September in Adria - part 2

The next day we sailed to Kornati. The entrance fee to the national park is quite hefty, but the area really has a magnetic charm. Our first stop was in the bay of Lojena on island Levrnaka. It is supposed to have the most beautiful beach in Adria and there are huge number of boats bringing tourists from mainland for day trips. Even on this day, when the high season already ended and the South wind was bringing some waves into the bay, it was packed with boats and there was way too many people for my taste. And I didn't find the beach that special, I've seen at least 10 prettier ones in Adria. So I did as I always do when I want to avoid outside world - I went snorkelling. I didn't find anything really special under the water, but there were some interesting purple things.  Like this red algae (kamenolista alga or Lithophyllum sticlaforme)...

... and a Calcarerous pink algae (janija or Jania spp). Sorry for the bad photo, but this colour is really something else, usually these things are white or very light pink.

The Hermit crab (rak samotarec) was hidden in the shell except for the tentacles and eyes.

There were plenty of Flounders (morski jeziki orArnoglossus spp.) there, but they were rather small.

Next we sailed to island Mana and then we anchored not far away from it between two small islets. I went snorkelling again. Red things really catch my eyes, like this Red encrusting bryozoan (mahovnjak rdeči skorjevec or Schizobrachiella sanguinea).

But it was the multitude of Octopuses (hobotnice) that really made me very happy. This is the first one with red eyes.

A pretty murex shell.

And this is the second one.

There were other things worth photographing as well - like this Honeycomb bath sponge with red algae (konjska spužva z obrobljeno luskavko or Hippospongia communis with Peyssonnelia polymorpha)...

...and Blood-red tubeworm (oranžni cevkar or Protula intestinum)...

...and Mediterranean red sea star (ognjenordeča zvezda or Echinaster sepositus).

There was a third octopus in between and this is the fourth one.

This beautiful shell of Giant tun snail (sodec or Tonna galea) gave the octopus away.

Before I swam back to the boat, I found the fifth octopus. I was over the moon to see so many, this was more of them in an hour than I saw the whole summer. And it is a clear indication of what a huge difference the marine reserves can make.

Next we sailed along island of Veliki Kornat with it's fences made of stone. The islands here weren't always so barren, a couple of hundreds years ago Venetians chopped most of the trees down for building ships, and the sheep and goats ate the rest of vegetation. Then erosion took away so much soil that trees couldn't grow back.

In the afternoon we sailed to small island of Ravni Žakan and anchored for the night. We were surprised to still find so many boats there, especially near Kameni Žakan, where we originally wanted to anchor. But we found a good spot, a bit away from the restaurant, that we had for ourselves.

Next morning I went snorkelling again, I didn't want to miss another opportunity to snorkel in such a clear water. And almost under our boat I found another octopus.

The pretty blue fish in front of yellow sponge are the young Mediterranean chromis (spužva žveplenjača in mladi črniki or Aplysina aerophoba and young Chromis chromis), the only coral fish in Mediterranean.

This year I didn't see so many Mediterranean fanworm (spalancanijev cevkar or Sabella spallanzani).

A colonial sea squirt (spužvasti plaščar or Didemnum spp) of pretty apricot colour was also there.

In the afternoon we sailed to East side of Kaprije and had a great evening with delicious food in restaurant Kata.

Next morning the water ship came into bay and we watched how the ship came more and more out of the sea as the water it carried was pumped into the cistern on land.

Later on I went snorkelling. It was not as pretty and colourful as in Kornati, but there were still a few interesting things there, like the Spiny starfish (bradavičasta morska zvezda or Marthasterias glacialis).

The Longstriped blenny (črnoboka babica or Parablennius rouxi) was patiently posing for me.

And I couldn't resist another photo of Red tube worm (pisani pokrovčkar or Serpula vermicularis).

As it turned out, this was my last snorkelling expedition for this year.

Later in the day we sailed on to Murter. On the way we almost got part of the regatta.

Next day we made a stop in pretty town of Betina.

It is the season for fig drying.

That day we sailed to Ždrelac and the next to Muline on Ugljan. And on Saturday it was time to sail back to Petrčane and then we drove back home and Captain stayed on the boat for few more weeks.