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"Everything's better when you feel guilty." - Anthony Bourdain
I never thought I would actually make it this far. Analyzing every expense and logistic and risk before I left home, I was certain I would crash and burn in the first week.These ancient places with their unrivalled scenery, extraordinary food and rich culture were glimpses from the Travel Channel and Lonely Planet, static and flat. The actual sounds, textures and tastes I could only imagine. The idea of making them a reality was nothing more than a dream. Now, spending my birthday in the San Rocco 4* Hotel in Istria, I can't believe I'm still getting away with it.
Jozica and her family pulled out all the stops for my last breakfast in Crikvenica - incredible cheese, brioche, spicy local sausage and the raw bacon that was slowly growing on me (it helped when Iris told me Jozica made it herself). After breakfast I took one last walk into town and bought myself an ice cream cone. I stared out at the sailboats on the harbour, pistachio dripping over my knuckles while I tried to decide whether it felt any different to be twenty-three.
My ride to Brtonigla was late, which didn't concern me too much since I had hours before I could even check in at San Rocco. Kevin, when he did show up, was a balding, wiry little man with a surprisingly solid handshake. I rode in the front and we chatted amiably for the first hour about family, politics, travel, global warming and anything else Kevin could think of. "How old are you?" He wanted to know.
"Twenty...three," I had to think about it for a moment. "Today, actually."
"Really?" Kevin looked suddenly excited. "I am thirty-nine today!" By further freakish coincidence, we both shared a birthday with the town of Rijeka, which Kevin said was celebrating it's annual freedom festival in memory of the day it gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, the year I was born. The symbolism was not lost on me.
We were miles outside of town when Kevin finally looked at the address I had given him. "Uh huh," he said, leaning over to rifle through the glovebox. "No map," he shrugged when he came up empty-handed. "I must have left it at home."
"GPS?" I suggested, certain he wouldn't try to make the trip without one.
"No GPS."
"But...you have a smartphone, right?" He had to at least have a phone.
He shook his head. "Brtonigla is in Istria, right?"
My gaze snapped from the mountain wilderness outside the window to his face. "You've never been there!?"
"No," he shrugged again. "I think it's a small town. 'Igla' in Croatian means 'needle'." Great, I thought. So we're literally looking for a needle in a haystack. "But Croatia is a small country, too," Kevin went on, as though this were any consolation. "We will find it. Don't worry." I glanced discreetly at the gas gauge. That needle was in the red zone.
Asking directions several times finally got us there. It didn't help that all the roadsigns were bilingual. Formerly part of the Venetian Empire, much of Istria still spoke the Venetian dialect of 600 years ago and held stubbornly to the Italian names of roads and towns. This explained, at least, why when I looked up the address of the San Rocco Hotel that morning, the town had a different name than the one listed in my tour itinerary.
"People are very helpful in Croatia," I remarked when Kevin asked a kid on a bike for directions in one of the ancient hilltop towns we drove through, characterized by stray goats, crumbling stone farmhouses and church towers surrounded by vineyards. It was stunning, in a third-world, east-Jesus-nowhere kind of way. I recounted the story of my arrival in this country, and the man from the bar who had personally driven me to a hotel.
"Yes," Kevin agreed. "Croatia is a small country full of small towns. This is why there would be no point in kidnapping you because everyone would know who the kidnapper is." This, at least, made me feel a little bit better.
San Rocco is incredible, and not in the sprawling, white-walls-red-carpet Hilton way I expected, thankfully. This 14-room four-star hotel, made entirely of burnished wood and stone, blends seamlessly into its rustic setting in the Istrian countryside. Awarded best boutique hotel for five years, it has a gourmet restaurant, pool, golf course and spa, but is still secluded, intimate and exclusive.
I'd booked a few days of luxury as a birthday present to myself and planned to take full advantage. The first thing I did - nay, the second thing I did - was sprawl out in my ample jacuzzi and shave every inch of myself. There was a cornucopia of bathroom amenities, not all of which I could identify but which I promptly stole anyway. The first thing I did was book a full-body massage. San Rocco's reputable health and wellness centre seemed like the perfect opportunity and it was my birthday damn it! Besides, I had a few hours to kill before my wine pairing dinner at seven. The hotel's "charming" use of old-fashioned iron keys instead of swipe cards helped with that as well. The third thing I did was lock myself in my room.
The massage was the kind with warm white towels, music, scented candles and a soft-spoken Swedish woman who removes even your underwear. And that was the most action I was going to get for the next two months.
I was still greasy with essential oils when I arrived for my dinner reservation, all decked out in the nicest outfit I'd dared to pack. I was wearing makeup and jewellery for the first time in over a month, and hardly recognized myself. A uniformed waiter laid a serviette on my lap and lit a candle for me, then proceeded to bring me a glass of champagne to start and an amuse bouche of cherry tomato gazpacho with parmesan cream, an eggplant chip and San Rocco's famous olive oil. Winning awards for the best olive oil in Istria and one of the best in the world, the stuff is liquid gold. Just smelling it makes you want to drink it by itself. Following that were course after course of the best seafood tasting menu money could buy - shrimp with spinach ricotta, pink salt and sweet lentils; boiled octopus with fennel reduction; homemade gnocchi with Adriatic crab; herbed sea bass.... My favourite was the cuttlefish in its own ink with potato cream and a luxurious handful of shaved black truffle. Shocking development: I LOVE cuttlefish ink! Or at least the way San Rocco does it.
Accompanying all of this, of course, was a largely unpronounceable list of monster wines. The waiter presented the bottles on his forearm and used descriptive words like "floral", "earthy" and "dry with round tannins". It was times like this when I felt a bit like an orang-utan in a tuxedo. I squinted at the labels and nodded intently, trying to look like I understood every word; trying, really, to not look like a complete idiot. I really did want to learn more about wine, which was why I'd booked this tour, and I was sure I would during my vineyard visits the following days. For now, though, I didn't have a clue what tannins were. I will say this: I tasted wines that night like I've never tasted before in my life.
I was fighting the feeling that I didn't belong in a place like this, basking in such over-the-top extravagance like some six-figure-a-year lawyer or Hollywood celebrity. And yet a cryptic smirk was tugging at the edges of my lips as I was poured another glass of Kozlovic Muskat. Maybe if I did have disposable income to burn, this experience wouldn't be nearly as special. There is always a certain amount of guilt that comes with living on borrowed time. Guilt, but not shame. You should never feel ashamed of being given something you feel you don't deserve. Gratitude is a more appropriate response. I am grateful for every second of every day because, on a trip like this, tomorrow is never guaranteed, and chances were I would never get the opportunity to do it again. I was going to milk every decadent drop of the next few days.
I just have to get through today and tomorrow. The thought came in that moment when a twenty-three-year-old body doesn't hold out quite as well as a twenty-two-year-old body. Did you know they give you WINE with a wine pairing dinner? Like, a LOT? A fresh glass with each of the eight gourmet courses served over three and a half hours. And you're expected to drink all of it. Considering I'd paid through the nose for this pairing and now had the miraculous opportunity to taste some of the best wines in the world, I wasn't exactly in a position to decline. I managed to keep track of what exactly I was eating and drinking, determined to make the experience an educational one, until somewhere around the fifth course, when everything started to go fuzzy. By 10:30 I was literally begging for mercy. I don't know whether it was the toxins released by my massage, the richness of the food or the fact that I'd electrocuted myself earlier trying to plug my phone charger into a 220V socket without a converter, but the wine hit me like a wrecking ball. I'm sure I was cross-eyed when I finally looked at the waiter and actually used the words, "Excuse me. May I please go back to my room now?"
I had to be in the lobby at 9:30 tomorrow morning for the start of my wine tour. And again the day after that. Just the thought was almost too much for me to take. Laying in bed with the room pinwheeling around me, it was hard to imagine even lifting my pounding head from the pillow in the morning.
If ever you find yourself in a similar predicament, fear not. There is, I've discovered, a solution. The human body is a miraculous mechanism. It will expel what it can't handle. I'll spare you the delicious details, but, to provide a little imaginative aid: eight courses. All seafood. Black as cuttlefish ink. I didn't feel too much remorse about a $300 meal winding up in the toilet bowl. It would have eventually either way, and I'd still had the chance to enjoy it during the time of consumption. I'd wanted the experience to be educational, and I'd gotten my wish. Luckily San Rocco has a stunning breakfast bar of fine cheeses, Istrian ham, spicy sausage, warm pastries and baked apples that will set you right.
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