Opatija waterfront
A view of Rovinj
Rovinj harborWe woke up to sunshine and it stayed that way all day! Today was the day to explore Istria, a peninsula shaped like an inverted triangle in northwest Croatia. At the top it borders a strip of Slovenia, with Italy very close to the north. On the west is the Adriatic Sea, and on the east is the Kvarner Gulf. It’s very hilly, with seaside towns strung out along the coast wherever the hills slope down to allow, and hilltop towns in the interior, and it is Gorgeous with a capital G, everywhere. We could have spent a week here very easily.
We drove over a good bit of it, both coast and interior, spent a few hours in the fishing village cum tourist resort, Rovinj, on the Adriatic (we’re staying on the gulf) and if it weren’t for the signs having too many consonants I’d have sworn we were in Italy. The look and the feel of this part of Croatia are decidedly Italian, probably stemming from the fact that it was once a part of Italy. It’s very green and prosperous looking, with vineyards and tidy farms in the little valleys between the mountains. It has become a major center for truffles (in honor of that I had a mushroom and truffle sauce at dinner) and the cuisine generally has an Italian tilt.
This is very off-season. We think we may be almost the only guests in our hotel and we had the dining room entirely to ourselves at breakfast and dinner. The streets in the evening are fairly deserted. By day, there are the ubiquitous tour buses, but not too many. The town of Opatija, where we are staying reminds me of Monaco. The stately hotels are in the Viennese style but the vegetation is Mediterranean. This region was also once part of the Austro-Hungarian empire and was Eastern Europe’s answer to the French Riviera at the end of the 19th century.
Tomorrow we leave for Italy again so Charlie can begin his course on Monday. The logistics for this particular leg of the trip have changed multiple times, but the latest and I hope final plan is to be driven to Trieste (about 1 ¼ hours) where we’ll take the train straight to Venice. The foundry/studio/bed and breakfast is a short walk from the station. Of all the possible ways to make this trip, this is by far the most cost effective and entails the fewest transfers and schlepping.
P.S. The lobby TV had a broadcast that our ferry, the Marko Polo had run aground today. We thought it strange that they hadn’t even mentioned life rafts, much less had a drill, and wondered if the passengers had a clue what to do. If we had been scheduled for tonight instead of last Saturday, we probably would have missed Croatia!
Errata: I learned today that the Bora from the mountains to the ocean brings dry winds and good weather. The killer is the Jugo which brings the moist air from the Adriatic. That’s what we had all week -- except for Mostar, which is on the other side of the mountains.
Also, the yummy cheese and meat pastries in Bosnia are called burek and they’re considered “fast food.”
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