The first day

I arrived in Dubrovnik last night after a long day of travel.

After Laura's bosses (magically) let Laura get off on time to give me a ride to the airport yesterday, I had a long day of travel. I started in Seattle, flew to Amsterdam, connected on to London, crossed London, and then took my last flight of the day to Dubrovnik, Croatia.

On board the flight to Amsterdam, I was pleased to note that Delta has begun offering some decent entertainment options for their economy-class passengers. We each got a person video screen and I took the opportunity to watch “Invictus”; “The Young Victoria”; and “Crazy Heart” – three films that I've had a decent appetite for seeing but haven't bothered to see on my own.

The flight to Amsterdam got off the ground about 30 minutes late due to an (apparent) computer/boarding pass problem. As a result, we were late arriving for my London connection. Orbitz had only budgeted me 55-minutes in Amsterdam, which, with the late departure, was whittled down to 25 minutes (and the plane was already boarding when we landed). Thankfully, they got me on a replacement flight soon after and I made the quick trip to London with plenty of time to trek across the city – from London City Airport to central London by light-rail; on foot across the Thames to London Bridge Rail Station; and a train to Gatwick airport. All without incident.

At Gatwick I grabbed a bite to eat. (Thankfully, or not) I found exactly the food that I had set out to find: an English fry-up (eggs/sausage/bacon/beans/mushrooms/tomatoes). I also managed to catch the tail-end of the Germany/Serbia Worldcup match. I was elated to see that Serbia managed to win 1-0 against Germany.

My easyJet flight to Dubrovnik was packed with teens and 20-somethings. The airplane had the atmosphere of a party, at least at times. I was too exhausted at this point to feel terribly excited, but I did enjoy watching the Dalmatian islands slip underneath the plane.

Upon arrival, I was greeted by warm and humid weather and a beautiful sunset. Soon after, I was also greeted by Damir Fak – the Croatia student who was hired to take do administrative tasks for the law program. Because I was arriving early, I had been told that they wouldn't be able to provide a ride. However, three other students arrived on the immediately-next flight after mine, and the program must have decided that it would be worth picking us up.

Damir is a cool guy from what I can tell, but he retired early. The three other students and myself decided to check out the area around our hotel, get some food and a drink or three. In addition to Lindsay Brandon (who I know from the Seattle University law program), I met Austin and Justin (last names unknown at time of writing) who are both from the Florida law program. We ate/drank a bit, I took a shower, and then went to bed after being awake for 31-hours.

I just woke up and I am sitting in my nice little bungalow hotel-room. The water is right beyond my balcony and there's a pleasant breeze. I'm going to get some breakfast.