Ground floor of Diocletian’s Palace
Welcome to Opatija - the view from our hotel roomThe Boras are the winds that come down the coastal mountains and blow like crazy. I don’t know if they cause the rain or merely make it impossible to walk in the rain, inverting or ripping umbrellas apart. Thought I’d take off like Mary Poppins for a while there. Charlie’s lovely new orange umbrella sustained some damage but is still functional.
Anyway, yesterday we had deliberately not gone into the indoor stuff when it was possible to do the outdoor walks with only light rain. So today when we had major storms, we went back to the Old Town and went into the “basement” which was really the ground floor substructure of Diocletian’s Palace. The halls and rooms basically follow the original upstairs layout, and it became a little easier to visualize what it looked like in its heyday.
Then upstairs to the Ethnographic Museum, which is new and cleverly built right around the ruins. It’s full of colorful and intricate handmade lace, costumes, jewelry, and furniture of the region. Unfortunately, while they’re beautifully displayed, they are not well marked (in any language) so it was difficult to know when or where they came from. Oh, well, interesting nonetheless.
After lunch we headed north for the Istrian Peninsula. Decided on the superhighway that we took into Split yesterday. Was it only yesterday? So much happens every day, I need this journal to keep track. Knew it would be faster and easier than the coastal road. (Think I-5 instead of Pacific Coast Highway.) So we were back on the mountain ridge, rain alternately pouring or just showering, but with extremely high winds and fog. I thought C. would be wiped out upon arrival in Opatija, but he thought it wasn’t so bad!
We checked into a hotel we’d booked this morning and walked a bit of our block. It was raining and windy. We picnicked in the room, having eaten two big meals today and not really feeling like braving the elements in search of dinner. Bottom line: You can’t beat Mother Nature. The plan is to drive around and stop in as many of the villages in this immediate area as we can tomorrow and leave for Venice on Sunday.
We’ve tried not to let the weather put a damper on our sightseeing, but of course it does limit us to a certain extent. The trip has been fascinating, though wet. Croatia is a beautiful country, with much more to see than we’ve been able to cover. I’d love to come back for a longer visit, but maybe early September or late May. We could still try to beat the summer heat and crowds, but get something closer to summer weather. And the ferries would be running to the islands!
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