DAY 118 - SESTANOVAC TO KRILO JESENICE: 28.2 MILES (56,400 STEPS)

16 August, 2011

28.2 miles (Total:  1137.4 miles) 56,400 steps (Total: 2,208,091 steps)

‘How do you tell a communist? Well, it’s someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It’s someone who understands Marx and Lenin.‘ Ronald Reagan

Matko droped me off at Pizza Amor, Setanovac  at 6.10AM—I had said the plan was to set off at 6AM, so in a perfect imitation of a British Officer in a war movie, who having fought his way through enemy lines, arrives and declares “terribly sorry old chap—few minutes late—ran into a spot of bother.’ It was a perfect note on which to part company; as he drove off he shouted “Don’t forget turn right immediately after the plastic Jesus.”

I did pass a roadside crucifix, but it didn’t look plastic—I just smiled recalling the wonderful time I had with the Marusic family and friends and turned down into a deep canyon through which the fast flowing Cetine river passed—its full force broken temporarily by an ugly Communist era hydro electric plant.  How on earth could any group of people fall for such an unreal and ugly ideology?  It organised against the basic human instincts for creativity, freedom, knowledge, ownership, travel, enterprise and spirituality.

Having spent nearly three months in former communist countries, I am just amazed that thinking people could have been fooled by it. That is why the essential requirement of a communist regime is total control—if people are able to travel freely and interact with other people and ideas, then the indoctrination that this is some perfect system fails.

I recall speaking with students in North Korea and they genuinely believed that I must be so envious of their lives that I was visiting and wanting to stay. One thing I would say that communism does far better than capitalism, and this is in the words of people who have experienced both systems, is that under communism people did genuinely seem to look after each other in their family and community.  Capitalism, in its extreme version, creates an ‘It’s all about me’ attitude, in which the advancement of personal self-interest is the only life goal.  Ultimately this breaks down community and breaks down family, which both require the individual to accept the wishes of the majority—this is democracy and it is the essential thermostat which regulates the selfish instincts of capitalist economies.

The journey down the canyon was longer than I had expected and I arrived in Omis around 3PM in the afternoon. Omis is a beautiful former smuggling port with lots of historic buildings and narrow streets. I hoped to find accommodation there. I checked a number of travel agents and they all told me that I have no chance of getting a room for under 200 euros a night. I suspected that this was a ‘line’ for gullible looking Western tourists to stump up ridiculous sums. I resolved that I would rather sleep at the in the bus station than blow a week’s accommodation budget on one night in Omis.

I was tired. It was very hot. My rucksack was cutting into my hips. I stopped at a cafe and ordered a tall Macchiato coffee and three scoops of chocolate ice-cream and studied my map. I had already walked twenty miles, but thought I might be able to manage another five, especially if it meant lower prices. I checked the prices at various stages along the way and there seemed to be a remarkable consistency around 90 euros per night. I walked on in the hope that I would get something cheaper.  After a further eight miles, I reached Krilo Jesenice, but couldn’t walk any further, so I started to haggle on the prices and managed to get the price down to 70 euros – still twice the budget, but they could see from my face that I was a captive market.