In summer 2023 we planned to sail from Krk down to Kornati national park and back again over the course of two weeks. Unfortunately our boat got hit by lightning a few days into the voyage and perished, and while we did eventually get a replacement boat, we didn't have enough time to do the original trip as planned.

In 2024, Michael, our captain, and Ronja, his partner in crime, both completed their microbio PhDs and decided to abandon us for the summer and travel the US in a van. So no boat. 

In early 2025, during boat planning, Michael pitched doing the same route we tried to do in 2023, with the same (model of) boat. He's attempted to do this particular tour three times now and something has always gone wrong. We were all a bit skeptical given the evidence, but statistically it was unlikely we would get struck by lightning twice. Fourth time's the charm? But whatever, not like we had much say in the decision. He is the captain after all.

Spoiler alert, we did finally complete the route and we did all survive.

Getting there

We drove from Zurich to Punat over the course of two days, leaving Friday midday and planning to go through the Gotthard tunnel on a holiday weekend. Luckily I happened to check just before we arrived to the tunnel queue and found out that a car had caught fire (tesla?) inside the tunnel and it would take approximately 5 hours to resolve. We redirected to go over the pass instead, then continued driving to our Airbnb in a Venice suburb.

The next day, we drove through to the marina where we got our boat and there was much rejoicing.

We made it out of the marina that night and anchored in a small cove somwhere nearby.

Gear

I was planning to bring my Leica M7 but as discussed in a previous post it was not doing too well, and needed to be sent to Wetzlar. So right before the trip I picked up a used M6, with the intention of selling it as soon as I got my M7 back. I've actually already sold it, I didn't vibe with the M6, but that's a story for another time. For the lens, I brough the 28mm ultron asph. I wouldn't say 28mm is my favorite focal length, but whenever I don't know what to bring, I bring that lens. It's so freaking sharp I know I can crop it forever. 

I also brought a Canon AS-1 (the waterproof point and shoot). I ended up killing it by the end of the trip, but luckily it managed to survive until the last day. 

I brought...14 rolls of film thinking there was no way I'd shoot more than maybe a roll or two per day. haha.

I shot it all. 

2 weeks of boat pics

I didn't dev and scan the rolls myself so I have no idea which Kodak stock is what, as my film guy uses one of the latest noritsus and all of the Kodak stocks end up looking the same (ektar is a bit more obvious). I can tell which lens is which, and also obviously did not take the Leica into the water with me, but I shot both cameras at the same time so the pictures are anyways pretty interleaved. 

Therefore, for the first couple days you get to scroll through a giant pile of photos with no context. Sorry! They all end up kind of looking the same anyways. But they are a vibe.

I did stick a roll of Lomo turquoise into the waterproof camera, then read the manual to confirm it would shoot it at ISO 100, as the canister did not have a dx code. Wrong! It turns out that the Canon AS-1 will treat film without a dx code as having ISO 25, not 100. Lomo turquoise is an iso 400 film, so these shots are all 4 stops over, but they actually came out fine:

We tried to avoid the marinas, but we did need to make landfall every so often to restock on food and water. 

Realizing my mistake with the Lomo turquoise, I put the roll of Lomo purple in the M6 where I could set the iso, but I got more of the same #boatlife shots that I already had a hundred of.

We did finally make it to the national parks. Congrats Michi!

We first stopped at Telašćica, which has these incredible cliffs. 

We then went into Kornati. One of the extra rolls I grabbed at the last minute was my last roll of Reflx lab 800T, because I figured it might be vibey in the water or at night with flash. And it was!

On the way out of Kornati, Michi planned a surprise for us. In 2023, it was a shipwreck in a fairly shallow part so you could easily snorkel around. This time, it was an old dock for a fortress built into the island. I had some XP2 in the point and shoot.

We ended the day anchoring at a spot where the climbers could go climbing. Dani and I swam to shore, hiked a decent way up, and observed the local sheep respectfully.

Sadly, our two weeks were coming to an end. More boatlife of the end

Speaking of ending, on our last day of swiming, the Canon stopped firing while I was in the water. Probably a bit to much force diving in with it, oops. I developed the roll of Mediterranean-souped ultramax at home with some interesting results:

We then said bye to Croatia and drove to Bergamo, where we'd be spending the night, before continuing to Zurich the next day.

And that was it! That's the end of boat 2025. No lightning. We all lived.

Next time, I don't think I'll bother bringing an expensive system camera. I've actually already sold the M6, because I have an M2 that does basically the same thing and I don't really need a meter for color negative (I do want my M7 with aperture priority back though). Additionally, there are only so many photos you can take on a boat in 2 weeks, as I was too afraid to put the M6 (knowing I was going to sell it) in a drybag, and the Canon was much more versatile. The Canon still died though, so I clearly still need a backup just in case.

Two Canons? I already bought a replacement lol.