay weren’t doing food. At one of them the punters joined in a conversation of where we could go for something to eat.

On our way back to Ston we saw a Oyster Shack, but sadly although the owner was there, there was nothing in store to eat. Our tummies began rumbling.

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We decided we may as well go back to Mali Ston and have something to eat at the Bota Sare Restaurant (Bota Šare | Bota Šare | Traditional dalmatian & sushi restaurants in Zagreb, Split, Mali Ston and Dubrovnik (bota-sare.hr)), so we could have dinner and, as they have three tour boats, book an Oyster Tour.

As we sat down to eat, outside of course but under cover, the grey sky began to turn blue and the temperature started to warm up. Our waiter whose English name is Lucky, tended us. Being young he spoke English very well and we chatted about the lack of the tourist industry, with a local tour driver joining in, where we should visit, Dubrovnik and where we should park when we got there. The restaurant used to be a salt warehouse where the salt was directly loaded onto ships and is around 800 years old. Everywhere is so full of character and history.

With only one other table of diners for a short while we almost had the place to ourselves. In fact after 20 minutes we did have the place to ourselves. We began with a complementary starter of mixed local sea food (caught that morning) pate made with fresh local herbs in olive oil, with a side of lightly toasted bread. It had a slight herby, floral finish to the taste.

We followed with Seared Tuna, also caught that morning, and the typical Croatian dish of smashed boiled potatoes mixed with kale with a side of home made bread.

To finish we had a typical Croatian desert Stonska Torta which has been around for a hundred years.. Its ingredients are pasta, chocolate and almonds, dressed with candied peel and almonds.

After dinner we had more chats with Lucky who told us more about the restaurant which is a family business. They have about seven restaurants but only five children. No doubt they didn’t plan ahead on breeding their own managers.

Our tummies full, the local wine enjoyed and the sun setting, it was time to make our way back to our apartment to plan for tomorrow.

The third day of this holiday continues tomorrow – – – –