The depth of the straits between the islands is up to 65 meters. Moreover, these straits abound in underwater rocks, which did not become islands purely by chance. Naturally, the bottom of the river is simply strewn with ship wrecks. Thousand Islands is considered the world's best freshwater diving reserve. The Thousand Islands zone is about 80 kilometers long. Naturally, both banks of the river were dismantled into summer cottages, hotels, motels and beaches. Trust me, this is an amazing resort. By the way, the Thousand Islands meat sauce, which almost everyone has seen and even tasted (McDonald's, Subway, Wendis, Burger King), was invented and advertised in 1912 in one of the local hotels. Most strikingly, here it is called Russian sauce, and in Europe it will also be called American sauce.
The Thousand Islands National Park was listed by UNESCO in the list of unique phenomena of the biosphere in 2002.
One of the most beautiful bridges in the world, connecting Canada and the United States. I drove on it in winter and was amazed by the views from the car window. "Bah," I thought, "Thousand Islands! We have to come here."
According to legend, some supreme Indian god was saddened by strife between people and descended to earth. He brought with him a beautiful garden, which he left to the little people so that they would not be very hostile to each other. Little people admired the garden, but did not stop their destructive activities. Then the angry god gathered the garden into his big string bag and flew back to his heaven. And the string bag broke right over the St. Lawrence River. Where the pieces of the garden woke up, there an island arose. And so it was, or otherwise, now no one knows. But people have another reason for contention. For a long time, Canada and the United States shared jurisdiction over these islands, and during low-intensity wars they were used as strategic outposts. But at the end of the 19th century, everything calmed down, and the area began to attract exclusively fishermen, summer residents and yachtsmen. The islands began to be sold for very modest money, even at that time. Gradually, each piece of land acquired its owner. And the owners in this part of the world are very correct. They tend to take care of their property. And so we sail on a steamer and look around. The day was good at first, but as soon as we boarded the boat, the weather turned bad. Therefore, the photos could be better.
There are many legends about the islands and island structures. For example, this bridge is considered the smallest border crossing in the world. The big island is said to be in Canada and the small one in the United States. The owner of the dacha can allegedly cross the border without customs formalities an uncountable number of times a day. In fact, this is pure fiction: both islands are Canadian on paper.
This is a rather large island, it is called Oleniy. In 1876, this island was bought by one person for 175 dollars and presented to the most secret Masonic lodge called "Skulls and Bones". Fans of conspiracy theorists claim that it is this gloomy organization that rules the world through a Jewish-Masonic conspiracy. The lines of control seem to lead to this deserted cottage. The lodge itself is based at Yale University. No one is allowed to enter the island, and members of the lodge have no right to tell anyone anything. But there are rumors, confirmed by aerial photography, that the island contains the ruins of two or three more manors, surrounded by abandoned tennis courts, now overgrown with gooseberries and wild rhubarb. The fact is that Yale Masonic lodges have hidden funding for the university, and in the last hundred years this funding has left much to be desired. This is the only reason why the Jewish-Masonic conspiracy cannot spread its wings in any way, otherwise it would not seem enough to anyone. But freedom-loving nations still cannot verify what is happening outside the walls of the only surviving cottage, because the island is controlled by the American border service. By the way, although the above paragraph seems to be complete nonsense, everything, except for the Judeo-Masonic conspiracy, is pure truth in it (and maybe he too). Members of a really very secret Masonic lodge "Skulls and Bones" do own the island and indeed sometimes visit their possessions, but the cottage does not legally belong to them. Property tax is paid by some trust fund, and it also keeps this house in order.
During the excursion I was tormented by one thought: suppose the owner of this hacienda called his friends. And there wasn’t enough booze. How long will it take for them to run for more?
This is the most famous, smallest and tidiest cottage. By the way, all buildings on the islands are connected to electricity, landline telephone networks and sewerage. The most complex engineering networks are operated by a special energy company.
There is a summer shed on the islet behind the bush, which is not visible from here.
Buildings rising out of the water, reminiscent of ancient casemates, evoke the idea of \u200b\u200bcastles. Indeed, there must be a castle here. Hello castle!
Multimillionaire George Boldt, who came to the States from Germany penniless, began his career as a waiter and ended up as the owner of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan. He was extremely fond of the nature of the Thousand Islands, and as soon as he could, he bought a decent-sized island, which he called the Heart (as you know, the Germans are prone to simple sentimentality). Boldt dedicated the castle on his island to his beloved wife. In the midst of construction in 1904, his wife died suddenly from some kind of illness. Boldt sent a telegram about the completion of the work, fired three hundred people of the staff and left here forever. He never saw his castle again. The unfinished ruins ruined the landscape for a long time, until in 1970 the American government bought Heart Island and finished construction. Now the castle is a luxurious museum. However, not everyone can enter the castle. On the island, of course, the US Immigration Service is raging. They are not allowed without a visa. Everything is good for me, but my mother, with whom we rode this time on the roads and waters of Ontario, had no chance. Without a doubt, this is the strangest US immigration destination in the world. But it is equipped in all respects as expected. In principle, of course, ships from both sides of the river dock on the island, and one can imagine how an attacker who dreams of illegally washing cars at an American gas station sneaks from one ship to another, bypassing the US Immigration and Border Protection Service. But they are on the alert and do not allow inclinations.
In the foreground is the castle's power plant. So what? Why don’t the noble don make himself a power plant according to an individual project?
We sail around the island, circling it clockwise. The power plant ... can't be. However, this is it.
The pier. The wooden booth is American customs.
I came up with a lot of comments on this picture, but then I decided to leave them all behind the scenes. The look of the castle speaks for itself.
The half-collapsed tower in the foreground is called the Alster Tower. Its purpose is not clear and I do not know. I think it was mothballed in the state in which the island was transferred to the US government almost forty years ago.
The picture shows the whole Heart Island. The power plant is on the right, the unfinished tower on the left. In the house opposite the island, Boldt planned to make a yacht club for his friends. In the background is the Canadian span of the International Bridge. The snapshot is naturally found on Wikipedia.
Casa Blanca's antique mansion (White House, obviously). Inside there are 26 rooms decorated in Victorian style. I don't understand why all the articles about this house are pushing exactly 26 rooms. The house was built as a very fashionable hotel. It opened its doors in 1903. I found an old New York Times print advertising a summer vacation in this house. Rooms are rented in it today.
New construction is noticeable in these two frames.
And the last frame is also, unfortunately, not mine, I found it on the same Wikipedia. Very nice...
The tower clock showed exactly 11.40. Surprised, I glanced at my wristwatches: 19.10. Mentally she quipped: "The city of happy people - they don't watch the clock." The guide, apparently guessing my bewilderment, said: “This clock stopped during the earthquake in 1667”. Under the motionless arrows on the narrow white-stone streets, life was seething, mixing centuries.
You must enter old Dubrovnik through the Pyla gate, a semicircular tower with a sculpture of the patron saint of the city - St. Blach. His gilded statue - Vlach holding a model of the city before the earthquake - stands in the altar of the church that bears the name of the saint. The steps in front of her, polished with millions of feet, have long been inhabited by tourists. In the evenings, music thunders here. A pulsating laser, tracing bizarre figures in the dark sky, now and then stumbles over ancient walls. The sharp beam freezes for a second, dissolving in the dim light of the ancients, like the walls, lanterns. Materialized link of times ...
Surprisingly, it was in Croatia that I felt the absolute concreteness of this concept, somewhat worn out from frequent use. In small towns scattered along the Adriatic coast, behind blind shutters that tightly close the loophole windows, people live in fortress houses that have retained their unchanged appearance since ancient times and received the status of architectural monuments. The children, deprived of any piety in relation to the gray-haired antiquity, jump in the "classics" drawn on the stone pavements of the 17th century. Like many centuries ago, the heavy doors of the shop are opened, filled with a variety of goods - local and overseas.
We, a group of journalists, were invited to Croatia by the Moscow travel company "Danvita", which has chosen this country on the Adriatic as one of its main directions of activity. To be more precise, that part of it that is called Dalmatia, while less than others mastered by the Russian tourist business.
By the way, Croatia is a country with old tourist traditions. Historical chronicles store information that the first hotel for merchants and other visiting business people was built in Dubrovnik in the 16th century. However, the real tourist boom began in the 19th century with the massive construction of railways. In 1840, the first tourist hotel was built in Opatija, Istria, on the largest peninsula of the Adriatic Sea. And Croatia was flooded with its closest neighbors - Austrians and Hungarians, who were the first to appreciate the healing local climate, the beauty of nature, the possibilities of a varied and healthy recreation. Everyone here is at ease - modern Robinsons, dreaming of solitude (they say, even if the country is flooded with vacationers, they will not be cramped: for everyone there is a personal cove or an island, where any boatman will willingly deliver "from the mainland" on a cheap basis), climbers and yachtsmen who dream about the "elastic wind", lovers of scuba diving and fertile thermal springs. And, of course, gourmets - the best varieties of fish (and there are about 400 species of them in the local waters), lobsters, oysters are put on the table fresh, bypassing the refrigerator.
Croatia is a country where you want to return. The reason, perhaps, is in harmony and beauty, which for some reason turned out to be beyond the control of the tough century of scientific and technological progress.
It is amazing: being just a few hours' drive from the center of Europe and taking advantage of all the benefits of civilization, Croatia has managed to keep untouched the charming corners of wildlife - the one that most of the continent knows only from old photographs, '' Danvita director Nina Senchenko enlightens me while we are we are waiting for our charter at the Domodedovo airport. Three hours will pass, and I will see everything with my own eyes.
Woven from the sea, sun, greenery, islands, coves and rocks, nature itself, like a brilliant architect, embodied on this earth the law of the "golden section", in "divine proportion", as it was called in the Renaissance, measuring out its share of forests, water and dry. "The gods wanted to glorify what they created, and on the last day they created Kornati out of tears, stars and the breath of the sea," - this is how Bernard Shaw described the piece of Croatian land that captivated him - a necklace of islands thrown into the sea. Probably, each of the 1185 islands deserves such words, each of the thousands of bays and coves that cut the coast of Croatia. Here, European kings and heirs to the throne rested from the great affairs of state, the lists of which include the German emperor Wilhelm, the Austrian one Franz Joseph, even the Japanese one Hirohito and other titled persons.
Shakespeare settled the heroes of his comedy "Twelfth Night" on this land. Over the years, her charm inspired the romantic Lord Byron, the Italian wit-comedian Goldoni, the courageous American Jack London, our compatriots Chekhov, Yesenin. Agatha Christie, wise by life and experience, chose Croatia for her honeymoon after her second marriage. "Under the window of our villa," wrote the famous dancer Isadora Duncan, vacationing in 1902 at the Villa Amalia in Opatija, "there was a palm tree that attracted my attention. Never before had I seen a palm tree growing free. Every day I watched, how beautifully its leaves sway in the morning wind, and from her I took this slight swaying of shoulders, arms and fingers. " Than she conquered the world.
The Croatian land has witnessed one of the most romantic stories of the 20th century - the love between the British King Edward VIII and the American Wallis Simpson. Having sacrificed the crown to his feeling, the crown bearer took refuge with his beloved in Dalmatia - although there are so many beautiful places on earth! - having delighted some of the compatriots with a brave act and aroused indignation by the frank, as it was regarded, neglect of the throne - in the other. But the scandal attracted the attention of the then British and American press to the beautiful land on the Adriatic. On the catwalks and streets of New York, clothes appeared stylized as the national Dalmatian costume. Curious tourists rushed to Dalmatia from the British Isles and from across the ocean. And everyone considered it his duty to definitely visit Dubrovnik, immediately baptized "the heart of Dalmatia, the pearl of Croatia, its trademark." Connoisseurs compared it to Venice and assured that it could well compete with the "beautiful Italian" for the right to be called the most beautiful city of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic.
We didn’t change traditions either and, barely stepping on the ancient stones, plunged into the extraordinary atmosphere of Dubrovnik - scorched by the sun, intoxicated with idleness, cheerful and uninhibited. I’ll note right away: there is probably no other such land where on a tiny piece would fit so many treasures taken under the protection of UNESCO, as Croatia: Dubrovnik, Split, Trogir, Plitvice Lakes and more, more ...
We were lucky: we were introduced to Dubrovnik by a historian, a native of the city, who knows all its nooks and crannies and spoke as if he himself had witnessed the events of centuries ago. Together with Leiko Iovich ("Your lion," he introduced himself), we walked along the main Stradun street, every now and then deviating to the side "skalinads", narrow - on the sweep of the arms - streets, steep stairs climbing up along the ancient houses, up, up.
In some places, the flight of stairs is interrupted, resting on the street-terrace, as if hanging over the houses. Now these terraces are inhabited by many tiny - two or three tables - restaurants serving excellent Dalmatian wine and seafood delicacies. The restaurants smoothly flow into one another, and the border can be determined only by the color of the tablecloth and the setting. The hosts are right there, persistently, but not annoyingly inviting guests, convincingly describing the advantages of their kitchen. The competition is huge, so you have to twirl around, using all your ingenuity to come up with something especially attractive. And they come up with. Cheerful fat man Marco, whose funny cartoon portrait among images of marine life adorns the menu board, invites potential customers to taste homemade wine. His competitor neighbor demonstrates a picturesque dish with fish, which can be baked, fried, boiled, stewed right away - whatever the guest wishes. The charming polka lady Helena, who was brought to Dalmatia by her parents as a girl, and she settled here, setting the table, puts in the middle a round vase-aquarium with a gold fish. And everyone will add a plate of cheese, salad or a glass of wine to the order. "Compliment" is called ...
As if having rest on the square-terrace, the staircase-street runs higher, to the next "square".
The location, height and width of buildings, the slope of roofs for gutters, the slope of streets, the size of windows and thresholds - all urban construction to the smallest detail was regulated by the Constitution of the Republic of Dubrovnik in 1272, - says Leiko Iovich. “By the way,” he said, “this Constitution, supplemented by minor amendments, lasted until the fall of the Republic in 1806, after the invasion of Napoleon. So, if the owner of the house made the threshold even an inch larger, getting out on the sidewalk, and the door was wider or shorter than prescribed, he was punished. It doesn't matter whether he was a noble estate or a commoner.
Learning the history of the free Republic of Dubrovnik, I mentally projected many of its institutions onto our life. It turned out interesting. "Forget the personal, deal with state affairs" - this inscription, carved above the entrance to the Great Veche and preserved to this day, was read by the "deputies" who gathered for their meetings. And God forbid it was to break this commandment from the moral code of the "fathers of the republic" and take advantage of the "official position"! They paid, as the chronicles testify, not only by expulsion from the honorary assembly, but also by reputation, which was worth more than gold. The Republic of Dubrovnik was dominated by the complete "consent of the estates" - and only this allowed it to avoid social unrest for centuries.
She did not create idols or erect monuments in honor of her celebrities - is it because she did not want to be demolished by the next generations? The only one to whom, by decision of the Republic, in 1638, a monument was erected in the courtyard-vestibule of the Prince's Palace, was Miho Prezata, a navigator, a citizen who donated all his property to the city. The republic valued artisans, encouraged science, literature and art. The first pharmacy in Europe was opened here - and now it is carefully kept in the form of a museum, where you can see flasks and devices over which someone like Doctor Faust was conjuring. And in the Palace of Sponsa, where the first school in the Republic was located, then - the most famous society in the Balkans "Academy of Scientists", now houses one of the most valuable archives in the world. The first documents from 7000 volumes of manuscripts date back to the XII century, the last refer to our century. Maritime historians especially value "professional materials": all records concerning ships and their routes have been kept here in perfect order since 1278. Including lists of teams and passengers.
Even during the construction of the fortress walls (and they were rebuilt during the XI-XVII centuries), as we would say, "national interest" was taken into account. Erecting, for example, the fortress Lovrenac, three walls were laid with a width of 3 to 12 meters, and one - only 60 centimeters. This was one of the wise precautions: if one of the commandants of the fortress decided to encroach on power over the free city-republic, he would be immediately "rendered harmless." And it is probably no coincidence that it is above the entrance to Lovrenac that another of Dubrovnik's moral tenets was carved on an ancient stone: "Freedom is not sold for all the gold in the world." The city was conquered, but could not be conquered.
After the fall of the republic, the fortress turned into a barracks of the Austro-Hungarian invaders during their 100-year wars, then - the cannons were barely silent - into a restaurant, then into a meeting place for the International PEN Club. During World War II, there was a fascist prison here. And now Hamlet is being played in Lovrenac. Until now, the ancient walls, in the scenery of which the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark unfolds, remember one of the best performers of his role - the great Laurence Olivier. And in summer, the fortress, like 32 other sights of old Dubrovnik, turns into a stage for the famous arts festival, which has been held here every year from July 10 to August 25 for half a century. Even the 1991 attack by the Serbs, who could not come to terms with the independence of Croatia, did not force the city at the foot of Srдж to take an "intermission".
We were preparing gifts for children in the courtyard of the Sponza Palace, suddenly the sky over the city darkened, and a rain of grenades and shells rained down on it, - said the owner of the boat on which we decided to sail around Dubrovnik. An experienced sailor, he now calls himself an "old coaster", he rides tourists on his own boat, at the same time performing the role of a guide. Earned in the season is enough for the winter. True, in order to put on shoes, dress and pamper three sons, a wife and a daughter, you still have to work hard at a construction site. Our new acquaintance is fine with that.
The main thing is to be calm, without war. Like now, he says. - And that day - December 6, 1991, the day of St. Nicholas, we call it - the day of fear and horror. Then a truce was declared, we thought there would be a ceasefire as promised. No. The ships blazed like torches. Houses, churches, streets shook from the shooting. It was scary when the cross on Srdja collapsed. It's like the end of the world has come. And six months later, on May 31, 92, there was a new raid. Then entire villages burned down. Very sorry for the Arboretum park in Trsteno. They say he was one of the most beautiful in Dalmatia. For several centuries it was cultivated by the Guchetichi - the famous aristocratic family of the Republic. There were poets, artists, connoisseurs and nature lovers. And in one fell swoop everything was destroyed. Only two plane trees are left, - our captain sighs. “Thank God it's over now. War wounds can still be seen only on houses. But we'll patch it up. But tourists come to us again. Russians, however, are still not enough. Mostly Germans, Italians, Austrians. Many guests from Holland and Belgium. Poles have appeared recently.
Later in the department of tourism I was told that tourist Croatia is gaining momentum again. The number of vacationers has already approached ten million a year - twice as many as the country's population. These are not only Europeans - they come from all over the world. Here they hope that by 2003 the "golden" pre-war level will be reached, when Croatia was considered almost the most visited corner of the world. There are reasons for optimism. Good hotels, solid, environmentally friendly cuisine, almost zero crime. For the third year in a row, the Blue Flag has been flying over the sea - the European Evaluation Commission awards it for quality services, cleanliness of the sea, improvement of beaches and berths. "Dubrovnik and its environs owns the cleanest sea in the entire Adriatic", - once wrote Jacques Yves Cousteau. And he can be trusted.
The island of Brac, where we went by ferry from Dubrovnik, looks like a huge ship anchored in the azure sea. Mitko, the driver of the minibus placed at our disposal, immediately reported that Brač is famous for its stone quarries. "The White House in Washington is built of our stone and marble," he proudly declared, and immediately offered to go to the quarries. We did it. But a little later, after walking around the lovely villages scattered around the historical center of the island - the town of Supetar. It grew up around a small harbor, and its main inhabitants are fishermen. Like many centuries ago, they come here in the mornings, moor their schooners and boats, dry their nets almost on the embankment, and sit down in coastal restaurants - konobas, order a cup of strong coffee, leisurely exchange a couple of mean phrases - about life, about the catch and go to trade this very catch. Life here flows slowly, measuredly, checking, as in the old days, by the sundial on the wall of the ancient temple.
On the way to the quarry, we turned into another village (Mitko really wanted to show the most famous places on the island).
This was Napoleon's headquarters, ”he pointed at a solid, sturdy building.
And now?
Now nothing. There is nothing in this village at all. Once upon a time
4 thousand people, 11 remained. During the war, they left in all directions: some - abroad, others - to big cities.
The abandoned village looked unexpectedly smart: no ruined houses, no boarded up windows. There was a telephone booth near the ancient temple. It turned out that the card can be used to call anywhere. Which I took advantage of, called Moscow. While we, dumbfounded, discussed this abandoned village, out of nowhere appeared a grandfather, a local old resident. The grandfather was cheerful and sociable. It was easy to talk to him - he understood Russian words well, and we, Croatian. The grandfather said that he was 71 years old, that he did not want to leave his home when his children and their neighbors left here. "They will come back anyway," he said confidently. "Some are already back." Suddenly something creaked in his pocket. Grunting, he took out ... a cell phone. We were numb.
Before leaving for the "mainland" we were invited to dinner at the hotel, which, as we were assured, is famous for its cuisine. Entering the hall, we confess we were confused. The walls were covered with posters reminiscent of our civil defense visuals. On one of the tables lay a disassembled gas mask, next to it - instructions for using inflatable vests, approximately the same as laid out in airplanes. Boxes with ... board games were raised in a high pile. In a separate box, some tubes in khaki packaging were poured in a mountain. We could not resist, began to consider them. It turned out to be a cream. One - from mosquitoes and mosquitoes, the other - from the strong sun.
Suddenly, young, healthy, tanned guys burst into the hall with a noisy gang. Looks like from the beach. Seeing the strangers, they excused themselves and quietly walked through the open doors into the building. We were told that British soldiers from the peacekeeping forces stationed in Bosnia are now living in the hotel. Every six months they come here for "rehabilitation", which is combined with military training, then go on vacation, home, and then return to their duty station. Six months before the next vacation. The guys are taken care of here - after all, the soldiers. “We cook their food according to English recipes,” said the cook Maria, who also fed us.
Then we met an even larger group of vacationers of peacekeeping soldiers from Holland at the Medena hotel. There were many girls among them. They looked unusual in camouflage. But the uniform did not prevent them from having fun in the night disco ...
And at the end of the day, Croatia presented us with another meeting - in the tiny village of Sebet near Trogir, not far from the Medena hotel where we lived. The village itself is typically Croatian - clean, neat, with a temple and a square in front of it, paved, as in all ancient cities with white stone, a couple of three narrow straight streets, where the windows of houses look into each other's eyes. And of course, with the remains of an ancient fortress wall. In a word - Trogir in miniature. Or Split. Or Primosten - you can name a dozen cities, similar, like twins, but also like twins different, with their own character, with their own special sign.
The peculiarity of our village turned out to be an art gallery. We saw her at once: at the open doors there were pictures - flowers, the sea, barges, sailboats, islands, rocks. Everything that we saw while traveling in Croatia suddenly came to life on canvases. They blazed with bright colors, impudent nervous strokes betrayed the author's irrepressible temperament. The hand felt strong, obviously masculine. Milyada Barada was displayed above the door. After looking at the pictures, we moved on. But they didn’t take a dozen steps when we stumbled upon the sign "Mino Barada Street". Intrigued, they returned to the gallery. On the house they saw a marble plaque, not seen before. She reported that the famous historian, member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences Mino Barada, who was also a writer and a prominent public figure, was born and lived in this house. Struck by the dates of his life: 1889 - 1989. One hundred years! We looked into the gallery again. From the second floor we were called by a pleasant female voice, asking what brought us here. “Curiosity,” we explained. The woman put down the brush she held in her hand and came down to us. Graceful, dressed smartly and elegantly, as if waiting for guests. Introduced herself. Milyada Barada, artist, poet, gallery owner. Heir to a famous name and an equally famous house.
Look - this corner was once part of the fortress wall. It is over 500 years old. - She proudly shows the old masonry and the niche that has been preserved for a long time. - The spirit of my ancestors hovers here, I feel it.
Milyada herself was born far from here - in Australia: Croats have long been scattered all over the world, especially in Canada and on the Green Continent. She returned to her historical homeland very young - something was drawn. Although there remained a brother and sister. Now he lives in Zagreb. He writes a lot - poetry and pictures. She painted since childhood and knew for sure that she would be an artist. Her paintings are bought by private collectors and museums from different countries. They also adorn the Vatican collection. Milyada did not even think about poetry. Rhymes and rhythms began to take shape unexpectedly. And they resulted in 8 books. Poems, like paintings, are about the sea, about flowers, about their native land. "About my roots and my element," says Milyada.
When she comes to Sebet, people flock to her. Fishermen talk about their catches and watch her paintings. They like them, only men are surprised how she, a woman, manages to capture the many-sided character of the sea so accurately. Women talk about children. She is interested in listening. She knows all the locals. It’s not difficult: there are only 500 people in the village. They live in abundance, and this pleases Milyadu. She does a lot of charity work. 26 years old member of UNICEF. Organizes humanitarian aid to children in Africa suffering from war, poverty and disease, refugees from neighboring Bosnia and other countries. Fortunately, her compatriots no longer need emergency help - they stand firmly on their feet.
At parting, Milyada gave me a book of her poems. One of her paintings is reproduced on the dust jacket. A stumpy tree, through whose branches the sea turns blue. The tree has been growing for more than a hundred years near the house where her ancestors lived and grandchildren will live ...
Already at the airport, I realized what I still lacked in Croatia. Dalmatians! It seemed to me that elegant spotted dogs from Dalmatia would come across there at every turn - just like in the famous Disney movie "101 Dalmatians". Not at all. In Moscow, these dear dogs can be found much more often than in their homeland. When I pestered the locals with the question - where are the Dalmatians, they answered laughing: in the Franciscan monastery in Zaostrog. In the painting of 1724, a Dalmatian was first depicted there. I should have seen ...
The tower clock showed exactly 11.40. Surprised, I glanced at my wristwatches: 19.10. Mentally she quipped: "The city of happy people - they don't watch the clock." The guide, apparently guessing my bewilderment, said: “This clock stopped during the earthquake in 1667”. Under the motionless arrows on the narrow white-stone streets, life was seething, mixing centuries.
You must enter old Dubrovnik through the Pyla gate, a semicircular tower with a sculpture of the patron saint of the city - St. Blach. His gilded statue - Vlach holding a model of the city before the earthquake - stands in the altar of the church that bears the name of the saint. The steps in front of her, polished with millions of feet, have long been inhabited by tourists. In the evenings, music thunders here. A pulsating laser, tracing bizarre figures in the dark sky, now and then stumbles over ancient walls. The sharp beam freezes for a second, dissolving in the dim light of the ancients, like the walls, lanterns. Materialized link of times ...
Surprisingly, it was in Croatia that I felt the absolute concreteness of this concept, somewhat worn out from frequent use. In small towns scattered along the Adriatic coast, behind blind shutters that tightly close the loophole windows, people live in fortress houses that have retained their unchanged appearance since ancient times and received the status of architectural monuments. The children, deprived of any piety in relation to the gray-haired antiquity, jump in the "classics" drawn on the stone pavements of the 17th century. Like many centuries ago, the heavy doors of the shop are opened, filled with a variety of goods - local and overseas.
We, a group of journalists, were invited to Croatia by the Moscow travel company "Danvita", which has chosen this country on the Adriatic as one of its main directions of activity. To be more precise, that part of it that is called Dalmatia, while less than others mastered by the Russian tourist business.
By the way, Croatia is a country with old tourist traditions. Historical chronicles store information that the first hotel for merchants and other visiting business people was built in Dubrovnik in the 16th century. However, the real tourist boom began in the 19th century with the massive construction of railways. In 1840, the first tourist hotel was built in Opatija, Istria, on the largest peninsula of the Adriatic Sea. And Croatia was flooded with its closest neighbors - Austrians and Hungarians, who were the first to appreciate the healing local climate, the beauty of nature, the possibilities of a varied and healthy recreation. Everyone here is at ease - modern Robinsons, dreaming of solitude (they say, even if the country is flooded with vacationers, they will not be cramped: for everyone there is a personal cove or an island, where any boatman will willingly deliver "from the mainland" on a cheap basis), climbers and yachtsmen who dream about the "elastic wind", lovers of scuba diving and fertile thermal springs. And, of course, gourmets - the best varieties of fish (and there are about 400 species of them in the local waters), lobsters, oysters are put on the table fresh, bypassing the refrigerator.
Croatia is a country where you want to return. The reason, perhaps, is in harmony and beauty, which for some reason turned out to be beyond the control of the tough century of scientific and technological progress.
It is amazing: being just a few hours' drive from the center of Europe and taking advantage of all the benefits of civilization, Croatia has managed to keep untouched the charming corners of wildlife - the one that most of the continent knows only from old photographs, '' Danvita director Nina Senchenko enlightens me while we are we are waiting for our charter at the Domodedovo airport. Three hours will pass, and I will see everything with my own eyes.
Woven from the sea, sun, greenery, islands, coves and rocks, nature itself, like a brilliant architect, embodied on this earth the law of the "golden section", in "divine proportion", as it was called in the Renaissance, measuring out its share of forests, water and dry. "The gods wanted to glorify what they created, and on the last day they created Kornati out of tears, stars and the breath of the sea," - this is how Bernard Shaw described the piece of Croatian land that captivated him - a necklace of islands thrown into the sea. Probably, each of the 1185 islands deserves such words, each of the thousands of bays and coves that cut the coast of Croatia. Here, European kings and heirs to the throne rested from the great affairs of state, the lists of which include the German emperor Wilhelm, the Austrian one Franz Joseph, even the Japanese one Hirohito and other titled persons.
Shakespeare settled the heroes of his comedy "Twelfth Night" on this land. Over the years, her charm inspired the romantic Lord Byron, the Italian wit-comedian Goldoni, the courageous American Jack London, our compatriots Chekhov, Yesenin. Agatha Christie, wise by life and experience, chose Croatia for her honeymoon after her second marriage. "Under the window of our villa," wrote the famous dancer Isadora Duncan, vacationing in 1902 at the Villa Amalia in Opatija, "there was a palm tree that attracted my attention. Never before had I seen a palm tree growing free. Every day I watched, how beautifully its leaves sway in the morning wind, and from her I took this slight swaying of shoulders, arms and fingers. " Than she conquered the world.
The Croatian land has witnessed one of the most romantic stories of the 20th century - the love between the British King Edward VIII and the American Wallis Simpson. Having sacrificed the crown to his feeling, the crown bearer took refuge with his beloved in Dalmatia - although there are so many beautiful places on earth! - having delighted some of the compatriots with a brave act and aroused indignation by the frank, as it was regarded, neglect of the throne - in the other. But the scandal attracted the attention of the then British and American press to the beautiful land on the Adriatic. On the catwalks and streets of New York, clothes appeared stylized as the national Dalmatian costume. Curious tourists rushed to Dalmatia from the British Isles and from across the ocean. And everyone considered it his duty to definitely visit Dubrovnik, immediately baptized "the heart of Dalmatia, the pearl of Croatia, its trademark." Connoisseurs compared it to Venice and assured that it could well compete with the "beautiful Italian" for the right to be called the most beautiful city of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic.
We didn’t change traditions either and, barely stepping on the ancient stones, plunged into the extraordinary atmosphere of Dubrovnik - scorched by the sun, intoxicated with idleness, cheerful and uninhibited. I’ll note right away: there is probably no other such land where on a tiny piece would fit so many treasures taken under the protection of UNESCO, as Croatia: Dubrovnik, Split, Trogir, Plitvice Lakes and more, more ...
We were lucky: we were introduced to Dubrovnik by a historian, a native of the city, who knows all its nooks and crannies and spoke as if he himself had witnessed the events of centuries ago. Together with Leiko Iovich ("Your lion," he introduced himself), we walked along the main Stradun street, every now and then deviating to the side "skalinads", narrow - on the sweep of the arms - streets, steep stairs climbing up along the ancient houses, up, up.
In some places, the flight of stairs is interrupted, resting on the street-terrace, as if hanging over the houses. Now these terraces are inhabited by many tiny - two or three tables - restaurants serving excellent Dalmatian wine and seafood delicacies. The restaurants smoothly flow into one another, and the border can be determined only by the color of the tablecloth and the setting. The hosts are right there, persistently, but not annoyingly inviting guests, convincingly describing the advantages of their kitchen. The competition is huge, so you have to twirl around, using all your ingenuity to come up with something especially attractive. And they come up with. Cheerful fat man Marco, whose funny cartoon portrait among images of marine life adorns the menu board, invites potential customers to taste homemade wine. His competitor neighbor demonstrates a picturesque dish with fish, which can be baked, fried, boiled, stewed right away - whatever the guest wishes. The charming polka lady Helena, who was brought to Dalmatia by her parents as a girl, and she settled here, setting the table, puts in the middle a round vase-aquarium with a gold fish. And everyone will add a plate of cheese, salad or a glass of wine to the order. "Compliment" is called ...
As if having rest on the square-terrace, the staircase-street runs higher, to the next "square".
The location, height and width of buildings, the slope of roofs for gutters, the slope of streets, the size of windows and thresholds - all urban construction to the smallest detail was regulated by the Constitution of the Republic of Dubrovnik in 1272, - says Leiko Iovich. “By the way,” he said, “this Constitution, supplemented by minor amendments, lasted until the fall of the Republic in 1806, after the invasion of Napoleon. So, if the owner of the house made the threshold even an inch larger, getting out on the sidewalk, and the door was wider or shorter than prescribed, he was punished. It doesn't matter whether he was a noble estate or a commoner.
Learning the history of the free Republic of Dubrovnik, I mentally projected many of its institutions onto our life. It turned out interesting. "Forget the personal, deal with state affairs" - this inscription, carved above the entrance to the Great Veche and preserved to this day, was read by the "deputies" who gathered for their meetings. And God forbid it was to break this commandment from the moral code of the "fathers of the republic" and take advantage of the "official position"! They paid, as the chronicles testify, not only by expulsion from the honorary assembly, but also by reputation, which was worth more than gold. The Republic of Dubrovnik was dominated by the complete "consent of the estates" - and only this allowed it to avoid social unrest for centuries.
She did not create idols or erect monuments in honor of her celebrities - is it because she did not want to be demolished by the next generations? The only one to whom, by decision of the Republic, in 1638, a monument was erected in the courtyard-vestibule of the Prince's Palace, was Miho Prezata, a navigator, a citizen who donated all his property to the city. The republic valued artisans, encouraged science, literature and art. The first pharmacy in Europe was opened here - and now it is carefully kept in the form of a museum, where you can see flasks and devices over which someone like Doctor Faust was conjuring. And in the Palace of Sponsa, where the first school in the Republic was located, then - the most famous society in the Balkans "Academy of Scientists", now houses one of the most valuable archives in the world. The first documents from 7000 volumes of manuscripts date back to the XII century, the last refer to our century. Maritime historians especially value "professional materials": all records concerning ships and their routes have been kept here in perfect order since 1278. Including lists of teams and passengers.
Even during the construction of the fortress walls (and they were rebuilt during the XI-XVII centuries), as we would say, "national interest" was taken into account. Erecting, for example, the fortress Lovrenac, three walls were laid with a width of 3 to 12 meters, and one - only 60 centimeters. This was one of the wise precautions: if one of the commandants of the fortress decided to encroach on power over the free city-republic, he would be immediately "rendered harmless." And it is probably no coincidence that it is above the entrance to Lovrenac that another of Dubrovnik's moral tenets was carved on an ancient stone: "Freedom is not sold for all the gold in the world." The city was conquered, but could not be conquered.
After the fall of the republic, the fortress turned into a barracks of the Austro-Hungarian invaders during their 100-year wars, then - the cannons were barely silent - into a restaurant, then into a meeting place for the International PEN Club. During World War II, there was a fascist prison here. And now Hamlet is being played in Lovrenac. Until now, the ancient walls, in the scenery of which the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark unfolds, remember one of the best performers of his role - the great Laurence Olivier. And in summer, the fortress, like 32 other sights of old Dubrovnik, turns into a stage for the famous arts festival, which has been held here every year from July 10 to August 25 for half a century. Even the 1991 attack by the Serbs, who could not come to terms with the independence of Croatia, did not force the city at the foot of Srдж to take an "intermission".
We were preparing gifts for children in the courtyard of the Sponza Palace, suddenly the sky over the city darkened, and a rain of grenades and shells rained down on it, - said the owner of the boat on which we decided to sail around Dubrovnik. An experienced sailor, he now calls himself an "old coaster", he rides tourists on his own boat, at the same time performing the role of a guide. Earned in the season is enough for the winter. True, in order to put on shoes, dress and pamper three sons, a wife and a daughter, you still have to work hard at a construction site. Our new acquaintance is fine with that.
The main thing is to be calm, without war. Like now, he says. - And that day - December 6, 1991, the day of St. Nicholas, we call it - the day of fear and horror. Then a truce was declared, we thought there would be a ceasefire as promised. No. The ships blazed like torches. Houses, churches, streets shook from the shooting. It was scary when the cross on Srdja collapsed. It's like the end of the world has come. And six months later, on May 31, 92, there was a new raid. Then entire villages burned down. Very sorry for the Arboretum park in Trsteno. They say he was one of the most beautiful in Dalmatia. For several centuries it was cultivated by the Guchetichi - the famous aristocratic family of the Republic. There were poets, artists, connoisseurs and nature lovers. And in one fell swoop everything was destroyed. Only two plane trees are left, - our captain sighs. “Thank God it's over now. War wounds can still be seen only on houses. But we'll patch it up. But tourists come to us again. Russians, however, are still not enough. Mostly Germans, Italians, Austrians. Many guests from Holland and Belgium. Poles have appeared recently.
Later in the department of tourism I was told that tourist Croatia is gaining momentum again. The number of vacationers has already approached ten million a year - twice as many as the country's population. These are not only Europeans - they come from all over the world. Here they hope that by 2003 the "golden" pre-war level will be reached, when Croatia was considered almost the most visited corner of the world. There are reasons for optimism. Good hotels, solid, environmentally friendly cuisine, almost zero crime. For the third year in a row, the Blue Flag has been flying over the sea - the European Evaluation Commission awards it for quality services, cleanliness of the sea, improvement of beaches and berths. "Dubrovnik and its environs owns the cleanest sea in the entire Adriatic", - once wrote Jacques Yves Cousteau. And he can be trusted.
The island of Brac, where we went by ferry from Dubrovnik, looks like a huge ship anchored in the azure sea. Mitko, the driver of the minibus placed at our disposal, immediately reported that Brač is famous for its stone quarries. "The White House in Washington is built of our stone and marble," he proudly declared, and immediately offered to go to the quarries. We did it. But a little later, after walking around the lovely villages scattered around the historical center of the island - the town of Supetar. It grew up around a small harbor, and its main inhabitants are fishermen. Like many centuries ago, they come here in the mornings, moor their schooners and boats, dry their nets almost on the embankment, and sit down in coastal restaurants - konobas, order a cup of strong coffee, leisurely exchange a couple of mean phrases - about life, about the catch and go to trade this very catch. Life here flows slowly, measuredly, checking, as in the old days, by the sundial on the wall of the ancient temple.
On the way to the quarry, we turned into another village (Mitko really wanted to show the most famous places on the island).
This was Napoleon's headquarters, ”he pointed at a solid, sturdy building.
And now?
Now nothing. There is nothing in this village at all. Once upon a time
4 thousand people, 11 remained. During the war, they left in all directions: some - abroad, others - to big cities.
The abandoned village looked unexpectedly smart: no ruined houses, no boarded up windows. There was a telephone booth near the ancient temple. It turned out that the card can be used to call anywhere. Which I took advantage of, called Moscow. While we, dumbfounded, discussed this abandoned village, out of nowhere appeared a grandfather, a local old resident. The grandfather was cheerful and sociable. It was easy to talk to him - he understood Russian words well, and we, Croatian. The grandfather said that he was 71 years old, that he did not want to leave his home when his children and their neighbors left here. "They will come back anyway," he said confidently. "Some are already back." Suddenly something creaked in his pocket. Grunting, he took out ... a cell phone. We were numb.
Before leaving for the "mainland" we were invited to dinner at the hotel, which, as we were assured, is famous for its cuisine. Entering the hall, we confess we were confused. The walls were covered with posters reminiscent of our civil defense visuals. On one of the tables lay a disassembled gas mask, next to it - instructions for using inflatable vests, approximately the same as laid out in airplanes. Boxes with ... board games were raised in a high pile. In a separate box, some tubes in khaki packaging were poured in a mountain. We could not resist, began to consider them. It turned out to be a cream. One - from mosquitoes and mosquitoes, the other - from the strong sun.
Suddenly, young, healthy, tanned guys burst into the hall with a noisy gang. Looks like from the beach. Seeing the strangers, they excused themselves and quietly walked through the open doors into the building. We were told that British soldiers from the peacekeeping forces stationed in Bosnia are now living in the hotel. Every six months they come here for "rehabilitation", which is combined with military training, then go on vacation, home, and then return to their duty station. Six months before the next vacation. The guys are taken care of here - after all, the soldiers. “We cook their food according to English recipes,” said the cook Maria, who also fed us.
Then we met an even larger group of vacationers of peacekeeping soldiers from Holland at the Medena hotel. There were many girls among them. They looked unusual in camouflage. But the uniform did not prevent them from having fun in the night disco ...
And at the end of the day, Croatia presented us with another meeting - in the tiny village of Sebet near Trogir, not far from the Medena hotel where we lived. The village itself is typically Croatian - clean, neat, with a temple and a square in front of it, paved, as in all ancient cities with white stone, a couple of three narrow straight streets, where the windows of houses look into each other's eyes. And of course, with the remains of an ancient fortress wall. In a word - Trogir in miniature. Or Split. Or Primosten - you can name a dozen cities, similar, like twins, but also like twins different, with their own character, with their own special sign.
The peculiarity of our village turned out to be an art gallery. We saw her at once: at the open doors there were pictures - flowers, the sea, barges, sailboats, islands, rocks. Everything that we saw while traveling in Croatia suddenly came to life on canvases. They blazed with bright colors, impudent nervous strokes betrayed the author's irrepressible temperament. The hand felt strong, obviously masculine. Milyada Barada was displayed above the door. After looking at the pictures, we moved on. But they didn’t take a dozen steps when we stumbled upon the sign "Mino Barada Street". Intrigued, they returned to the gallery. On the house they saw a marble plaque, not seen before. She reported that the famous historian, member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences Mino Barada, who was also a writer and a prominent public figure, was born and lived in this house. Struck by the dates of his life: 1889 - 1989. One hundred years! We looked into the gallery again. From the second floor we were called by a pleasant female voice, asking what brought us here. “Curiosity,” we explained. The woman put down the brush she held in her hand and came down to us. Graceful, dressed smartly and elegantly, as if waiting for guests. Introduced herself. Milyada Barada, artist, poet, gallery owner. Heir to a famous name and an equally famous house.
Look - this corner was once part of the fortress wall. It is over 500 years old. - She proudly shows the old masonry and the niche that has been preserved for a long time. - The spirit of my ancestors hovers here, I feel it.
Milyada herself was born far from here - in Australia: Croats have long been scattered all over the world, especially in Canada and on the Green Continent. She returned to her historical homeland very young - something was drawn. Although there remained a brother and sister. Now he lives in Zagreb. He writes a lot - poetry and pictures. She painted since childhood and knew for sure that she would be an artist. Her paintings are bought by private collectors and museums from different countries. They also adorn the Vatican collection. Milyada did not even think about poetry. Rhymes and rhythms began to take shape unexpectedly. And they resulted in 8 books. Poems, like paintings, are about the sea, about flowers, about their native land. "About my roots and my element," says Milyada.
When she comes to Sebet, people flock to her. Fishermen talk about their catches and watch her paintings. They like them, only men are surprised how she, a woman, manages to capture the many-sided character of the sea so accurately. Women talk about children. She is interested in listening. She knows all the locals. It’s not difficult: there are only 500 people in the village. They live in abundance, and this pleases Milyadu. She does a lot of charity work. 26 years old member of UNICEF. Organizes humanitarian aid to children in Africa suffering from war, poverty and disease, refugees from neighboring Bosnia and other countries. Fortunately, her compatriots no longer need emergency help - they stand firmly on their feet.
At parting, Milyada gave me a book of her poems. One of her paintings is reproduced on the dust jacket. A stumpy tree, through whose branches the sea turns blue. The tree has been growing for more than a hundred years near the house where her ancestors lived and grandchildren will live ...
Already at the airport, I realized what I still lacked in Croatia. Dalmatians! It seemed to me that elegant spotted dogs from Dalmatia would come across there at every turn - just like in the famous Disney movie "101 Dalmatians". Not at all. In Moscow, these dear dogs can be found much more often than in their homeland. When I pestered the locals with the question - where are the Dalmatians, they answered laughing: in the Franciscan monastery in Zaostrog. In the painting of 1724, a Dalmatian was first depicted there. I should have seen ...
Elena Bernasconi
In my works, the main characters are adults and wise people. So I decided to write about our younger generation. Even if these are only stories, not novels, the trouble is the beginning. We will also write novels, if these short stories appeal to readers. And at the end of the book, readers will receive a bonus. I will reveal the secret of the story "Red Partisans". So let's go
* * *
The given introductory fragment of the book The land of a thousand islands. Adventure. Alternative history. Collection of short stories (M. V. Yankov) provided by our book partner - Liters company.
THE COUNTRY OF A THOUSAND ISLANDS
Land of a Thousand Islands
adventure
Introduction
Let's introduce ourselves. My name is Ulyana, I am 11 years old. For the last 4 years, my younger sister Nastya, mom and dad, have been living in the city of Gelendzhik. We came from Volgograd, where all our relatives stayed. Mom is engaged in online sales, she is even on vacation, she does not part with her laptop. Dad, they don't give him a summer vacation - he's a builder.
Therefore, in the summer, on vacation, we usually go without him.
This story began when my mother found some new company in Indonesia that was actively promoting its products on the Russian market. Exclusive and cheap clothes sold well and my mother repeatedly bought goods from this company. Regular purchases by the same buyer have left their mark on the reports of this small organization. She was offered to personally come to the city of Mangar to sign some agreements. Travel and hotel rooms were paid by the company itself.
What where When? I was curious, eerily. Where is this city of Mangar? Where is Indonesia and what country is it? I went online and found out that it is called the country of the “thousand islands”. Even the Indonesian government doesn't know how many islands they have. The director of the Indonesian Ministry of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs Alex Retrobun said:
Like this. Moreover, many of them have not been studied and almost half do not have any names at all.
Bananas, pineapples, pirates, piastres! From that day on, a systematic siege of mother began. By all the rules of women's wars. Licks and tears, diligence and complete refusal to fulfill their duties, reasonable arguments and tantrums. There is no need to explain to the female half of humanity what psychological pressure is. Although mom is not a man, she has nerves too! It all came down to one thing - either mom takes me with her, or blames herself. Let him think every minute where her daughter disappears and in what company.
In general, my mother gave up and the trade began. Mom's argument - you have to buy a ticket for me, which, only one way, costs 1200 dollars. I put forward a counter-argument - children under 12 years old, a ticket is bought for 50% of the cost. And I will soon be 12 and then I will have to pay 2 times more. Youth won, all the more my dad supported me. The very thought of being alone, staying with two children, for almost a month, terrified him.
"Hurrah! I'm going! " - a thought flashed through my head. I was incredibly happy. Emotions poured into an avalanche. Seeing this, my mother made it clear that if I did not focus on the trip and training, then I would not see Mangara. Having struggled a little with my emotions, I calmed down.
The whole week was preparing for the trip. My preparation was not to interfere with my mother. Which is what I did. Within a couple of days, the whole school knew that I was going to Indonesia in search of pirate treasures. Perhaps I will even fight modern pirates. Maybe I will meet some local prince and much more.
We left Gelendzhik on May 28, and the next day we arrived in Volgograd. After spending two days visiting grandparents, they left Nastya in their care and went to Moscow on the train. Then, 12 hours by plane and we arrived in the city of Jakarta. Our torment did not end there. Another 2 hours on a small plane, we flew to Mangar. Finally a taxi and we are at the Oasis hotel. We rested the rest of the day. The hotel is not the best, but expensive. This is because they have their own beach, which we took advantage of.
And the next day, after an early breakfast, I was left alone. Mom left on business, giving me a whole bunch of instructions. Like all ordinary children, I simply did not hear them, highlighting only the main thing among them - not to leave the hotel territory. An hour was tormented by the TV, which showed many programs, but in Russian it was only about sports and politics. It got bored, and happily forgetting about one of the "no", went to the beach.
The day was windy and clouds ran across the sky, but it was still hot and stuffy. I bathed with pleasure, prudently “forgetting” that children, alone, are prohibited from entering the water. But I remembered that during the first days, under the direct rays of the Sun, one should not lie. After looking around the beach, I chose one of the free umbrellas, where I moved with my things. The choice was not accidental. A small boat lay next to the umbrella. She hid the guard lying under the umbrella from the watchful eye. And I was not eager to answer the question, where are my parents.
She opened her backpack, took out a towel and mineral water. After taking a sip of cool mineral water, she spread a towel under an umbrella and “forgetting” about the “mustn't” lay down to sunbathe. The wind drove grains of sand along the beach, which got into the mouth and ears. The sun was heading towards the zenith, adjusting the thermometer to the 40 degree mark. Saved only the breeze, which playfully tried to carry away and whirl forgotten plastic bags in some kind of waltz. She covered her head with a shirt, and so that it would not be carried away, she pressed the edges of the fabric with a backpack.
I must have dozed off. I was awakened by a rough push on my shoulder. She looked up and saw a man running towards the hotel. A sandy waltz was played all over the beach. The sun disappeared behind the clouds that appeared out of nowhere, and the wind became strong and gusty. The first drops of rain began to fall from the sky. I got up and saw that there was almost no one on the beach, and just 500 meters from me in the sea, a large water column was rising into the sky. Mommy! And what is it?
Quickly I put on my shirt, put the towel in my backpack and threw it behind my back. I already wanted to run when I felt that I was starting to twist and lift me into the air. She grabbed onto the side of the boat, then pulled herself up and rolled inside. I was scared. I was very scared. I was so scared that I stopped thinking. She did everything instinctively. She climbed under the bench, pressed her back to the bottom of the boat and gripped the bar firmly. Then everything was like an attraction. This is when you fly somewhere, you see everything, but you do not understand where and why. The wind with the sand beat painfully in the face. Sand got into the mouth and eyes. She threw her shirt over her head and covered her whole face with the cloth. In the neck area, at the back, I tied the hem of the shirt with a knot. It became easier to breathe, and the face stopped whipping with sand. After some time, the force of the wind weakened, then there was a blow, and I lost consciousness.
I woke up from the salt water that got into my mouth. Carefully she got out from under the bench and looked around. The sky was overcast, a strong wind was blowing, and there were waves all around. Water splashed in the boat and if it didn’t drown, it was only due to its structure, designed for unsinkability. I opened the pocket of my backpack and took out my cell phone. He was all wet and did not work. There was nothing to do but cry. I did it successfully, turning crying into a roar, and then into hysterics. I felt better.
Before dark she scooped water out of the boat, having adapted a mug for this. The wind became quieter, the waves were less. And at night, through the clouds, the light of some stars began to break through. But the Moon, when it was not obscured by clouds, shone in full force.
In the morning, the wind intensified again and the clouds were gone. The sun mercilessly, with all its tropical force, brought down its light on me. I wanted to drink. I took out a plastic, liter bottle of mineral water from my backpack. The water was 3/4 of the volume, and I drank half of it without hesitation. I laid out the contents of the backpack. However, what was there to spread? A towel, a mug, a bottle of water, a pack of pechenegs, sunglasses, a panama hat, which I, for some reason, did not wear on the beach and a cosmetic bag. The handbag that I used to carry on my shoulder now rested in the backpack too. It contained: a small massage comb, a wallet with wet money, black headphones, hand sanitizer, lipstick, mascara, lip gloss, a mirror, a spinner (antistress toy), a flashlight, house keys, a folding knife and a pepper spray. Digging a little in secret pockets, I found two sweet bars.
It began to bake. Even the wind, which was strong and raised a decent wave, did not help. Probably, I am a born sailor, I have not developed any seasickness. She pulled a towel between the bow of the boat and the seat, lay down on the bottom of the boat and crawled into the makeshift hut. It was much cooler in the shade. All day I looked over the side of the boat, but I saw neither the ship nor the land. The wind weakened only in the evening.
I felt thirsty again and the rest of the water, along with the cookies, was ordered to live long. But my spirits improved, although there were no reasons for this. Spent the night wrapped in a towel. In the morning I felt thirsty, but there was no water left. I decided to leave the bars for later. Eating sweet without being able to wash it down with any liquid? Brr. Again she built an impromptu hut from a towel and climbed into its shadow. The sun began to approach the horizon when I saw the island. She got to her feet and realized that he was there. You should have guessed so, done earlier. Looking from the boat almost from a recumbent position, I could miss other islands or a ship. What to do? There are no oars. The wind was blowing towards the island, but it was clear that I would be carried by.
I looked around again. Bench! But it is screwed down. She quickly opened her makeup bag and took out a nail file. Maybe I would not have guessed, but once my grandfather did this when he forgot the instrument at home. The screws were removed in 15 minutes. And now I am already at the bow of the boat, rowing like a real rower in a canoe.
The island was not more than 20 meters away when the boat, descending from the next crest of the wave, hit something. There was a crash and closer to the stern the thin skin of the boat was ripped open by an underwater rock. From the oncoming waves, the boat began to be thrown, either upward or downward. The hole began to widen. A little more and the boat will fall apart. I threw my backpack over my shoulders, took a bench in my hands and threw myself into the water.
June 4 - 12, 2017 Unknown island. Hunting. Fishing. Tableware
I spent the night on the beach, using the bench as a bed and a backpack as a pillow. It was hard and uncomfortable to sleep, but better than on stones. As soon as dawn came. Rising from my makeshift bed, I looked around. At first glance, it is clear that this is an island, not a mainland. Throwing my backpack on my back, I went in search of water. I was lucky, I quickly found a small stream. As it turned out later, he was the only one that did not disappear if there was no rain for several days. Having drunk enough and filled the bottle, I went to inspect my possessions now. The island turned out to be surprisingly small. I don’t remember how they share there, but it was definitely not coral. Rocky, yes, but there was no volcano on it. The island was no more than one and a half kilometers long and 800-900 meters wide. There were no beaches, the shores were either steep or hidden by mangrove thickets. Conclusion - the island is not for tourists. I did not meet animals, but there were many birds. This is both good and bad. It's good that there are no snakes and predators. Bad, because it meant that there was no land in the vicinity. Although, the animals could also lime, but I did not find traces of a person's stay on the island.
I was hungry. The first thing I found was bananas. It turns out that getting bananas is not so easy. The first time I could not rip them off. Helped by the same tornado that brought me here. He walked along the edge of the opposite side of the island, breaking and uprooting trees. So I just ate too much bananas.
Once again I walked the whole island, but now along the coast. I was finally convinced that there are no large animals here. Hence, it is necessary to seek protection only from the weather. And you also need a fire. We do not live in ancient times, ships sail, planes fly. This means that something is needed with which to send a signal. I dragged bamboo sticks and some other branches to the shore, only there was nothing to set them on fire. She began to make a hut out of bamboo and palm leaves, but the night was approaching. She quickly ran for bananas, turning on the way to get drunk to the stream. It got dark somehow immediately, along the south. It was only light, but not even a couple of minutes had passed before complete darkness fell. Taking a flashlight from her bag, she went to her hut. It was quiet around. Too quiet. Only the sound of sea waves and the rustle of foliage broke the silence. Fear rose up in my throat. I understood that I had nothing to fear. But rather, it was not fear for my life that scared me, but loneliness.
When she returned, she immediately hid in her shelter. During the day I managed to build a good mattress of leaves and, wrapped in a towel, tried to fall asleep, but failed. Something was wrong. No pillow! She shook all the things out of her backpack and stuffed it with palm leaves. Putting my backpack under my head, I closed my eyes and fell into the land of dreams.
That night I slept like a dead person, two sleepless nights affected. I spent two more days building the hut. It turned out to be not so easy. The structure collapsed at the slightest touch. If you can't fasten all this with nails, because there are none, then it must be tied. The question is what? Manila hemp, manila hemp, how far away you are. Oh, I remembered! My grandfather said that it was made from banana leaves. Leaves are crumpled, soaked, combed, and so on. Not important. We just need to get a rope now and urgently. Two, three weeks soaking is not our method.
I collected the banana leaves, laid them on a flat stone and kneaded them thoroughly with a bamboo stick. Then she drowned the soaked leaves in the stream, crushing them with a stone. The question arose, how to comb them? How to remove the pulp so that only fibers remain? Comb? Comb! I climbed into my bag and pulled out a massage comb. Obviously not what is needed, but there is no other. I had a bite of bananas, which had already become boring, and got down to business. I started combing banana leaves right in the stream. More precisely by combing. The massage brush brushed the pulp out of the leaves, leaving only the fibers. By evening I already had a decent pile of something vaguely reminiscent of tow.
The next day, from dried palm fibers, she began to weave pigtails. Do you know how ribbons are braided? In the same way I weaved the rope, only instead of ribbons, I weaved the fibers of banana leaves. During the day I got about 30 meters of thin rope. Now you can start building the hut again. Do you know how to make a wattle fence? Colas are driven into the ground and flexible branches are passed between them. So I did. One day I was stocking up materials and breaking in pillars. Another day and the hut is ready. A small one - 2 meters wide and 3 meters long. According to her mind, she should be smeared with clay - in general, it would be class! But it's not cold here, not necessary. If necessary, I will. But I made it myself.
I really wanted to eat, but the bananas were no longer in my mouth. In addition, the bananas on the broken trees began to rot. Subsequently, I had to climb up a palm tree after them. Have you tried to climb a palm tree? And here I was. Just like in the movies. She threw the rope over the trunk of the palm tree and wrapped herself around the waist. I throw the loop higher, put my feet on the tree and help myself with my hands, I begin to rise. Then I press against the trunk, throw the loop higher, and the procedure is repeated. One drawback is that after climbing such palm trees, all legs and arms are scratched.
There were coconuts on the island, I even picked up a few. After suffering, I dug holes in two nuts with a stone. I drank the contents - tasty, but not nutritious. Therefore, I decided not to climb trees specially for coconuts. Which ones fall and I will collect. There is water in the stream, and there is no reason to acquire new scratches and wounds due to coconuts.
I had to find something more nutritious. What is on the island? Birds, and fish in the sea. Both require fire - I have not yet learned to eat raw meat. And so, you need to get fire. Making fire by rubbing a stick on a piece of wood, let the boys indulge. I don't wear glasses, which means I have no lenses. Get fire, the sun will not work. You can also make fire with a flint and a file, as my grandfather did. You hit the file hard with a stone, and a sheaf of sparks flies out. File, file, file, nail file. Hurrah! A nail file is a small file.
Five minutes of searching in a cosmetic bag and holding a coveted tool. Now you need flint. There are many stones on the island. Half an hour of experiments and in the hands of a dark gray pebble, which gives sparks when it hits a nail file. The question arises - what to set on fire? Small and large branches are collected, there is even something similar to moss. I tried to get fire for half an hour. Broke all fingers, but no fire.
That's right, the file is small, the pebble too, and I don't have as much strength as my grandfather. You need something that is flammable. What I have? Nail polish remover! It burns beautifully, I tried it myself. Again searches in the cosmetic bag and a bottle with the necessary liquid appears. There are also perfumes, but they are expensive. I left them as a last resort.
Soak a piece of rope and drip some liquid from the bubble onto it. Now, quickly, before it has time to evaporate, we extract a spark with a nail file and a pebble. Hurrah! There is fire! Five minutes and I have a big fire burning.
Now we need game. I untwisted the rest of the rope and got a long string. While walking to the stream, she picked off all the fruits and seeds that came across along the way.
At the very confluence with the sea, the stream spilled into a large puddle, up to 1 meter deep and 10 meters wide. I made a regular loop and put it on the bank. In the loop itself and next to it, fruits and seeds were scattered. She hid behind a tree, holding the end of the string in her hands. It didn't take long. Birds similar to ducks appeared and made their way to the shore. A little more time, and finally, one of the birds entered the center of the loop. Jerk! Ducks throw themselves in different directions. But one remains in place, bustlingly pounding its wings on the ground.
I am going to kill a bird for the first time in my life. I'm very sorry for her. Several times I even wanted to let her go, but hunger took its toll.
After 20 minutes, I was sitting by the fire, holding in my hands almost a kilogram of meat in feathers and thinking - what's next? I have never cooked a poultry from start to finish. At home, everything is simple - he took out a package with chicken breast or legs, thawed it, salted it and in a frying pan with butter. This is of course the simplest recipe, but how do I get to this? A bird in feathers, with guts, legs and head. How should I cook it? I remembered! Dad and I cooked fish in clay, and he said that you can cook a bird like that. Right in the feathers. We must remember what he said there.
"So. At the very beginning, you need to check whether the clay is suitable for cooking. To do this, you need to roll several balls out of clay and put them on the fire. If at the same time the balls are sintered into strong lumps, and not crumble, but only crack, then the clay is suitable.
Clay is clear. Now, without plucking the feathers, cut short the neck and wings of the game, rinse from the inside, salt and then stew. You can put fat, fruits and berries inside the carcass. After that, it is necessary to coat the game with clay, hammering it under the feather. The clay layer should be 1-2 cm. We rake the fire, dig a hole in the ashes and place a clay "doll" there.
So the hiking knife came in handy. Small and uncomfortable, but it cuts and has a small handle. Somehow she cut off the bird's head and wings, ripped open the belly and removed the entrails. Fu! I'm not going to study to be a cook. Bananas and coconut pulp were placed inside the duck. I don't know what will happen, but I have no apples. It will do well. I smeared the duck with clay and smeared myself. I put firewood on the fire, let the earth warm up better and there will be a lot of coals. She put the duck next to it so that the clay dries a little, and she herself ran to the stream.
I washed my face for a long time, scared away all the ducks, but found an old coin. It was dirty so that it was almost impossible to see the image. So for now I put my find in my pocket. She returned to the fire and continued her culinary delights. After the “doll” was laid in the hole, she threw coals on top and made a small fire. After a couple of hours, I pulled out a clay doll from the fire. The clay is caked and hardened. Broke it with a stone. The feathers were baked in clay and separated from the bird carcass along with the skin. It turned out so yummy! If it seemed to me that the bird was not salted, then I just sprayed it with sea water.
“I have never eaten anything tastier in my life! Or am I so starving? "
A couple of days passed and the bird, I ate too. I tried to fish. For this I used earrings. Children's earrings are attached with a loop lock. Very similar to a small spoon. I sharpened the tip of the loop, bent it and the spoon is ready. Banana leaves are soaked in the stream for 12 days. I tried to weave a line from fibers. The line turned out to be thick, and, as it seemed to me, fragile. No wonder, I don't know how to properly prepare fiber and how to weave it. Rescued a lace from the shorts, which plays the role of a belt. The synthetic threads split well and were durable. There were no problems with the rod. The float was also made of bamboo. To make it better visible in the water, the upper part was painted with red lipstick.
And so I sit in a small cove and try to catch fish. A pebble in a bauble earring glitters in the sun and this attracts fish. Unfortunately, most of the fish jump off the hook. My lure doesn't have the kind of squiggle found on any fish hook. It prevents the fish from jumping off the hook.
But soon I adjusted and the catch got better. Unfortunately, the large fish simply unbends the hook. I look at the catch. There are many fish, but all of them are not larger than my palm. Those fish that are brightly colored, I throw back into the water. I heard it said on TV that poisonous fish are specially brightly colored, as if warning - do not eat me, you will die. Therefore, I throw those fish that are brightly colored back into the water. I put the rest of the catch in a palm leaf and am about to leave, but at that moment, the water in the bay seethed. The fish that I threw away was drowsy and now it was being eaten by some large, underwater predator. Perhaps not one. I looked closely, and it is, in the water were circling three fish, the size of my hand. Remember, now it's dinner time.
I had a hair clip that looked like a fish. Chipped off plastics from it, under which a steel plate was found. With a bit of work, I got another knife. The blade is about the size of my little finger, but good enough for cleaning fish. The main thing is that it is not folding and therefore more different efforts can be made to it - it will not loosen up. With the same knife I cut off the shoots of young bamboo. I baked fish and shoots in clay. It turned out delicious, only the fish is small, and the shoots had to be washed in water from clay. The conclusion is simple - the shoots should be baked in bamboo leaves, and the fish should be caught larger and smoked.
The next day I didn't go after the game. I decided to catch those large fish that I saw in the bay. I tried to make a trident. Bamboo was used. To a large stick, I tied eight smaller branches, cutting off their ends obliquely. It turned out not a trident - an eight-prong. I came back to my place and started trolling again. Only this time I stopped fishing as soon as I caught a dozen fish. I cut them in half and threw them into the water.
It's a pity there is no camera. I must look great. I am standing on a large rock in shorts and a T-shirt, my eight-prong raised above my head. And here are the guests, the water in the cove began to move. One of the fish swam very close, and I hit her with my weapon. Something jerked hard on my hand, and the eight-prong flew to the side. A large fish was floating on its side along the bay, and two bamboo sticks were sticking out of it. "I got!" She grabbed the former eight-prong, which turned into a six-prong and threw herself into the water. The waters in the bay are waist-deep. She quickly caught up with the fish and struck twice with her weapon. The fish quieted down, and I pulled it ashore. The prey was longer than my arm. It will definitely be over 70 centimeters. Satisfied with her catch, she went to her hut and began to prepare dinner. In the evening I had fish on a spit and baked bamboo shoots.
Already 10 days have passed, and in the sea not a single boat. Planes fly regularly, but they are high in the sky. I wanted to write on the sand "SOS", as they do in films. But the island is small and there are no sandy beaches. It remains to hope for ships. I prepared firewood in four places on the island. So whichever side the ship appears from, if I have time, they will see my fiery "SOS". You constantly have to monitor the fire so that it does not go out. Already twice I yawned and had to start a fire again. And there is not so much liquid for removing nail polish. True, there are perfumes, but there are very few of them.
End of introductory snippet.
