"It doesn't matter you don't get it - you're playing well", says Ales judgingly to Michal at his quite unexpected hauls in the new game of Abalone and it's pouring with rain behind the windows of a little house on the edge of a village Novigrad. Adriatic Sea is very heavy today and big waves with a great roar are dashing on the coast. The weather is awful but the trawlers are still bouncing on the waves, taking to the nets not only the cropped fish, but the big cones from the pine-trees as well; there are a lot of cones floating on the water level all the time. A shark is frizzing in the pan in a tiny kitchen and a fresh ray is waiting for its big day in a fridge. I had no idea how delicious shark is, when cooked and consumed fresh. We had light wine from the landlord's vineyard and a few cups of strong home-made gin with fruit, that Croatians call Rakija - what a great dinner!



    The idea to join one of the traditional tours of Michal Voženílek to the Croatian coast has arisen from match between several circumstances. The most important thing was fact that it's the closest area where it's possible to fly all year round and yet I didn't know it at all. The village of Novigrad (Cittanova in Italian) is lying on the west coast of the peninsula Istria, about 80 km south from the big Italian port Terst; we went from Brno and the tachometer shows 690 km. Just to compare - ride to the well known Bassano del Grappa is about 150 km longer, and it is Novigrad that is situated more southerly. Thanks to the neighbourhood of the sea - which temperature doesn't go under 14°C even in the winter- is the temperature on the coast still high above the zero, so you don't get the usual "bassan" frosts in here.





    You can go for a swim even fifty metres from the house and there are some dandelions in front of the house. But only a though fellow is able to swim in the cold water this time of the year. By all means it seems much better to use swimming pool in the nearby hotel, it has got warm sea water and it costs 120 Czech crowns roughly for the whole day of swimming. Tennis courts are placed 100 metres from here - running as local flying all year through - but due to the extreme summer temperatures I can hardly imagine a tennis player who would come on a hot summer day, even if he got up early. Apparently, it's not rare when the temperatures rises over 30°C in the summer morning.

    The village of Novigrad is very small and it looks as if it consists of several pubs gathered around a tiny port. All of the pubs are almost empty this time of year. A blonde Slovakian girl works behind the bar of the port's pub "Victoria" and she is so startled from the sudden amount of Czech visitors (Zuzka will excuse me) that she puts on a different CD than she meant to and the Croatian pub is suddenly filled with Slovak music. We pay only friendly 630 Czech crowns for a delicious garnish plate with meat of seven tastes, therefore we order two of them at once. New Year's Eve is just once a year.

    There are loads of people standing on the sea bank and waiting for the traditional grand fireworks with their faces looking up the sky. But the devil's machine is not easy to set on, finally after ten minutes the first sky-rocket is launching and the New Year of 2004 is being welcomed with a magnificent show with a dozens of fire geysers, erupting high above the sea bank and falling on the sea line. Very fine indeed ...

    And what can be a better way of welcoming the first day of the New Year than new year's flying. On the newly built southwest launch above the village of Buzet is unfortunately lissom, northern wind blowing and the thermal activity is weak. Although the benches with a grill closely to the launch are tempting us to come ans sit in the warm lee, just as a pretty toilet shelter standing right on the rock, we are heading off closely to the sea on the nearby Kastelir, where the New Year's thermal activities are steadily turning the course of wind directly to the launch. We got the first two hours for the new pilot's time; with a beautiful view on the hilly side of Istria peninsula on the northeast and the endless sea surface with big, sailing freighters on the southwest.






    The second day of New Year isn't apt to flying, the wind is not good and the sun, on account of cloudiness, isn't as strength as yesterday. We are packing, saying goodbye to the locals and leaving by a strong car of Michal Voženílek, our bags heavily loaded in the side car; heading back to the darkish, freezing weather of the Czech lands. There is some snow waiting for us, according to the latest news.






    Finally I would like to thanks Michal Vozenilek and Pavel Vesely for their invitation to the New Year's Eve trip to the warm lands. It wasn't quite as sunny and hot as the arrival of the year 2000 on the island of La Palma, which I still love to think about, but on the other hand I'm sure Czech pilots will be pleased that on the contrary to the Canary Island, this trip has cost me about four times less. And I have to admit - the fresh fish from the Adriatic Sea is as great as that one from Atlantic Ocean.