Zadar, Croatia: the island Nin: cradle of Croatian culture.13.Sept.2014.

[Hier auf Deutsch]
We finally had a day which was supposed to have no rain at all. So, we were headed off to  Nin, 17km north-ish from Zadar. Nin is an ``island'', inasmuch as you need to cross bridges to get to it. Here below you can see in the map pretty clearly that Nin's southern border is really separated from "land" by a very narrow canal:

Good to know: At some point in its history, Zadar was similarly separated from land by just a narrow canal -- which got closed off and became the Fosa, and Zadar became a peninsula. Apparently, the muckity mucks have it in their heads to re-make Zadar an island in the future. Who knows if it'll happen. 

What you can also see in this map above is  ,,Park Solana Nin". It's not really a park, per se, just a place where they make salt from saltwater (and have been for ages).

IMPORTANT TIP (about riding the bus in Zadar): We ended up feeling that the only way to figure out how to get from point A to point B was to find a blog post or so where someone else had done it already and copy them. Or, walk (20-30 min) to the main bus station and ask the information desk for help.  When you do manage to find a bus, it's not clear where the bus will stop -- you kind of have to hope other people will want to get off the bus at the same time, or you have a GPS-friendly map on your phone and push the button roughly when you think should work. 

So, one such blog said that instead of hoofing it down to the main bus station, one (if staying in old-town Zadar, which we were) could instead take the bridge across, go up a few streets and then catch the bus there.  That bus stop redirected us one street further, which we then spent some time walking up and down to find the precise stop.

We were rather early, and the Bus came when it was supposed to. It was about 17 Kuna for the trip to Nin.   The bus had no list of stops inside and no PA system where the driver says where/when stops happen. Luckily, we were not the only ones getting off in Nin, so it worked out.

The strange lettering/alphabet in the next pic also says ``Nin", in Glagolitic -- an old form of Croatian alphabet. Made by the guy for whom Cyrillic was named (he didn't actually make Cyrillic, he did lay the groundwork -- which I guess was exactly this).

``The Glagolitic alphabet /ˌɡlæɡɵˈlɪtɨk/, also known as Glagolitsa, is the oldest known Slavic alphabet, from the 9th century...The two monks later canonized as Saints Cyril and Methodius, the brothers from Thessaloniki, were sent to Great Moravia(modern Czech Republic and Slovakia) in 862 by the Byzantine emperor at the request of Prince Rastislav, who wanted to weaken the dependence of his country on East Frankish priests. The Glagolitic alphabet, however it originated, was used between 863 and 885 for government and religious documents and books, and at the Great Moravian Academy (Veľkomoravské učilište)founded by the missionaries, where their followers were educated.'' (wiki)

Outside the city are these two clever posters, the picture of Nin is shown correctly for the direction your approaching from.  In the first, you're approaching from the south, and see the long, narrow beach in the background. In the second (where you're technically leaving Nin), approaching from the north, you see that same beach in the foreground:

We walked from the bus stop to Nin intself. Next to the tourist info was the city. Well, in particular, Branimir, an important Knez (~Duke) of Croatia. Nin is behind him.

``Branimir (Latin: Brannimero) was a ruler of the Duchy of Croatia who reigned as duke (knez) from 879 to 892. His country received papal recognition as a state from Pope John VIII on 7 June 879.^[During his reign, Croatia retained its sovereignty from both Frankish and Byzantine rule and became de jure independent." (wikipedia)

That's about as much as we know about the guy.

I also like this next pic of his statue, since it looks like he's magicking up a storm:


Nin claims to be the oldest city in Croatia. I suppose it's possible.  I don't really have any commentary for/against this. I suppose I found a site talking about the history of the region. Here's a rambling post that seems to support this. 

Outside the city, near the gate was this ship, a replica of the kind of old boats that Croatia/Zadar/Nin was known for (not sure if this is circa Roman times when they sided with Rome in Pompey's rebellion, or circa Venetian times (17th Century or so)):



The gate of Nin reminds me of the  Alamo:



Nin has a few tiny streets and more statues and churches. I don't know what this statue is doing -- is he carrying something? Throwing something?


Nin has, in particular,  two tiny churches. One is actually inside the town, so we saw it first (church of the holy cross, built 9th Century):




I'd show you more pics, but it was pretty hard to take decent ones inside, since it's so tiny.

Nin also has the ruins of the  biggest Roman temple of the Adriatic . Sad story: they found ~8 awesome larger than life statues of emperors and gods. 4 are now in the archeological museum in Zadar. The rest ``disappeared" shortly after they were dug up. Only ~10% of Nin's been excavated/explored archeologically. These are probably related.


We had the same problem as on Ugljan when it came to lunch -- restaurants were ``open'', but not serving food. We finally found one that was serving food and I had some nice chicken wrapped in bacon.

The other side of Nin has a gate as well -- here's a small (somewhat damaged/in ruins) door/gate and a bridge. The water there is the canal by means of which Nin is an island:


We walked along towards the sandy beach in the north

Velebit Bergkette

Here's a better pic of the (Velebit) mountains and the sandy beach. The shack is where you can rent kites for kite-surfing. We did not try this out.

En route to said beach, we ran into some more kittens. One was brave and played with us for a bit, the other just watched.

you can guess which is which

Here's the not-so-brave one looking on:



The houses hereabouts are either white, grey (concrete-colored) or very colorful. E.g. here's one that's on the market:



A man on a bicycle approached us, asking "Deutsch?" (i.e. do you speak/are you German?). After some shrugs and nods he launched into a rambling sales pitch for an excursion (,,Ausflug") to the most beautiful beach(Saharun), ,,like the Carribean"(Karibik).  I already had the flyer he was waving around, which I said and we kept going. He seemed nice enough. Not long after, when we were actually at the shore, a woman approached and asked if we needed rooms (also in German).  Nope, thanks.

Walking along the sandy beach, we saw a lot of people wading quite far out -- 50m or more. It was very shallow there (not sure if that's relevant for kite surfing?).

After all this, we had a bit of time left to go to the other super-tiny church, St. Niklaus. 

It really struck me as the kind of silly place you'd've seen in Monty Python & the Quest for the Holy Grail (trivia: the name in German for this film is ,,Die Ritter der Kokosnuss"  (the Knights of the Coconut)).  That was sort of spot-on, inasmuch as Nin/Zadar was a stopover for people on Crusade:



Here, I included people in the pic standing next to the church to make the scale clear:



This is the best one, in my opinion:



This tiny church was built in the 11th Century and the ,,spy-tower" was added in the 17th Century. I'm reasonably certain that the hill it's standing on is an old grave-mound.


Spy-tower? Why'd they need that, you say?
Well, the Venetians (that's a story I should really tell, give me a second) --who at that time were in control of Nin/Zadar -- were at war/fighting off the Turks, so it was used to see if Turks were approaching.

So -- that story.  From 1202.

Pope Innocent III: Hey Venice, I need boats and troops for the next Crusade.
Venice: Sure, Pope. We'll drop everything for a year and do nothing but build you boats.
[time passes]
Venice: Here's those boats you wanted, Pope! Where's the money?
Pope Innocent III: Uh, well. Turns out, I don't need so many boats. And don't have the money.
Venice: Fine. We're going to go sack Zadar to pay for this.
Pope Innocent III: No! Don't do that! I'll, uh, excommunicate you!
Venice: Psh, whatever. [sacks Zadar]
Pope Innocent III: [excommunicates the entire city of Venice and the crusading army]

Or, if you prefer more formal language:

``The Siege of Zara or Siege of Zadar (Croatian: Opsada Zadra) (November 10–24, 1202) was the first major action of the Fourth Crusade and the first attack against a Catholic city by Catholic crusaders. The Fourth Crusade sacked the Croatian town of Zadar, a rival of Venice, despite letters from Pope Innocent III forbidding such an action and threatening excommunication...Innocent III negotiated an agreement with the Republic of Venice, Europe's dominant sea power at the time, involving the construction of a fleet of warships and transports. The deal stipulated that about 35,000 crusaders would need transport and the Venetians would be paid 94,000 marks of silver, to be paid in instalments...After the Venetians had suspended their commercial operations for a year to build and crew the ships, only about 12,000 showed up at Venice to man and pay for them...The crusaders thus found themselves only able to pay 51,000 marks to the Venetians. In response, the Venetians indicated that they would accept the invasion of Zara (now Zadar, Croatia), a Catholic city on the coast of the Adriatic, as well as nearby Trieste, in lieu of payment for the time being. Zara had rebelled against the Venetian Republic in 1183, and placed itself under the dual protection of the Papacy and King Emeric of Hungary^[9] (who had recently agreed to join the Crusade)...Though a large group of Crusaders found the scheme repulsive and refused to participate, the majority agreed (despite the written protests of Innocent III), citing it as necessary to attain the larger goal of taking Jerusalem. In 1203, Innocent excommunicated the entire crusading army, along with the Venetians, for taking part in the attack.''

If you were wondering, he later absolved them.

Alright, fair enough. What's the view like?

Here:








Alright. Onwards. We took the bus back from Nin and wandered around looking for the pizza-and-calzone window-restaurant I'd seen before ,,Pizza Cut Dado" and tried the calzones. Delicions.

Next blog post(s): two days of swimming, some Croatian oldies music. Next day after that, sea-kayaking. After that - Plitvice lakes! (amazing pictures of amazement).

Zadar, Croatia:to Ugljan with bicycles.12.Sept.2014.

[Hier auf Deutsch]

The weather forecasts mainly disagreed, but a few seemed to suggest that the nice weather we were seeing in the morning (we'd decided to get up earlier in hopes of actually seeing some sun) would disappear around 2pm. Well, maybe it'll only drizzle and we'll be fine.

At the beginning of this trip, we'd been met by a guy who'd shown us to the apartment and gave us some recommendations of things to do He'd said that  Ugljan (the nearest island) is easy to get to by ferry (takes about a half hour) and good to see by bike.

We found a place not too far away to rent some bikes: zzuum -- really, it was a guy in a Cafe-Bar,  who had a collection of bikes stashed in a courtyard or basement which he rented out.

We paid 100 Kuna (~ 13.3 Euro) per bike per 24 hrs and had to quickly jaunt over to the ferry to catch the 11 am one. It was something like 72 Kuna per person + bike.

First view from the ferry (to the south) -- to the right is the Zadar old-town peninsula:


There's this tradition (for some number of hundreds of years, passed down from father to son) that there's always a guy here rowing people to and from, between the two sides of the canal-type-area (for 5 Kuna/0.75 Euro):




We also went by the AIDA-Aura, which from where we were sitting seemed like a rather small cruise ship:







When we arrived to the city of Preko ( the name means "over" -- because it's over the water from Zadar) , we first hunted down the tourist info. Unlike the one in Zadar, this one was actually useful. She gave us a map and some suggestions of where to bike to. As we left, people came in and asked similar questions and she said you really need a bike to get around (and we didn't see anywhere to rent one, so were glad we'd brought them, despite the high ferry fee).

We started biking around but were almost immediately hungry. We asked restaurants in the next town we arrived in whether they served food -- nope. None before 16:00 at the earliest (we were going to see this as a theme in smaller/less touristy areas) And no grocery stores, either. So, back to Preko.

We ate at Konoba Roko -- but it took a long time and the sun was already gone behind clouds by the time we finished.

We got back on our bikes and biked around the coast some more. Every bit of coast was set up for swimming and sunning -- full of locals and tourists trying to soak up what sun there was before the rain came.

Here's a map of the area. You can see the ferry rout from Zadar to  Preko (on Ugljan).  Then we went north-ish  along the coast to Sutomišćica and than up the hill and back along the main street(Here's a page with pics and info about the various towns on Ugljan):



Here's a bench (in Poljana) with a good view of Zadar:



You can see a small island in this next photo.  Almost the only thing on it is some old religious building (cloister?). In the background you can see some of the mountain range and the coming rain storm:


This pic was somewhere between two villages. Everything was olive-green -- because of the olive trees (foreground) and the fig-trees (background):



As we were on the edge of Sutomišćica, we saw this former building which is now home to several pomegranate trees.  Pomegranates look a lot like apples, but I think we did not see one apple tree this trip (despite me constantly confusing pomegranates for apples):



Reasonably certain this was  Sutomišćica :


We also saw a marina (whose restaurant was called the Olive Garden (no relation to the US chain)) and then got a bit rained on. But, only just a few drops. It was gone and we kept going, then went up to the main road and started biking back Preko-wards.

We were approaching the road that leads up to the ruins (probably a good lookout point), one of these former-hil-forts-turned-church-now-in-ruins when we were hit by the real rain. It did not look like it would let up, so we gave up and pedaled back to Preko. I had no rain pants and just my Birkestocks, so was socked from the waist down.

Naturally, the rain let up a few minutes after we were back in town waiting for the ferry. I was done, though, and had no desire to bike any more in that condition. We went back to town and gave the bikes back.

Also ran into some kitties that agreed with me about staying out of the rain:




Next Post: The island Nin. 

Zadar, Croatia: Veni, Vidi, Pluit. roman things and the Archeological Museum.11.Sept.2014.

[auf Deutsch hier]

I should correct something I wrote previously -- an omission of a great restaurant. I forgot that we'd eating at Trattoria Calzona on Tuesday. Wednesday, which I hadn't said anything about lunch for, was at Na Po Ure, which Lonely Planet suggested.

``This unpretentious family-run konoba is the place to sate that appetite, with from-the-heart Dalmatian cooking: grilled lamb, calf's liver and fresh fish served with potatoes and vegetables.''

We had the ``Fish, first class" (grilled whole). You see this in every menu -- there's two classes of fish you order. Not what kind of fish (grouper or whatever), just what class it is. First class is more expensive (of course?). There's also usually a grilled tuna steak option as well. Maybe that's 3rd class? Anyway, due to the delightful prices, we could afford to try out the first class fish and it was really tasty.


11. September. Thursday

More rain. One forecast called for as much rain as the flood we had in Münster. Luckily, that's not what we got, but it was still pretty stormy.

IMPORTANT TIP (for the weather):  There are a lot of weather predictions you can find online.  For the same day, we were seeing weather.com say one thing (like "Sun! Lots of it! Maybe some clouds") and BBC say the opposite ("Biblical floods!")   

I found this one to be the best and most precise (as far as you can be precise with weather here).   Also good to note -- it seemed like even if the forecast said rain, if you got up early enough (8/9am), you'd see some sun. There was also a good chance of seeing it again late in the afternoon for an hour or so/

On the left side of this following photo (red roof) is the University of Zadar. Nearby (further away) you can see rain. This was taken facing southwards:



Another photo of a rainy day -- the Pier in Zadar (facing West/Southwest):



For lunch, we ate at  Konoba Stomorica (Konoba is,,Restaurant'' or ,,Tavern" in Croatian). Very very very tasty tuna steak (had it rare and didn't regret it) and some veggies.

IMPORTANT TIP (for eating out): You get exactly what's in the Menu -- if you order tuna steak, you get tuna steak. Sometimes this will come with potatoes. Usually you'll need to order them (or veggies or whatever) yourself as sides. These cost between 15 and 30 Kuna  (~ 1,3 Euro / 10 Kuna).

Archeological Museum Zadar

The Museum had 3 (I think) floors. The highest was objects from pre-history in the area of Zadar.  Zadar had always had some people living around it. At some point, the Liburni tribes developed hill-forts which later became actual fortified places ---cities with walls, churches, defensive forts.

The pointy bits on hills around Zadar were all probably former hill-forts (I'll try to remember to say this again when I post a picture of the horizon looking at said peaks).

``After the year 59 B.C. Zadar became a Roman municipium, and in 48 B.C. a colony of Roman citizens. During Roman rule Zadar acquired the characteristics of a city with a regular road network, a main square – forum, and next to it an elevated capitolium with a temple. In the 7th century Zadar became the center (capital) of the Byzantine theme (province) of Dalmatia. At the beginning of the 9th century Zadar was mentioned as seat of bishop Donatus and the Byzantine leader Paulus. At the time a church was erected on the Roman forum, the church of the Holy Trinity, today St. Donat, for which it can be said to be the symbol of the city." Read more here

Zadar (Iader) was conquered by Romans and got a Forum (as any Roman city would have). The ruins are still kind of there, but with this Church in the middle:





There've been some excavations. Here's a game some Romans liked to play:



They also found these  ``charms against evil":


The text associated with it assured the reader that despite what people have heard of Romans being debaucherous and so on, the penis was really used as a luck talisman etc etc. I suppose if these came from graves, they're more likely to have been a serious kind of thing than something teenagers laughed with each other about.

After we were done, the rain (eventually) took a bit of a break.

On the left is the church ``Sv. Donat (Sv. = Saint) and on the right is the bell tower. Foreground is part of the Forum:



This next Church-and-Convent was originally built in 1091 and renovated in the 16th Century:



If you stand close to where the Temple (on the north end of the old Forum) was, this was the view that day -- complete with a rainbow.

That rainbow, by the way, points exactly to  theMuseum of Gold and Silver (in a religious context)


This wall and the stones with faces are what remains of the area leading up to the old temple:



Coming up:
Next day: a half-day visit of the island Ugljan by ferry with rented bicycles.
Next next day: finally some sun and a visit to the ,,island" (reachable easily by bus and walking) ``Nin"

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

==================================

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.

2014.29.06. Dubrovnik. Cable Car. City Walls.

[hier, auf Deutsch]


2014.29.06. Sunday. First, the cable car ride.

It's good to know, that the bus (any bus shuttle at all) that takes you back to the Dubrovnik airport, leaves from the ,,Cable Car" stop instead in front of the Pile (Peee-lay) gate (where you're dropped off when you arrive).

To get there, you walk to the old city, but instead of walking you, you walk around, following the road north-ish, outside the city walls. It's really the only street you could take.

There's a place to buy tickets on the cable car which takes euros-- a fair amount of places (but not all) around Dubrovnik do. A round trip was about 14 Euros (100 Kuna).

Here are some photos I took while waiting in line:



You can see Lokrum (which we'd visited the day prior) in the background:



Inside the cable car, there wasn't a whole lot of room to take photos.  Here's one I managed to take:




From the top, here's a view of the city and cable car:




I figured out a way to make a panorama from some of my pictures from the top -- this is as you look north and a bit east (you can see why they'd filmed a fair amount of Spaghetti westerns in Croatia):




You could also see the ,,Red Keep" from Game of Thrones :



[Compare with this still from the Game of Thrones (2.Season, 6.Episode).]  The photo also shows a (returning?) canoe-tour group. We didn't end up doing that ourselves, but it was popular among other conference-goers.  If you look very very closesly, you can also see (sort of ,,under" the Red Keep) the Pier.

More to the west, you can get a good view of the western harbor (the "real" harbor) of Dubrovnik, and the Elaphiti Islands:







At the top of the mountain stands the fort  Festung Srd (originally constructed in the early 1800s by Napoleonic French forces).  It is now a museum about the Croatian war of Independence (which they call the Homeland War, of1991-1995).  During the war it was shelled from nearby mountains (those pictured earlier). You can still see traces of the damage:




It's worth noting that the cable car was damaged during the war and out of commission for a while. It's only been somewhat recently that it's been repaired/renovated/replaced and up and working again.


City-Walls Walk

There are only about 2 places where you can start your walk along the city walls (which costs 100 Kuna, and no, you cannot pay in Euro).  We were wandering (after the cable car) around a bit first, starting through a northern gate into the old city:



We hadn't made it up the hill on the northern side of the old city, so we walked around a fair bit. I liked these nice tiny streets:



We also saw this rather funny tavern --- ,,Tavern Lady Pi-Pi".  The statue/fountain is of a woman peeing (I kid not).



Before finding the entrance to the city walls, we found a basketball court/playground and got some directions (half in Geman)

A view of the playground from the walls:



First view from the city walls -- this is what you see right after you enter through the Pile gate:




It was super warm and not particularly comfortable on the wall. We'd said this later to our host and he said you should only visit it early in the morning.













Here was another Game-of-Thrones place, the ,,House of the Undying"(still from the show):





There were also some empty buildings -- my guess was that these were sort of reminders of the war (or perhaps simply not repaired since then, for whatever reason):





End of the trip. Summary/ Thoughts.
On the next day, with the help of our host, we managed to use a way from where we were staying t othe Cable-Car stop, basically without stairs. It was incredible.

We were rather early, though, so we ate some lunch at ,,Yummi-Cafe" there.

A tip: Souvenirs are several Euros cheaper at the airport giftshop than in the old city.

All in all, Dubrovnik was very pretty and the people nice.

It was never clear to us how tipping works in Croatia, so we always gave something.

Where we stayed had a lot of steps between it and where we needed to go, but there were a lot of nice fruit trees around (lemon, apple) and everything was beautiful, green, and quiet. Also, most other places there had just as many steps.


The biggest ``attractions" of Dubrovnik are:

• the walk around the city walls
• the ride/view of the cable car (and the museum in Srd) 
• the Elaphiti Islands
• swimming in the very clear, refreshing, salt water 
• hiking in the mountains (not in the summer!) 
• canoe-tours around Lokrum and other places
• Snorkeling (German is ,,schnorklen") 
• tours with glass-bottomed boats
• eating fresh fish dishes
• good coffee
• beautiful, sunny weather (not always, but often)

We managed to do most of these things. I'd go gladly back to Croatia, although probably try out another city.

If you like swimming every day in the Adriatic Ocean and enjoying the sun, Croatia is a good travel destination.

28.06.2014 Dubrovnik. The Island of Lokrum.

Our host spoke some German (mixed with an occasional word of English). We learned from him that the nearest island, ,,Lokrum'',  is a kind of nature preserve.

We had lunch at  Konoba Gallus. There was a huge group of tourists, fresh off the cruise ship, who were to eat there. So, there was only a small little side area where we could eat (and only pizza).

It was here, further, below, and to the right. One one side was a stone wall, and not so far away was the matching stone wall of the building of the restaurant. It made a sort of breezeway that the wind gently flowed through and was very pleasant.  Here is someone else's photo. 

I had seen the following sign from this hidden area. It took a few times reading through it, before I understood what it was about :).



Afterwards, we walked to the east harbor of Dubrovnik, past the various stands for tours and dinners and tours, and finally saw the one ship which went to Lokrum.  It was 140 Kuna (~ 18,50 Euro, $25.20) round trip. Here are a few photos of the ride to Lokrum:

After 10-15 minutes, we were there. We'd learned (from previous travel) that it's a good idea to have a map. So, I took this picture of the relevant map before we went traipsing around:



We started at the harbor marked (1) and walked around sort of west and north.

Here's a view from the harbor where we landed:





and another:



There were a lot of peacocks on the island. Maybe they came from the time when the island belonged to the Hapsburgs (Wikipedia agrees with my theory).



The peacock danced -- either to try to scare us off or to impress the ladies. He vibrated, shaking his feathers, and made an odd rustling sound in the process.

Here's another, trying to do the same, without the giant feathers:



We saw a peahen with her babies as well:





We saw a fair-sized lizard (maybe as big as my foot) and another, which scampered off:



At the harbor of Lokrum were a lot of crabs. Here's the best picture of one I ended up taking:



There's a smoking ban on the island (so you don't burn it down). I like the sign for it:





One of the sights to see is a former benedictine monastery, now in ruins:




Another photo of the monastery. From this angle, it reminded me of the Alhambra. It's not easy to tell here, but the wall is a light pink. Pink granite? (Does pink granite tend to occur near limestone? It seems to in Texas).

'


After the previous-monastery, we walked down to the other side of the island, a part of the coast where a few people swam. Rather, where families with their small children were standing in the wayer. It was very shallow and not somewhere we felt like trying to swim.










After the coast, we walked back up to their "Dead Sea/Lake", (``Mrtvo More'' in Croatian), a saltwater lake.




And there were yet more peacocks there. We got to see a few fly up to and down from trees, which was quite a sight (couldn't get a picture fast enough, though):





There was a (also from the Hapsburgs) Botanical Garden,  with palms and cacti, and some really large prickly pear cacti:








Some random religious building:




I thought it was cute/funny that this restaurant (on the island) had, in addition to "normal" desserts, also fruit like watermelons in the dessert fridge here:




Next time (probably the last post from this trip):

Sunday: Cable car up the mountain, and later, walking around the city walls. Lots of photos.

26.06-27.06.2014 Dubrovnik.End of the conference.

[auf Deutsch]

Since Thursday was mostly just about the banquet, I'll skip talking about it and posting pictures (since this is a travel blog). However, if you were there, or simply want to look at pictures from it, I can advise that the organizers are collecting photos and will post them, I think, on the conference webpage.

Ok, ok. One photo. In the middle (with the beard) is the person whose birthday we were celebrating. Around him stood many of his former students.



I should mention that every day I had breakfast at  Sesame,  a restaurant (and also a hotel, I just learned) near the IUC-- ,,Inter-University Center"-- where the conference was held. The waiters were nice and their coffee was delicious.

Here's the view from the IUC in the direction of Sesame. You can see a little of Sesame on the left side -- it's pretty well hidden by the trees.




Friday, 28.06..
Friday was the last day of the conference. the conference was held in the IUC which had a really pretty courtyard, where we daily had coffee and cake (and math chats):



Here's a view from in front of the IUC:




Lunch was at ,,...nishta", a vegetarian restaurant. Tasty and interesting. I had the felafel and lemonad.

After the last talk, a lot of people wanted to go swimming, since the weather was great. We went to a ,,Beach bar", where you could swim and snorkel nearby.  But, like every ,,beach" here (outside of the artifical one by one of the fancy hotels), it was no proper beach, but a rocky coast.

It was fun and relaxing. Some people swam, some sat, some drank. You could comfortably leave your stuff to be watched by the people there and go take a turn in the water. The water, as ever, was a bit ,,fresh" and therefore refreshing :). I finally had my swim-goggles with me, and the water there next to the ,,beach bar" was shallow enough that I could see a few things -- a sort of ,,sea-snake" and some fish. It would've been a lot easier with a snorkel. I was very much out of practice holding my breath.

Here's a nice view near where we were swimming. It's a part of  `Blackwater Bay" from Game of Thrones:




After the swim, we met up with a few others, then re-divided into groups for dinner. Because of my pleasant experience in the harbor in the west, I suggested we simply go there and find something. The weather was still nice enough that we all opted to walk there (it was mostly downhill, anyway). It was a pleasant walk.

A nice sunset view as we walked:



This is probably Croatian for ,,push":




We ended up eating at  Porat.  I had the seabass, which was steamed in banana leaves, and every bit as soft and delicious as the menu had promised.




Hier is some of what other people ate:







Next up on the travel blog:

• Saturday -- exploring the botanical garden/reserve on the island of Lokrum
• Sunday -- Cable car up the mountain, lots of beautiful views of Durbovnik. Later, a walk around the city walls. 

I flew back on Monday.

24.06-25.06.Dubrovnik, next two days.Swimming.Talks.The other Harbor in Dubrovnik.

24.06 Tuesday began with rain

I didn't sleep well Monday night and was woken up by some serious rain. Despite (or because of) this, the view from the window was pretty great:




For lunch, the group I was with grabbed some sandwiches (again) from a small shop and sat on the pier from Game of Thrones (Seriously. Remember this scene? Or this?) . Afterwards, we went for a swim around the corner (really, over a hill and back down) from the first cove, which was much nicer and cleaner, although the water felt cooler. Probably because it was much warmer and sunnier.

Same pier where we ate lunch, but on the next day:


After the talks, we went back to the old city. We ate (just outside the walls) at the same place as Monday evening,  ,,the Terrace". It had a great view and the food was pretty good. I had one of the daily specials, the ravioli with truffles as well as an order of grilled veggies. Our experience has been that most things don't come with veggies, but ordering them on the side for another 2.5-3 euros is always an option.

Some of us wanted to go into the old city proper afterwards to walk around. Here's a totally normal street in the old city:



and a woman with wings, swooping around the main street (she probably was advertising the Midsummer Night's Dream which was playing at the far end of the street)



On the next day (Wednesday), there'd be a proper tour of the old city. We weren't sure if we would go, especially since it was supposed to rain the next two days. So, we did our own little mini-tour of the side streets and alleys of the old city.



I saw this sign and thought, well, gotta check it out:



The view was reached through a whole/doorway in the city wall. Here are two pictures of the "most beautiful view":





Another normal (narrower) street, from near the south wall:



This building dates from 1664:



You have to pay around 100 Kun (btwn 7.5 and 10 euro) to clamber around the fortifications properly. We didn't really have that much daylight left, so left it for another day and just peaked through a fence:



We rounded a corner, and saw a great view of the other side of the city and its defenses, towards the north:



Outside of the old city, to the east, is a small harbor. Very pretty during dusk:








Dubrovnik from the Pier:
 




We saw some other people swimming, but I personally wasn't interested in swimming right there:




From the pier, we could see a cruise ship, which was probably headed to the other harbor in the west:




25.06 Wednesday and the other harbor of Dubrovnik. 

On Wednesday, there were only two talks (well, two talk time-slots) and then we had the rest of the day free. I discussed some math with people for a while and later did a very small amount of walking around. My friend had mentioned some not-so-touristy restaurants on the west side of everything, by the bus station (and the other harbor), so I decided to go for dinner over there.

Heading there, one could see more mountains in the distance:



We managed to avoid all stairs going there, and just walked down a gentle hill. Success!

First view of the other harbor:




After we ate, more harbor, with some sunset light awesomeness:





The restaurant we picked is called ,,Amfora". Tasty tasty, and the waitstaff was a lot more laid back than the pushy super-used-to-throngs-of-tourists guys around the old city. Similar prices, but the food quality was higher. I had the risotto, which had the correct rice and lots of basil and parmesan. Delicious.

There are stray cats all over Dubrovnik. They seem to be both rather clever and sweet. This one, as I approached and hauled out my camera, scampered up on the scooter and then mewed at me as I pointed the camera at it, like he wanted payment for doing what he was supposed to. I didn't throw him any food (to be fair, I had none on me).

22.06 --23.06 Dubrovnik Croatia, arrival. First 2 days.

Auf Deutsch.

I'm in Croatia now, for a conference which runs from 23rd through the 27th of June. It's in honor of the 60th Birthday of the  founder of my sub-area of Topology (Goodwillie).  I'm happy to see my colleagues again -- and the sun as well :) .
==========
Arrival -- day 1. 

Croatia -- from the plane, everything seemed very hilly (really, mountainous), sunny and beautiful. I'm here for a conference, and immediately had the feeling that I should come back to visit again, when I really have enough time to enjoy the place.




After we landed, we took the shuttle (not the public bus, which we didn't see) into the city -- it took maybe 20 or 30 minutes. It was a beautiful ride along the adriatic coast.



What I had not understood when booking a hotel, was that its location necessitated schlepping my 16kg suitcase up ~100 stairs -- I chose to hold it over my head, and cursed not wearing my ankle brace.

Well, I guess I'll get in shape this way.

When looking up the ``street", what you see:



And here's the view from half-way down:



I sent an SMS to a friend who's also here, so we could meet up and find some dinner. We opted for the old city ---which is ``close" as the crow flies, and a little less close when you take into account the stairs. We ate at the ``favorite" restaurant of our host, which was not that great.

Here's a picture of the main street of the old city (it's about 300m long):


 We discovered that the old city *also* has a lot of big staircases (thankfully, the restaurant-street was only up about 5 or so steps) :





After eating, we took some time to go to the/a harbor (the one on the east end of the city), had some ice cream and looked around.



There was a fake submarine:





Outside of, but near to the old city:


A nice vantage point, looking south-east ish:



2nd Day (First Day of the Conference)

On the second day in Dubrobnik started the conference. For breakfast, we ate in a restaurant which is adjacent to the conference center (it's called "Sesame"). Good coffee, and I could get a totally normal breakfast of müsli, yogurt and fruit.

We had sandwiches from the "Sandvich Stand" for lunch and sat on the pier (which was in Game of Thrones):




While we were sitting there, one of the other people mentioned that on a nearby island they saw an octopus along the coast. This was said while we were watching little crabs scuttling around an outcropping.

Afterwards, we walked up a hill towards a fortress and looked out over the city:




Looking in the other direction, we saw a cove where one could go swimming (which also showed up in Game of Thrones). Later that evening I even went swimming there:




The water was amazingly clear, which you can kind of see in this picture:




In the city, we saw a lot of pretty little side streets (which is called an "Ulica" in Croatian):

After lunch and after another lecture, I gave my own talk. I felt it went quite well :).
I swam later (after all the talks were over and after dinner), sort of in celebration. The water was a bit cold, but sort of "marbled" warm-cool and the saltiness was nice (and different from just pool swimming).

[Next: more pictures, more of everything!]