Vis and Rovinj

On Friday we were in Vis, a small island about half-way up the Croatian coast. This island was turned into a military base after World War II, so that Yugoslavian President Tito could build and keep his navy. That put the island entirely off-limits except to people who were already living on it. There are only two main towns, Vis, with a population of about 1,500 and Komiza with around 900 inhabitants. Komiza actually dates back to Roman times like much of the rest of the Adriatic.

Vis is an island with a strong strategic position, so it has been fought over many times in its history, the most famous Battle of Vis taking place in the 1860s between France and Austria. Getting back to the Yugoslav period, the island became something of a fortress and a honeycomb of tunnels and caves for storing weapons and ammunition. It remained closed to the public until 1992, and since then it is growing the tourist trade. In fact, as we were here, they had already started filming 'Mamma Mia 2' in town nearby. We were actually sitting on Deck 5 watching them run multiple "takes" of a bride in a white dress running down the pier a little ways away from the ship!!

But, earlier in the day, we visited the island of Bisevo where the famous Blue Cave is located. The cave was discovered by an Austrian artist in the 1960s, and was most probably not made into the tourist attraction it is today until Vis was opened up in 1992. Grace and Monica both had some concerns about entering the cave as it looked like the opening was pretty small. And it turned out to be just that! Everybody had to duck to go inside, just to have to stay down while we backed out again to let another one of the tour boats out. We finally got in, and as the cave opened up everything turned blue! It was quite something. The water was crystal clear (no pun intended); the colour inside the cave is caused by light reflecting through the water from an opening to the outside that is about 4 metres long and a couple of metres down.

The itty-bitty entrance to the cave. Heads way down, everybody!

That's not a reflection, that's another
rock in the water

Grace, almost looking like she's enjoying
herself. Her claustrophobia is worse
than Monica's.

This is the underwater opening where the
light gets into the cave.

 We stopped by Komiza to take a look around after leaving the cave. It is still just a fishing town with a long history. There is a fishermens' museum in town that showcases the special boats they used a long time ago. The photo below is of two replicas, but the last original is on display. It was the first 'convertible' fishing boat. The sides were put up to sail in rough open seas without taking on any water, and then the panels could be removed to make it easier for fishing.

The replica fishing boats

The whole town is still centered on fishing

A scrawny little thing, but he insisted
on a chin rub!

The town's church on the hill. There is a big ceremony
once a year where a fishing boat is chosen to be carried
to the church and burned as an offering for good luck. Everybody
wants his boat to be the next one!

Back in Vis, watching the filming off the right
side of the island.

Monica was working on the blog while everybody
else watched.

Our last day was spent in Istria, the large peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Adriatic Sea.

We started out walking in old Rovinj, which is very much like Venice without the water. It did, however, during its 400 year history being a Venetian holding, once have a canal where the main street is now.

The old town 

Rovinj is also a big fishing town

It is easy to see the Venetian influence

One of the traditional fishermen cleaning his
lines in his old style boat. He speaks a
dialect between Italian and Croatian.

One of the many 'Lions of Venice' around the city to show
that it was a Venetian holding

A tiny courtyard. It would have belonged
to one family in Venetian times, but now
all the buildings are small apartments.

The local market. All the produce is grown locally on the
peninsula.

The 5 1/2 hour tour was one of the longest of the trip, doing our walk around then going by bus, for about an hour, as it turned out, to Motovun, yet another old town, but this one way up on a hill in the middle of nowhere! Or seemingly so...unless of course you are a truffle lover. By that we mean the tuber that grows sort of like a mushroom, NOT the chocolate kind! The forest around Motovun is one of the primary truffle-growing areas of Europe. Something like 80% of the world's fresh truffles are hunted in this area, using dogs instead of pigs. The trouble with pigs was that you couldn't train them to stop once they had found the truffles - they would always try to eat whatever they dug up! Dogs, on the other hand, are good at finding the truffles and then waiting for their preferred treats. The world's largest white truffle was found locally, a whopping 1.3 kilos! At current rates of about 800-900 Euros per kilogram, it was worth quite a bit. After having it recognized by Guiness as a world record holder, the man who found it invited his family and friends over and they had a truffle 'pig-out'!

Istria is also known for very good quality extra virgin olive oil. There is a rating of olive oils from all over Europe done every year, where the top 500 are identified and the list published. For the past 5 years, the Istrian producers have made the top 50 each year, so they boast that they are in the top 10% of all European extra virgin olive oils. Based on a tasting and this high praise, we brought a bottle home.

Vineyards on the way. Istria is known as the 'Tuscany
of Croatia' because the rolling hillsides are so similar
to Italy. 

Motovun from a distance. It is pretty far up on the hill. It wasn't
attacked much, probably because it would have been
way to much work to get there!

Looking over the valley from the town walls.

The restaurant where we had lunch.

Appetizer of local cured ham and truffle-laced cheese

Creamy polenta with shaved white truffle on top

The 'other' truffle - chocolate tart!

Our local pre-dinner performer for the Adriatic part of the cruise was a ladies' Klappa group who had driven 4 hours from Zagreb for our concert. Our hotel director, Johann, had been so impressed with them that he knew all of us would really appreciate their music. And we did, giving them a standing ovation at the end of their performance! They were so good that we are including a little video clip here in the blog. The group has been together for 30 years, although of course the members change, and has won the Croatian national Klappa singing contest 5 times! After the fifth win, they were politely asked not to enter again since no one even came close to their talent.

We had packed in the afternoon as we would be arriving in Venice the next morning, with a 6:30 pilot pickup. Since many of us had never entered Venice by water before, we wanted to be up fairly early for the sail-in. But there was still time for a few photos to remember the cruise by:

Bridge tour with captain Tonci from Dubrovnik. A real
personable master of the ship.

Sunset at Rovinj

Our new friends, Grace and John from Modesto, California

Ramon and Patricia from the Esprit's crew

Another great cruise with Crystal. The Esprit will be crossing to the Caribbean from the middle of October for about 3 weeks. Because of the ship's size and using the time to do some work onboard, there are no guests on board. The captain figures 8 days to cross the Mediterranean from Dubrovnik and another 8 to cross the Atlantic, if the weather stays good. They just don't know yet exactly where they are headed. Esprit will be a great little ship in the Caribbean. We hope to see her again sometime.

Up next - Venice!