Makes a pleasant change from the police taking your car away!! © Ricky Yates
Only German fish sold here? © Ricky Yates
A family grave in Sali churchyard whose ancestors go back to 1580 © Ricky Yates
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Sali 'Beach' and sunbathing pier © Ricky Yates As elsewhere in Croatia, what is called ‘the beach’ on Dugi Otok isn’t what one normally would think of as a beach. There are no long stretches of sand gently sloping down into the sea. Instead, in each of the island’s coastal settlements, there are man-made places where it is possible to enter the sea and swim and sunbathe on the shore. Sali 'Beach' © Ricky Yates The two pictures on the left are of our nearest ‘beach’ in Sali, about ten minutes walk from the apartment. They illustrate what I mean by ‘the beach’ being man-made. The handrails do make entering the sea that bit easier and the sea itself was very pleasantly warm. However, there is no chance to gently wade in as the sea-bottom drops away quite steeply. This part of ‘the beach’ is quite . . . → Read More: ‘The Beach’ A 24 year old German!!! Officially, if you stay overnight somewhere in Croatia, your presence needs to be registered with the authorities. Therefore we had to give our passports to Darinka, the owner of the apartment, so she could take them back down to the Tourist Office and register the fact that we would be temporarily resident in her apartment for the next ten days. When our passports were returned, inside each of them was an official slip of paper. Both slips were entitled in ‘Crenglish’, (a language very similar to ‘Czenglish’), ‘Temporary of Permanent Residence’!! But apart from that, the one issued for Sybille was completely accurate. However, when we examined my ‘Temporary of Permanent Residence’, we descended into howls of laughter. Whilst they had got the day & month of my birth correct, they had put my year of birth down as 1985 thus making me . . . → Read More: The interesting effects of Croatian bureaucracy Jadrolinija Ferry for Dugi Otok arriving at Zadar © Ricky Yates Having arrived in Zadar on the afternoon of Tuesday 7th July, we decided that now was the time to head for an offshore island for the time of relaxation that we had promised ourselves. We found the booking office of Jadrolinija Ferries on the Zadar quayside and enquired about booking a ferry crossing for ourselves and the car for the following day to the island of Dugi Otok. There are more than a thousand islands along the Croatian coast of which more than one hundred are inhabited. Some are so close to the mainland that they are connected by a bridge, whilst others are so small and isolated you would have to take everything needed for your stay with you. We opted for the island of Dugi Otok because it fell into neither of these . . . → Read More: Dugi Otok St. Donat's Church, Zadar with Roman remains in front © Ricky Yates Zadar is the largest city on the north Dalmatian coast with a population of around 70,000. Its historic centre lies on a peninsular only 500m wide with a Roman street pattern containing marble paved traffic-free streets and a wealth of Roman remains and historic buildings. Chief amongst these is St. Donat’s Church, an amazing circular building which dates from the beginning of the ninth century. Although located in Western (Roman Catholic) Europe, the Church is of early Byzantine (Eastern Orthodox) style. What makes it even more fascinating is that it was built over part of the Roman forum that dates from the 1st century BC to the 3rd century AD. Therefore, incorporated into the Church are two complete Roman pillars, together with other stonework containing Latin inscriptions. It is possible to climb a stone . . . → Read More: Zadar |
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