Diving in Trogir

9th September

Went diving today! We checked out of the campsite early to get to the Trogir dive centre at nine in the morning. The weather was beautiful, the wind had died right down during the night which meant the big waves and currents I had had a lot of fun snorkeling in yesterday had gone - diving was on!
The guys at Trogir Dive Centre were excellent and I highly recommend them. They put us at our ease and were extremely professional, which made for a very relaxing dive. They had excellent boats, a mid-size speedboat which had plenty of room for us and a larger day-boat. The prices of the dives was also very reasonable (better value than pretty much all the other dive sites in the area and further south) and they offered a 10-dive package which also brought the price down further. Once we had kitted up and got on the boat we were soon coasting across to our dive site, which was the Balkun reef, had a thorough briefing from the skipper Ivan and were soon slipping into the water.
Again we saw lots of Blennys and Gobys, I managed to get a good photo of what I think is a Black Goby, although because it's camouflage was so good I can't be sure! We saw lots of other forms of life and I managed to get reasonable photos of some of it including Leopard Seaslugs and Facelindae (Nudibranches), an all-white Star Fish and a massive Scorpion Fish sitting amongst the rocks. We were also lucky enough to come across an Octopus feeding on a massive spider crab which it had just ripped in two. The crab was huge and there were a flurry of other fishes poking about for some of the remains. The octopus quickly retreated back into it's hidey hole before I managed to get a really good photo of it, but you can see it here. Look for the line of suckers in the middle of the photo. That was a real treat.

Back on land we said our goodbyes to the dive centre after what was a really good dive and drove across the bridge into the ancient town of Trogir. We had a lovely walk around this little island and the old town which is now a UNESCO world heritage site with it's castle, old buildings and narrow winding streets. The distinctive Camerlengo Castle was built in the 15th Century (the hexagonal corner tower was built in the 14th Century) by the Venetians to defend the town and the harbour from Turkish attack. There is also a tower on the opposite side of the island to aid in the defense of the town. Dominating the Eastern side of the island is the Cathedral of St Lawrence (St Lovre) built in the 12th Century, but supposedly based on an earlier temple and shows Gothic styling possibly added to during the Venetian reign. The Cathedral stands in the Trg Ivana Pavla III, which also has a nice clock tower.

After stopping for a coffee to recharge the batteries we headed on to Split, 24Km further south and parked up to have a wander around the city. We mosied along the rows of shops, market stalls and seefront before deciding to push on to the campsite we had found for the night.