Zadar, Croatia. The first few days: 09.Sept--10.Sept.2014.

[auf Deutsch hier]

I'm in Croatia again, this time more north than Dubrovnik (it'd be harder to be much south and still in Croatia)-- Zadar. 

Zadar is one of these places form which civilization spread -- since pre-historic times, people have lived here.  This includes the Romans, who were so kind as to set up the streets in a grid, which has persevered to the present day. It has made getting around much easier than expected.

So, why Zadar? It's a pretty city on the Adriatic coast, and not too far from many other places.

It has a collection of nearby islands and nearby parks:

Islands (just a small sample):

• Dugi Otok, with the ,,most beautiful"/,,most Carribean-like" beach in the area (the beach is called Saharun) and a lot of other nice parts 
• Ugljan, the nearest, easiest-to-get-to (ferries every hour until quite late) island, but you really need a bicycle or scooter there to get around 
• Nin, with two very tiny churches, sandy beaches, ,,medicinal mud", and salt pans

Parks:

• Kornati (strande group of islands, which are sort of a half-underwater mountain range. Makes it dangerous/difficult to navigate, so best as an organized tour)
• Telascica (pretty park on the southern tip of Dugi Otok, facing the Kornati islands)
• Plitvice Lakes/Waterfalls -- not that near, 2 hrs by bus, and supposed to be spectacular
• Zrmanja Canyon -- with canoe/kayak and tour groups. Where ,,Winnetou 3" was filmed, has a sort of ,,southwest US" vibe.
• Paklenica - good for hiking and such, about an hour away

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09.09 -- getting there

[Flight]

This was my first time to fly through the airport nearest me, Münster-Osnabrück.  It should have been a 25 Minute bus trip to catch a 06:15 flight, but I hadn't realized until late that the local busses weren't running -- so, I'd have to take a taxi to the main train station (~ 20 minutes) to then catch the bus. At that point, might as well pay the extra bit and just go directly to the airport (~25 minutes away).

So, the Taxi saved me about half an hours time -- so I got 3 hours instead of 2.5 hours of sleep -- but then I was at the airport wayyyyyy too early. I clearly could have gotten there at 5:15 and been fine. Maybe even 5:30.

Then in Munich, i had 3 hours between flights. Pro Tip -- after you go through passport control, there's a place where you can take a nap. If I'd known that earlier....ah, well.

[in Zadar]

On the first day, we were too exhausted and worn out by travel and the temperature to do much. We did make it out to the Sea-Organ (Morske orgulje) , which is kind of surreal
You can listen to it here.

On the next day (Wednesday), the weather was of course crappy and we had to stay mainly instead. Rather than go to a museum, we walked around in the rain anyway and ran into the ,,Croatian Design Superstore Pop-Up" . It took place in the ``Rector's Palace", an old building which, according to the posters inside, was supposed to have become a museum in 2012. It looked like that was still sort of underway -- one small part was a kind of museum, outside of this ,,Design Superstore" thing -- which had everything from furniture and clothes to wine, olive oil and kid's toys. We walked very very slowly through but at the end, still had to wait inside for a while and let the torrential rain and thunder and lighting blow over a bit.

Here was the entryway:

It lightened up a bit after a while, and we hurried out to find somewhere to eat.
We decided on a place around the corner,  Trattoria Canzone.

We walked around the city some more later when it dried out a bit:

Here's a bit of the ,,Foša", a kind of moat bordering on the south end of the old city:




At the end of the Foša is this city gate -- which I think is the oldest in Zadar:




I'd bought a travel guide which said that you can see some venetian symbols in the city fortifications -- perhaps that's what this is:



Supposedly, Zadar has the ,, most beautiful sunset in the world". So, we tried to see it:



Here was the view from the edge of the Sea organ:



And where the sunset was supposed to have been:



We saw the Ferry which runs regularly between Zadar and Preko (on Ugljan):



After the sun set, there's an art installation powered by solar cells -- a light show of sorts -- called greet the sun (Pozdrav Suncu)






On the next day we got yet more rain and went into a museum (of Roman antiquities). More later.