The ferry connecting Plitvice Lakes' pier 1 to pier 2. [Photo by Wang Shanshan/China Daily]

But the conductor didn't even stop to ask me. He gave a broad grin when I looked back and saw him checking the passenger behind me. He must have known that I didn't have a ticket.

Bus tickets are expensive in Croatia. A ride costs 10 kuna ($1.5), when a college graduate may only earn 6,000 kuna a month. A visit to a public toilet costs three kuna.

Zagreb's city center was a contrast with its bus-terminal area. The old, grand buildings resemble those in Austria. In these blue-stone or white-stone architectural wonders, we found the largest number of sports-shoe shops that we had ever seen, other than in China. The shoes were made in Croatia.

The next morning, we took another four-hour ride toward the south, and arrived at the destination of our trip－the Plitvice Lakes National Park in the mountainous karst area of central Croatia.

In the 2009 film Avatar, the story was set on an alien planet called Pandora with lush green forests, lakes and waterfalls. The "planet" was the Plitvice Lakes.