I went to a taxidermy frog museum
I'm back! This is your SabbatiCLO The Sequel recap.
Floor Time
/flôr tīm/
noun
the 15-60 minute time period spent laying on the floor in the middle of the work day, typically as a relief from the soul-sucking reality of corporate America.
Bok! I’m back from my SabbatiCLO! This year’s trip truly came and went in the blink of an eye. While my European travels may be over (for now), I notice that it’s that time of year when everyone and their mother is traveling, and I figure that makes it an optimal time to share my trip recommendations for Madrid, Spain, and Croatia (I also had a quick 2 days in London, but I’ll leave that out since you heard plenty about it last year :).
MADRID
Like any city in Spain (at least from my experience), Madrid is packed with the most warm and compassionate people. I love that whenever I visit Spain, I can practice my rusty Spanish and am met with patience and understanding as I stumble through incorrect conjugations. In addition to that, drinks are cheaper than water in Madrid—and let’s talk about the water! Madrid is known to have the best tap water in Spain, and I’d take it further to say that it’s some of the best I’ve had in Europe1. The food is obviously incredible. I love that Spain is one of those places where you can just stumble into any old restaurant and you’ll have incredible tapas. The quality of food is just elite and at an affordable price.
Highlights
Bodega de la Ardosa. Yeah, this is the place. It’s the oldest vermut bar in the city, but they have a full bar. My sister and I went twice because it was so unbelievable. Specifically, they make an incredible tinto de verano, their apertivo olives are infused with pimiento—securing them a spot on my top 5 olive list (CLO-live?! Sorry. Had to.)—their croquetas are divine and the ambiance is just unassuming, vintage, and cozy. The highlight though, was their pinchos. Specifically, the bacalao (cod). The first bite I took out of this thing is literally a core memory. It’s the best thing I’ve ever put in my mouthhole—there, I said it.
Museo Reina Sofía. The perfect sized museum, home of Guernica and other extremely famous works by Spanish painters. I found the exhibits to be really different from anything I’ve seen in the States or other parts of Europe—for instance, one floor focused on the Cold War, and seeing this significant event in history illustrated through the eyes of Spanish painters was really powerful.
Corral de Moreria. This is a Michelin star restaurant on the top of a hill with a pre-fixe menu and flamenco show. At first, I’ll be honest, I thought it was going to be a bit kitschy and lame, but I am happy to report I was wrong!! The food was super solid (the sea bass being the star of the show), and the performance was a FULL HOUR with uber-talented dancers2. Definitely would recommend it if you’re down to do an off-the-beaten-path tourist stop.
Gofio. Obviously, most of these highlights are about food. This is another bougier spot (I’m talking 14-course lunch bougie), that is actually pretty lowkey in terms of its decor and overall ambiance. I think they were playing classic rock music the whole time but don’t quote me on that. The food is Canarian (you can look up gofio) and everything we ate was a flavor I had never tasted before—which was super cool! Also got to try local Canarian wines that did that natural wine thing where they smell like BO but taste like flowers and joy. Weird.
PARIS
Clarice in Paris! This was my first time in the city of lerv. I was like little Remy arriving to my Airbnb in the dead of night, seeing the Eiffel Tower shimmering in the distance and getting a little flutter in my tum. Listen, I totally get the hype. I found the city to be so elegant and beautiful and I was only there for one full day (I know, I know, atrocious! I will return!). The Parisian lifestyle of sipping wine on the sidewalk of a bistro made me suddenly want to wear ascots and chain-smoke3.
Highlights
Racines. An adorable bistro tucked away in a laneway. They have an a la carte and set lunch menu, and my friends and I opted for the set lunch. They served a house spritz made with rhubarb that tasted like spring.
Juveniles. A wine bar (with full menu) where I had one of my new favorite reds. My friend Martine and I went at the American dinner time (7PM! Embarrassing!) so there were fully just Americans there and we were like…oh no. But by the end, locals were filtering in and the food and wine helped to tune out this obnoxious family on our right arguing about American politics…
Le Pain Retrouvé. We did a bakery HAUL here—I got the best croissant of my life and literally took a baguette for the road (pictured below).
Musée de l'Orangerie. Located in the Tuileries Garden, this little museum is the perfect 1-2 hour-long stop. It’s most known for being home to Monet’s waterlilies and it was magnificent. I know many of us New Yorkers have already seen some at The Met but this infinity-shaped room designed specifically to showcase a handful of Monet’s biggest works was magic.
CROATIA (DUBROVNIK, HVAR, SPLIT)
I’ll try to keep this bit brief because my friends and I were in Croatia for a full week and did a TON. For Floor Timers only, I’m sharing my Croatian travel map with all the recs I got—hope this helps!
A couple topline things to note: I wouldn’t say Croatia is known for their cuisine, but it’s worth trying all the fish and seafood they got. Also, they make incredible wine? I had no idea and at every place we dined, it was clear that they are extremely proud of what they produce locally.
Highlights
The cats. There are cute little kitties everywhere. Even dog people will be unable to resist the begging-for-food kitten eyes of these little fellas.
Dubrovnik
City wall walk. I imagine that in the high season, doing this walk would be similar to being herded like cattle. However, in the off-season (or start of high season, whatever you want to call May), it was perfect! You get to cosplay as a member of the Night’s Watch and walk around the perimeter of Old Town, with sweeping views of the Adriatic Sea from every corner.
Restaurant 360. This was our fancy dinner at a Michelin-star restaurant built into the aforementioned wall and UNESCO Heritage Site. We were a party of five which fortunately got us seated in what seemed to be an old gunpowder storage room. It was a private little cave with a window at the end showing us the waves crashing in as the sun set. The food was actually top notch and the wine pairing was unusual but refined.
TajMahal. Idk why this is the name, but it’s a Bosnian meat restaurant (not for vegetarians!) that was unbelievable. This was the only spot during our entire trip where we had to wait for a table because it was so popular.
Hike to Dubrovnik cable car. The cable car was actually closed when we were there due to high winds, so we did this switchback-heavy hike up and down to the peak and it was lovely. You’re walking along the cliff so you can see the Old Town and sea the whole hike and it’s gorgeous. Overall pretty easy hike but very rocky so bring good shoes!
Hvar
Kava 37. Very clearly the yassification of an old city, this is a San Francisco-like coffee shop with great espresso to back it up. The star of the show was surprisingly their ham and cheese croissant that contains pickles!? I can’t explain it but it was excellent and I had it two days in a row.
Dalmatino + Central Park. Yes, five New Yorkers really went to a bar called “Central Park”… anyway! This restaurant serves traditional Dalmatian cuisine—I got the gregada and loved it, which is primarily why I’m putting it on this list. Also, nowhere we went in Croatia really made cocktails (or good ones at least), but this restaurant randomly made a killer Naked And Famous. Central Park next door was the natural nightcap choice, and they had a great selection of gins and tonics to make-your-own, in addition to your usual fare of Croatian beers to choose from. They also had live music on both the Monday and Tuesday we were there—so I think this spot is bumpin’ every day of the week.
Split
Boat day!! There are tons of tours that take you from Split to neighboring coves and islands, but we had a proper skipper in our midst and decided to rent a boat ourselves (aka doing a drug-deal-like exchange and paying this Croatian teen €300 in cash to take his boat for the day—actually seamless and worked well). We made three significant stops in various coves at neighboring islands—but my favorite was ahhh…le Goo Lagoon (Blue Lagoon), where the water was 5 meters deep and so crystal clear you could see straight down. I’ve also never seen so many sea cucumbers in my life but the seafloor was riddled with them.
Diocletian’s Palace. They have an extremely complicated ticketing system but this is located in the center of Split and definitely worth checking out.
Froggyland. LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT FROGGYLAND. This is a one-room museum consisting of 507 taxidermy frogs in little vignettes. It’s the weirdest and most wonderful thing I have ever seen and I made it clear to the British couple out front that it was definitely worth their €13 to see it. Also, they weirdly close at 10 PM which begs the question: Why?
Something To Laugh About
Back on the saddle! Here are some gems I found while “fighting” jet lag at 5AM…
Don’t @ me, but this.
There’s nothing I support more than the return of Vine energy, like this.
I’ve watched this video upwards of ten times and still can’t decide what my favorite part is.
I hope you enjoyed hearing about my travels and that they help shape whatever trip you want to plan in the future. One thing I’m not is a gatekeeper (what’s the opposite? A gateleaser? A gateChaser?) so if you have any questions or want additional tips, I’m happy to share what I have. In the meantime, enjoy your long weekends, nerds. Summer is HERE!!!
Til’ next time, wanderlusters. Your friend,
Clarice
By the way…I’m reading this.
Still Throne of Glass. But! Decided to throw some other reads into the mix while on SabbatiCLO. Nothing screams European vacation like a little m u r d e r. Also highly recommend watching this film if you haven’t yet—it’s the trio at their hottest.
Note that I have nothing to compare this to because it was in fact my first flamenco experience—but it felt top-tier.
Smoking kills, kids!
we did it joe !