CRF: The Best of Croatia

"CRF" is not a crime show you've never heard of, it stands for "Cutting Room Floor." It's been almost a year since we returned from Europe, and we've started to get seriously nostalgic.  To give us all an extra travel fix, we're posting some of our favorite photos that never made it onto the blog.  Here are our favorite unpublished memories and pictures of Croatia.

More than any other country, we associate Croatia with hedonism, sun and the scent of saltwater.  Our trip never felt like a vacation, but Croatia is a vacation by definition.  Everyone there was on holiday in one way or another - it was the same for the naked Germans and drunk Russians and sunburned Brits that joined us on those rocky shores.  It was July.  The sun never seemed to go down.

For a few happy days, we stayed at a huge campsite on Cres Island.  There was squid to eat in town and beer to sip on the long oceanside promenade.  When we swam, we were stung by tiny jellyfish.  When we walked in the balmy evenings, we listened to cicadas and waves.  Nearby, in a pine forest, a rusty amusement park spun its blinking, neon magic.

At home in the US, not long after the trip, someone told us that Croatia sounded "scary and Russian."  It's true that in some places, like Zadar, one can find bomb-scarred buildings from the Balkan wars - but you have to look hard.  The scariest thing about Croatia today? Probably the spiny sea-urchins that lurk in the shallow water.
The Dalmatian coast is mostly rock, and some salt-scoured islands feel almost entirely dead.  Real, comfortable, sandy beaches are rare.  Most people sunbathe on concrete slabs.

In Opatija, a city where seafood approaches perfection, we had a barbecue of squid and blitva.  The market where we shopped for our supper was made of Tito-era cement and seemed like the only cool place in the sun-baked city.

The heart of the summer - no rain, mild air, a sense that nothing bad can possibly happen - is best spent in a tent.  We soaked up the sun and got into our sleeping bag coated with salt.  We never went inside.  We ate by the ocean, we napped in the shade, we swam and walked and came home to a crowded camping city that smelled always of grilling sausage and suntan oil.
This was the semi-permanent home of one of our neighbors there at Camping Kovačine - grandparents, small children and at least two couples used this one camper as a base.  Did they all sleep inside?  Hard to tell.

Late one night - well past midnight - we were returning to our campsite in Ičići and came across this streetlight game of volleyball.

These scales always remind us of communism.  Every market from Minsk to Budapest to Sarajevo is full of them.

We spent a lot of time near the Mediterranean on the trip, but almost always during the colder months.  The summer seashores are too crowded in Malta or Greece or Provence.  At least, they're too crowded for serious travel.
But there we were, in Croatia during the high season.  We succumbed because there was no other choice.  It's Croatia that we think of first when our minds turn to sunny saltwater.  It was unavoidably perfect.  It was a vacation.
To see all our posts from Croatia, just click here.
To see all the Cutting Room Floor posts, with great pictures from the other 49 countries, just click here.

A Softer, Quieter Coast

After more than a week of swimming in the salty, rocky Adriatic, Lake Skadar was especially cool and soft.  The beach was muck-bottomed, the surface was calm, the air smelled of trees and earth. The only ripples I heard were my own. It felt as though all the roughness of the world had been smoothed and melted into silt and lakewater.
Those who think of Montenegrin water will surely think of the Mediterranean, but there is another place where boats set out in the mornings and fish jump for flies. Lake Skadar is a quieter, but no less majestic, second coast.  In the more trafficked end, boats cut lines into the lilypads and algae.

Filled by the mountain river Morača, Skadar retains something alpine, even as it lies so close to the sea.  The surface is punctuated with islands and little watercraft.  Beyond the water, in the blue-hued distance, are the peaks of Albania.
The lake is actually shared between the two countries (it's called Shkodër on the other side), with a zig-zag border that cuts down the middle.  Skadar is the largest lake in southern Europe, with a fluctuating surface area of about 170 square miles.  It feels even bigger, maybe because of how exaggerated the mountain shoreline is, or because of how it's positioned: the lake is elongated from east to west, so the sun travels from one end to the other, appearing and disappearing over the water's edge.

At the little pebbly beach in Murici, cows and donkeys nosed through piles of burnt trash and small camper vans stood in the shade.  The place felt like the end of the earth, with nothing but lakewater to look at and sheer mountains behind.  Murici, the town, is a tiny place with a little mosque and steep streets.  In the mornings, a grocery van came to town - old women in headscarves crowded around to buy flour or dish soap.
We slept here, near the beach, in a bungalow that smelled of new pine lumber and bugspray.  There was an open air restaurant, where the people in the campground could eat fried fish or greasy ćevapi.

At "Jezero" restaurant, on the more populated side of Skadar, we feasted on pickled trout and baked eel.  Tour boats docked and puttered around the pier below the restaurant's terrace.  Groups of people were led down to the boats, then motored far out into the distance, where we lost sight of them among the islands.  Groups came back to shore very tan.  The boat touts worked the parking lot relentlessly, waving brochures and spinning tales of private beaches and secret coves.  The meal was too large for us, we retreated to the car full of fish and feeling sleepy.

The western reaches of Skadar dissolve into a marshy, weedy wetland full of waterlilies and eel traps.  There are a few villages here, where shallow fishing boats are pulled up to firm land and women sell live carp on the roadsides.  It's a destitute part of the country, far removed from the development of the coast.  The people are different too, with harder-set mouths and more clothes.

Here, the cultural landscape is tinged by nearby Albania more than by Serbia or Croatia.  The signs are in Shqip, the people are Muslim.
In Murici, we watched a round, older woman wash clothes on the beach, boiling the cloth over a woodfire and then beating the wet clumps on the pebbles.  Further along the pebbled shore, some children swam and a few tourists shared a bottle of wine.  We swam in the evening and listened to the laughing conversation of a Czech rally-racing team.  During our morning dip, we saw that a white-haired German couple had slept right out on the beach.  It was uncrowded and calm there; we all kept our distance from one another, sharing the view and the quiet.

It's difficult to tell, in some places, where the earth begins and the water ends - green fields blend into algae and weeds.  In other parts of coast, the white rock of the mountains slices directly into the surface.  The drive around the lake's edge is a wonder. The road is narrow and crooked, the drops are frightening, there are few guardrails.  One is rewarded with a changing, deserted vista that is wilder and more dramatic than almost anywhere else in the Balkans.
The whole Montenegrin coast of Skadar, and much of the Albanian side as well, has been protected as a national park.  It's a paradise for birds - we watched herons fishing in the evening and pygmy cormorants sunning themselves in the morning light.  Some of the last pelicans in Europe live here, though we didn't see any.
The speck out in the bay is the remaining heap of rocks from tiny Grmožur fortress.

Watching the light fade over the lake's waters, our thoughts were drawn to the blaring music and eternal swimsuits of the coast.  This is a part of Montenegro that feels cut off from the rest, a place where peacefulness reigns.
Interestingly, it is more purely an amalgamation of mountains and water - what this country is famous for- than the famed resorts of Budva or Kotor.  Here, one can slip into the otherworldly more easily.  Swimming and staggering in the salty hotspots: abrasive.  Wading and succumbing in the fresh water: soothing, silent, a dip into the distant and unknown.

The Luck of the Irish

Really, we were the lucky ones. Andorra played the Republic of Ireland in a sold out match on Friday and we happened to be camping right above the stadium. When we pulled up to pitch in the afternoon, just about every police officer in Andorra was surrounding the grounds. "We're just camping," we explained to the first row. "Here for camping!" to the second. "We're in a tent up there," we told them when we came back through later. "Yes, yes, camping," they all said, pointing us through on our final trip. We couldn't have been more a part of the action.
Except, of course, if we were Irish. The first green shirts were spotted in town that morning. We thought it was amazing that those guys traveled all the way here for the game. Little did we know that busloads would arrive and congregate outside the stadium for hours before the game. It was a big match for them, bigger than for Andorra. Both teams are in Group B of the UEFA Euro 2012 qualifiers - and Ireland is just a win or two away from securing their spot. Andorra, on the hand, is an underdog, as the friendly old man who runs our campsite explained with a hand up near his forehead for Ireland and a hand down near his knees for Andorra.
Beers were carried from the campsite bar over across the street, where the Irish supporters had hung up flags and a banner that read "YES WE CAN!" The game didn't start until 9:30, but the singing started around seven. When it rained for a little while, the singing got louder. Close to game time, the Andorran supporters (who we'd assumed were just having an 'early' dinner) had still not arrived in any great number. We were invited down to join Team Ireland, but would have felt a little bit like traitors. Plus, we had a paella to make.
When the rain stopped at the start of the match, this rainbow crossed the sky. Dare I say there was a pot of gold underneath. Two quick goals put the Irish up 2-0 in the first twenty minutes of the game - a fact we surmised by the roar of the crowd in the distance. The tiny stadium's stands were almost completely green. Just to give you a little perspective: The other Group B stadiums (Armenia, Slovakia, Russia, Macedonia and Ireland) hold an average of 31,000 people. Ireland's is the biggest of the bunch, with 50,411 seats. The Estadi Comunal in Andorra la Vella holds 500. You could say that enthusiasm seemed to be relative.
The campsite owner had introduced us to this police officer earlier in the night and we'd been given permission to come over and watch. At that hour, before the game had started, a specific spot was pointed out for us beneath the glow of the stadium light - presumably, so no one could see us there from below. By the time we arrived later, with the match in progress and the Andorrans struggling, no one seemed to care that we were there. Other campers were huddled around with umbrellas and the police chatted casually to each other.
Andorra's more of a winter sports country - and roller hockey, interestingly. Their national soccer team is about as good as any country's would be working with such a small population. It doesn't mean they don't like the sport. We've seen pick-up games like this one a few times and heard rowdy matches going on at recess. It just means that most Andorrans were probably not heartbroken about the 2-0 loss to the Republic of Ireland. To be honest, we were a little relieved. I doubt we would have gotten much sleep had their been a huge upset. And it would have been a very sad, long bus ride home for a lot of fans.

Gypsy Kitchens: Camping Paella

In Catalan, "paella" means "pan," and can refer to a wide variety of dishes. Here in Andorra, it seems that every home and restaurant has their own version, all of them delicious. On one of our first days in the principality, we were lucky enough to eat a little of the "gran paella popular" at the Fira del Roser, in Sant Julia de Loriadav.

There was a time in our lives when we made a lot of paella. Using a multitude of ingredients and a two-step, range and oven method, we complicated and elongated the process until it was much more difficult than it should have been. Then, on a canoe trip a few years back, a breakthrough: paella can be extremely simple. This is our recipe for camping paella, which calls for no fresh ingredients and can be made using one burner (or a campfire) and a very moderate amount of effort.

In a kitchen, there's no substitute for live clams and mussels, raw shrimp, market fish, parsley, fresh peas and all the rest. But outside, without refrigeration, those ingredients become problematic. Instead of fresh vegetables and shellfish, chicken and sausage, everything here is canned or semi-non-perishable. Rice is a given; onion, garlic and lemon are hardy enough; canned peas and peppers add plenty of flavor.

We used canned octopus, squid, shrimp claws (a real find), mussels and clams. None of these are necessary, and the only one that's suggested is the tinned clams, because their juice is so integral (if clams aren't your thing, consider buying a small container of clam juice). Any tinned, canned or jarred shellfish should work well - canned cod could also add something, even sardines in a pinch. Drain the fish, discarding packing oil but retaining any other liquid. Also drain the peas and peppers, discarding the liquid. Cut the peppers into small pieces.
Chop one large onion and brown in olive oil, peanut oil or butter. Add a few cloves of minced garlic and cook for a few moments, then add more oil and two cups of rice. Cook the rice, stirring occasionally, until the edges of the grains become translucent. Add three cups, combined, of the retained fish liquid (or clam juice) and water. Use no more than a cup of fish liquid. Also add a heavy pinch of saffron. Stir everything together and bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Cook the rice (uncovered) until nearly done - about fifteen or twenty minutes. Although this is rice-cooking blasphemy, make sure to stir every now and then to prevent the bottom from sticking - the added sugars from the onion can cause the mixture to burn.
When the rice is almost done, stir in the vegetables and seafood and cook just until warmed and tender. Before removing from the heat, stop stirring, turn the heat to high and toast the bottom of the rice until fragrant (about a minute and a half). This last step creates the mythical "socarrat" char at the bottom of the pan, which any highly-regarded paella is supposed to have.

A note on pans: a wide, shallow pan - like a cast iron skillet - is ideal and traditional, but a narrower, deeper pot can work well too. We actually cooked our paella in a cast iron pot and finished it in a ceramic dish, but that's because it's cold and windy here in the mountains, and we couldn't cook the rice very well in a pan.
Normally, paella is served in one big dish, which everyone eats from with forks, spoons and fingers. Squeeze lemon over the top and eat hot, relishing the fishiness and the socarrat.

Here's the recipe:

Camping Paella

Ingredients:

2 cups rice, preferably arborio or similar

5-8 tins, cans or small jars of shellfish, cephalopods or fish (with an emphasis on clams and mussels)

1 can peas

1 tin peppers

1 large onion

3 cloves garlic

1 lemon

Olive or peanut oil, or butter, or some combination of each

Pinch saffron

Process:

- Open and drain all cans, retaining any water-based fish liquid, but discarding any oil and the vegetable packing liquid.

- Slice peppers into small pieces. Cut any larger pieces of seafood into manageable chunks.

- Chop onion, finely-mince garlic, heat about 3 tbs. oil (or butter) in pan or pot.

- Sautee the onion in the oil until lightly browned, add more oil and stir in rice. Cook rice until translucent at edges, then add 3 cups, combined, water and fish-liquid. Use no more than 1 cup fish liquid.

- Add a heavy pinch of saffron and stir, then bring water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and let cook - stirring occasionally once somewhat thickened - until rice is nearly done. Add small amounts of water if liquid disappears before rice is done.

- Stir in seafood and vegetables and let warm/cook until rice is tender. Stop stirring, turn heat to high and toast the bottom of the mixture until just fragrant, about 1 or 1 1/2 minutes.

- Remove from the heat and serve with wedges of lemon.

The sign of success - socarrat.

Gypsy Kitchens: Moules à la Bretonne

We cook mussels a lot because they are so simple, cheap and delicious. There may not be another dish that is this easy and feels as luxurious. On the northern coast of Brittany - Breton in Gallic, Bretagne in French - camping near the chilly, autumnal Atlantic, it finally seemed like the right time to do a Gypsy Kitchens post about this standby. We dressed them up a little, giving this version a regional twist and a more substantial broth (heartier, one might say, to get us through a cool night in the tent). Here, then, is our cider and white-bean recipe for mussels, what we are calling "Moules à la Bretonne."
Of course, Mussels don't require a recipe at all. Often, there is nothing worth doing to them except adding a little wine and garlic, steaming and serving. The idea, here, was to focus on the broth. This region, along with Normandy, is famous for its apples and ciders, and it seemed appropriate to use a local tipple in place of the typical white wine or vermouth. It should be noted that this is a hard cider, and a dry one at that. One could use a sweet, fresh cider, but it might be a little overwhelming. To make everything even more fun, we chopped up some ginger to accompany the shallot and garlic in the base.
Using a good dose of olive oil or butter, soften a finely-chopped shallot or yellow onion (or two shallots, or even a few leeks) in a pot that's large enough for all of the shells. Cook the well-minced ginger with the onion - use as much as seems right to you, anywhere from a tablespoon to several - and notice one of the best smells in cooking as the two roots mingle and become aromatic. Add the garlic when the onions are just on the verge of browning, cook a few seconds more, then add the white beans. Because we're on a campsite, the beans came from a can. Warm up the beans, then add the mussels, some cider and cover the pot.
Backing up a moment here, it might be worth mentioning that picking through your shellfish beforehand is always a good idea. Discard any badly broken mussels and any that are wide open. If the shell is open a little, and stays closed when you squeeze it, it's likely fine. Also, pull out any bits of detritus stuck in the cracks, and - if you can bare one more step - give the guys a good rinse in cold water before cooking. We probably don't have to tell anyone not to eat any mussels that haven't opened when they're cooked, or any that smell foul. One more note - there is a lot of salt in most shellfish, so adding more is never necessary, no matter how much you want to.
Cook the mussels for about twelve minutes, keeping the pot covered the entire time. If the shells haven't opened after twelve minutes, cook them for another three or four minutes. Then - and this sounds silly, but it's true - you're done. Just put the mussels in bowls, ladle some of the broth over the top and eat.
The broth was actually even better than we'd hoped. As the breeze got cooler and more blustery, we huddled at the picnic table, eating bowl after bowl. The local mussels were delicious and tender. The slight sweetness of the cider counteracted the brine in the broth to perfection, and the beans gave the juice a nice focal point.

A funny thing about mussels - they always fill you up more than expected. After finishing the dishes (there weren't many to do), we got into the tent feeling stuffed. Listening to the sea and the wind outside we talked about how satisfyingly maritime the evening had been.

Here's the recipe, as laughably easy as it is...

Moules à la Bretonne

Ingredients:

3 to 4 pounds mussels, cleaned well and bought fresh

1 can white beans, rinsed

2 shallots, minced

3 tablespoons ginger, finely minced

2 cloves garlic, smashed and minced

2 to 3 cups dry, alcoholic cider

Olive oil or butter

The Process:

- Clean and rinse the mussels, discarding any broken or wide open specimens.

- In a pot that is at least 1 and 1/3 the size of all the mussels (to account for the shells opening and expanding, which they will), lightly saute the shallots and ginger until the shallots have softened, but not browned.

- Add the garlic and cook for a few moments. Pour in the beans and cook until warmed through, about two minutes.

- Add the mussels and the cider and cover tightly. Turn the heat up to medium high, lowering if the pot begins to boil over.

- Cook 12 minutes, or until most of the shells have opened. Remove from the heat and serve as immediately as possible.

I Never Went to Summer Camp

For the last four months, we've been camping. Well, that's not entirely true. Just about fifty percent of our nights have been spent in a tent. So, we've seen a fair share of campgrounds. Some of them reminded us of gated communities, others skewed toward retirement homes, all were perfectly lovely. But Camp Danica nearby to Lake Bohinj felt like summer camp - and since I never went to summer camp, it was a particular thrill.
There was a whole program of entertainment. Mondays were "Circus Workshop," where kids (and adults who pleased) could try their hand at juggling, stilt-walking, etc. Tuesdays brought a magic show with special guest assistant "Bear." Slovenians really do like bears. Wednesdays encouraged folk dancing, Thursdays were campfire stories, and so on and so forth. While there were a number of younger children there with their parents, the majority of the minor population consisted of scouts. All at once, over two dozen teenage boys and girls arrived in a bus that specified "Scouts" sans gender. At the dishwashing station, we heard two boys chastise another for forgetting his "necker" - - that's when we realized the troop was British.
An older contingent all seemed to be there to climb Mount Triglav, which popped out dramatically now and then in the grey, foggy scenery. The weather was mostly bleak, very cold and often rainy, but people remained in good spirits. So close to the Julian Alps and Slovenia's highest peak (Triglav), the campsite attracts a lot of guests that are using it as a jumping off point. The morning that we left, a handful of older men surveyed the paragliding conditions. In the evenings, campers about our age filled 'Allo 'Allo, the campsite pub. Never have I been in a bar where a customer asks for the remote control to turn the volume up on a nature documentary. The footage showed Slovenians climbing K2 and the viewers were captivated. Never, either, have I been at a bar where headlamps were the "it" accessory. I took mine off to be more civil only to find myself feeling like the only girl at the sleepover without pierced ears.
Where all this turns particularly Slovenian is the presence of the campground chickens. There were three of them, spotted when we first arrived and bid farewell when we left three days later. At first, we thought they belonged to the French family whose camper they lingered around most. "Oh, how French. They brought chickens so that they'd have fresh eggs!" I quipped. The family left and the birds remained. We still are partial to believing they were the property of a camper, but it's very possible that they were simply campground chickens. Hey, why not?
Luckily, you didn't need to chase the birdies around for fresh eggs. Parked near reception each morning was a bakery van. It sold bread, eggs and honey liquor. We only felt the first two were necessary for a well-balanced breakfast. Just one block away was the milk automat Merlin's already mentioned. Only in Slovenia would you feel like you were inside the pages of a Patagonia catalog, volunteering at a day care and vacationing on a farm at the same time - all on a campsite.

Camping Kovačine Grill Night

As the summer has progressed the campsites we’ve stayed in have been getting busier. In the spring we often stayed on large lots with only one or two other campers around. Now, in the middle of July, it can be difficult to find a spot to pitch the tent. The largest and most crowded camp we’ve stayed at yet – Autocamp Kovačine, just outside of Cres town on the island of Cres – was more bustling urban center than wooded glen. “Grill party” night, when seemingly the whole population gathered at the shore, felt like a New York street fair set in paradise.
Kovačine has seven hundred fifty pitches, and I would guess that the average lot was home to three (maybe three and a half) people. There were almost no empty spots, even at midweek. There are three restaurants on the premises, a small supermarket and a few bars – many people never leave the campground. The grill party was especially for those people, the ones who are regulars and part of the campsite community. Campers greeted each other excitedly and saved spots at tables for friends. As with a lot of other campsites, much of the conversation was conducted in German.
This man orchestrated most of the grilling. He set up quite early in the day, lighting his coals hours before the first diner was served. Friends gathered around him as he worked, joking and laughing. It seemed that he was a fixture here, and that his jovial and efficient preparations were an important part of the annual scene.
These kids were selling shells and painted stones for a few kuna. We bought a sea urchin and a rock for about a dollar – mostly because we wanted to take their picture.
As the sun set, two men began playing music on a stage and the festivities really got underway. The beer began to flow a little more swiftly from the bar taps and younger children were put to bed.
Along the promenade the mood was quieter. People were strung out along the shore in groups or alone, watching the sky slowly blacken. This is not the culture of the island, or of Croatia, but of the campground – people are there to savor the beauty of a place, and to pickle themselves in the hot, July evenings. It’s detached, of course, but it’s also special in its own way. One of the best things about camping (for us) is that we can feel part of nights like this, where we aren’t outsiders or foreigners, but really part of a crowd.

Lake Uri

In German, it's called "Vierwaldstättersee," or, "Lake of the Four Forested Cantons." Lake Lucerne (or, if you prefer, Lake Luzern), is a complicated, twisting canyon landscape with many deep branches and points. Though it's all one body of water, the locals call each of the different sections by a different name. There's the Buochser See, the Küssnachter See, the Alpnacher See and the Urner See. We spent two nights in Brunnen, camping by the waters of the Urner bay, which, in English, is called Lake Uri. It is a pretty, quiet part of central Switzerland, with a long and important history. These are the waters by which the Swiss Confederation was founded and on which William Tell sailed. It is here that the modern nation was born and where the canton of Schwyz - the namesake of Switzerland - rises up in forested hills.
Despite all of its history, Lake Uri is much quieter than the other, more westerly branches of Lucerne. Brunnen, where we stayed, is the largest town, but isn't all that big. We spent both days here hiking around the Swiss Trail, which stretches from Brunnen all the way to Rütli, which sits remote and misty at the point where Uri meets the Buochser See. Along the way, we passed through most of the little towns on the water. Some were actual villages, having a few cafes and churches. Some were little more than a ferry dock and two or three houses. Sisikon, where we stopped walking the first day, was one of the smaller towns. We waited at the dock for the boat, content in the sunshine. We were the only passengers getting on or off there, and were amusing to the ferry's crew.
Legend has it that William Tell, who was being taken across the lake to be executed after insulting the governor, was caught up in a storm. Fearing that the boat would capsize, his guards released Tell - who was renowned as a sailer as much as he was a marksman - to help them pilot the craft to safety. When they reached shore, however, Tell leaped onto the rocks and pushed the boat back out into the waves and wind.

Tell is a very famous figure here, with statues, shrines and streets bearing his likeness and name. Much of the mythology surrounding him was created - or exaggerated - by Friedrich Schiller, and the playwright is nearly as famous as his subject. There is even a gold inscription on a thirty foot high, natural obelisk in the lake that is dedicated to the writer.

The more salient historical points surrounding the lake, however, have to do with the founding of the Swiss confederation, which was signed into effect in 1291 here in Schwyz. The original cantons of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden formed an alliance that was ultimately joined by the other five lake cantons, and then, gradually, by the rest of Switzerland. The spot where the document was signed is not far from the lakeshore, and is popular with tourists - we didn't visit, but we saw a lot of people going there on the ferry.
On the trail, high up above the waters in the alpine meadows, it's easy to imagine that nothing has changed here since the 13th century. The farmhouses are ancient, people still mow and turn their hay by hand and the plunking of cowbells is the only sound of civilization. The mountains, of course, are ancient and at the tip of the bay they rise steep and snowy.
The view from the campsite was tremendous, and we fell asleep listening to the lapping of wavelets and the distant churning of ferry engines. To the left, here, are the lights of Brunnen proper, and the entrance to Uri beyond.