Kravice Waterfall // No Thinking, No Doing, Just Being (and Midget Cows)

The magnificent waterfalls at Kravice // © nomadFra // Shutterstock.com

You’ll hear it before you can see it.

No, they aren’t fearful words of warning from a foreboding wildlife keeper (let’s call him Muldoon, for the sake of arguments). They were the words of the most important individual from Bosnia and Herzegovina that I have ever met. Sure, these words came after a story about midget cows, but context isn’t always important.

Trying to cobble together a thousand or so words about Kravice Waterfalls strikes me as a redundant exercise. What is there to say? I could fill this piece with synonyms of the word ‘beautiful’, but all that does is compound a fact that speaks for itself. Besides, no writer on the planet can weave a sentence that will touch the majesty of seeing such things in person. Not even Italo Calvino.

When talking about beauty, facts are largely meaningless. Located 10km south of Ljubuški, the waterfalls at Kravice are an example of a tufa cascade, the result of limestone forming when carbonate minerals precipitate out of ambient temperature water. No, I don’t know what that means, I lifted it straight from the internet. The waterfalls are around 25 metres high, spread across 20 drops, depending on the season. They used to be owned by the wealthy Selimić family of benefactors, although how someone can own a waterfall is beyond me. The waterfalls are on the Trebižat River, a major tributary of the Neretva and one of the most musical rivers in Herzegovina.

See, facts do nothing for this.

I have a vague memory of my first visit to Kravice. It was, unsurprisingly, the first time I had done Bata’s tour, my second day in the country, my first full day, a chance to get to know Eric and Casey a little better while immersing myself in the wonders of this curious place. We took on the kids of Podvelež in an impromptu game of football, dishing out a 10-1 drubbing of the tykes. We stopped briefly in Međugorje. Kravice was next, although the weather wasn’t really good enough for swimming.

I can barely swim anyway.

Not a bad place for a drink // © Shevchenko Andrey // Shutterstock.com

You don’t need good weather to enjoy Kravice. You don’t need to be able to swim to enjoy Kravice. All you need to do is take your time journeying down towards the cascades and let your mind soften when you finally get there. As we are all sick of hearing, 60% of the human body is made up of water, a number that rises to 73% when talking about the brain. Places like Kravice aren’t for thinking or doing. They are for being.

Which is pretty much what we did on that first journey to Kravice. We looked at the waterfalls. We didn’t do much else, because doing anything else would have interfered with looking at the waterfalls. The human brain is capable of incredible things, but nothing comes close to the total shutdown of being confronted by beautiful blasts of nature. You can keep your calculus, just leave me here.

Hold on, midget cows? Truth be told, I haven’t heard the story in a long time, and trying to fill in the gaps would be a disservice to that great man. I vaguely remember an assumption that the cows had drowned, but they were found huddling under a waterfall. How that leads to midget cows, I do not remember, but sometimes the lack of a straight line can take you down some beautiful roads. This is one such story, and unfortunately, you’ll have to be content with question marks for now. Rest assured that everyone had a great time and agreed that it was very good.

I’m babbling. There is no shortage of blogs about Kravice Waterfalls, but all of them fail to do justice to this place. How could they? Nature isn’t made for description. It isn’t even made for our gawping eyes. Heck, it isn’t even made.

Soon after that first trip to Kravice Waterfalls, we returned. The weather was better, allowing those who wanted to swim the chance to get into the water. There was even a rope swing for the more adventurous. I rank in the bottom percentile when it comes to adventurousness (a Tinder profile quote if ever there was one), but the thrill of plummeting water surrounded by lush greenery was all the excitement I needed. Now, if only I could remember the story about the midget cows…