Zadar-Sukosan-Sibenek (Croatia)
20 August - 27 August 2016
20 August - 27 August 2016
The Croatia that inhabits my mind
has no alignment with the stunning country that it actually is, or to be more
specific, how unbelievable the Croatian Adriatic is. There’s quite a complex
and crudely formulated kill machine in my head that for most of my life has cut
down in haste anything associated with the red & white chequers of Croatia.
Unfairly treated and harshly judged, for you, I’ve always admitted that. Never
did I have one good word to say about Croatia or its people, there’s history
and angst with me. Where this story takes a severe turn is however is where my
DNA joins the party.
70% that’s my ‘highly probable’ association to North-eastern Italy, Croatia & Bosnia.
That says enough, 70% with a focus on Northeast Italy, Croatia and Bosnia
This shows the main areas that contributed to the DNA mix
The yellow areas are coincide exactly with the areas we sailed in
This result of course is of no real
surprise to me, anecdotal evidence for most of my life has suggested (or should
I just call it evidence because it’s known), that I have strong ties to this
part of the world. My mother, aunt, uncle and grandmother are all from Split
(Croatia), the link therefore is not tenuous. And additionally, for all those
that cast aspersions on DNA tests and the integrity of those tests, well I
respond right back, how is it that the scientific evidence matches the
anecdotal evidence so thoroughly? I rest my case, go talk to somebody else
about your conspiracies and oddly constructed arguments.
Somewhere in Croatia - on the road to Zadar (Croatia)
I’ll not discuss my near hatred
of Croatia here but I will say that when Inga & I were seconded to join a
crew of Latvian yachting enthusiasts for a week of sailing in Croatia my
excitement levels never bubbled to anything more than lukewarm. My consideration and response was along the lines
of tolerance, it was going to be
something that I’d allow myself to tolerate.
I ask you now, join me in in transgressing through the art of seven
days of overt persuasion, Croatian style.
Onboarding in Zadar
Our rally point was the town of Zadar,
the oldest continuously inhabited Croatian city. In total we were a group of
eight, all vaguely known to one another in a Kevin Bacon few degrees of
separation kind of way. Our Captain, Valts Butans & his partner, Veronika
Butane, were known to us via a connections through Inga’s mother. When the call
went from them, through their own network that they were on the hunt for crew
members to join them for a week of sailing in Croatia, well we thought, why the hell not? Actually that was more
Inga, I was more, ‘freakin’ Croatia,
well, at least I’ll be able to swear at them in their own language’.
All other members of the crew
were known to Valts & Veronika, but not to us, so it was like blind-date
travelling – look out for the reality show coming to a late night time-slot near
you soon.
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast flyer
Day one of our program on How to live a life like a millionaire, for
all of 2 minutes, was a stunningly beautiful sail down ‘the channel’. Pulling out of Zadar we headed south under
sail, baked under some gorgeous sky, cutting across deep blue water and
skittling the channel with ease. I call it the channel as this part of the Adriatic is bounded by islands of Ugljan and Pasman on the leeward
side and the Croatian coastline on the windward. The sailing was calm,
peaceful, cathartic. How could you not enjoy
the sound of the boat cutting through the water, the sight of other sail boats
zig-zaging (tacking) down the coast and stretching out on deck, catching all
the rays of the day. It was the epitome of the leisure lifestyle and it was an
absolute joy. No hassles at all, only the coastal breeze hitting you in the
face and the blue sky above you, as blissful as it could be.
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Your reality check – don’t get
cocky
On our first night we made anchor
at a little bay around 6-8kms south of Biograd Na Moru, almost directly across the channel from the southern tip of
Pasman island. After a movie star type of day out on the water I think we were
all feeling a little too comfortable for our own good. Obviously we’d taken the
art of sailing for granted because that night Mother Nature came out with an
unequivocal statement that made us all take note of our environment and the
requirements of managing a boat under pressure.
From nowhere, or so it seemed, a
violent storm struck the coastline and we had positioned ourselves smack in the
middle of it. Even though we were in anchored in a relatively sheltered bay the
ferocity of the wind, and then the lightning and driving rain made it night of
madness. We’d been one of a few yachts that had sought to anchor in the bay but
with the advent of the storm we all found ourselves drifting into the path of
one another. There was potential for carnage. All the crew spent the night
trying to manoeuvre the yacht out of trouble and hoping to all hell that our
mast wasn’t the one to be struck by lightning as these ‘bombs’ were being
dropped all around us.
The whole night and morning was
spent flashing torches at other boats, yelling at other crews and generally
having a sense of hyper vigilance about all things. We only really got to
settle and feel comfortable about our situation at close to 5am but at that
time the lesson had been learned. On the water there’s no such thing as
comfort, you can rest on your laurels, you just need to be prepared. We later discovered, when we returned to Zadar, that the night caused significant damage
out on the water, ripping sails, running yachts aground and lightening striking
masts.
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Southern tip of Pasman island - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Southern tip of Pasman island - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera – ACI
Marina Zut – Sukosan
Drained from the prior night we
still for some reason attempted to cross
the channel with high wind gusts and
made our way to the southern tip of Pasman island. I wouldn’t say that it was
blowing a gale but the wind was certainly quite high and tacking across the
channel to the island, on reflection was either brave or foolhardy. Still, even
though Valts, I believe, was confident enough to take us across there were
times when I think the wind even caught him off guard and did see moments of
concern on his face.
After a couple of hours work we had
made our way across for the greater part and the wind had also thankfully died
down. We pulled into a bay at on the southern tip of the island, made anchor
and we all ‘dropped off the face of the
planet’ for a few hours. It was as close to a zombie boat as you could have
imagined.
Recharged and rejuvenated after a
few hours sleep, a relatively relaxing afternoon sail brought us to the outer
islands on the coastline and we docked at the tranquil & sedate Adriatic
Croatia International Club (ACI Marina
Piskera in the Kornati National Park) – it was about this time that I was
started ‘to figure out ’ the concept of what it was that people loved about
sailing. Because not only is it the act of being out on the water but also
there’s a sailing fraternity and camaraderie when you pulled into a marina that
was obvious. I liked that, it was kinda
cool. There were bottles of wine being opened, people chatting about their
experiences, general banter, it was the type of event that I’d never
experienced before.
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Piskera - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Zut - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
The following day we spent
sailing in the Kornati National Park.
Having made our way to the island of Zut we anchored for the afternoon
and explored a little before gliding effortlessly to the ACI Zut Marina where
we stayed overnight.
Our first real stop in ‘port’ or
a town outside of Zadar was in Sukosan. Having sailed from the island of Zut
and after navigating the small channel between the islands of Ugljan &
Pasman we spent the day under beautiful skies and were lucky enough to havbe immaculate sailing
weather once again. Our stop on shore at the end of a great day of sailing was
a pleasure, and to my surprise, a real treat in the sense that Sukosan was my
first contact with a Dalmatian town, (since
encountering Split as kid), and hey, surprises to all, I found it to be
quite the attractive spot. Whether it was my deliberate ignorance, or even my
blatant ignorance to all things Croatian, but here we were, on the Croatian
coast, in a very attractive town, and it didn’t suck. Not at all in fact. A
small, quaint and quite charming small town, it just had a nice calm, breezy
feel about it, the type that you generally associate with small coastal towns
(just not in Croatia, or so I thought), and I liked that. More surprising still
is that we went onto discover more of the Croatian coastal towns to be of the
same elk, which automatically put me in the position where I needed to re-evaluate
my whole Croatian proposition. Did I
really do them just a disservice in my mind.
Kornati National Park - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Zut - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
ACI Marina Zut - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Entrance to Sibenek - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Now, let me outline here THE ISSUE I’ve had with CROATIA for most
of my life, or more pointedly, the issue I’ve had with the dumb, half-witted,
overtly nationalistic nimrods that have infested parts of Australia with their
ludicrous patriotism and exported hatred. It’s their unsubstantiated hatred that
manifested itself into the dislike of me personally, like I was some beacon
that was built to absorb their stupidity. As a half Serbian- half Croatian I
went to a Catholic school whose Yugoslav occupiers came from the Croatian side
of the divide. Their stupidity and dislike of who I was came directly from the
fucked up outlook of their parents and hence, anything with a Serbian smell, no
matter in what form it was presented, was something to be derided. I spent
years negating their stupidity, taunts and dumb ass name calling. If not for
them then certainly I’d have a different feeling towards Croatia, maybe even at
some point I would have felt Croatian in part. Certainly my ancestry suggests
that I have a right to do so, but obviously I don’t, and in some ways that’s a
shame, but hey, at least I can learn to appreciate it for what it is rather
than disregard it out of hand.
Onto Sibenik
The entrance to Sibenek was a bit
of an unexpected highlight. There’s a long inlet before you get into the
harbour proper but residing at the entrance of the inlet is one of the best
preserved fortresses along the Croatian coastline.
St Nicholas fortress was built in
the 16th century and served as the first line of defence to protect
the port from Turkish attacks. This
place was built to look ‘serious’, as in a deterrent first and a real fort
second. These days it serves quite rightfully as an historical feature and
tourist attraction.
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Adriatic- Croatia
Cruising into the marina on placid
calm waters we docked and made plans to head off as a group to investigate the
Krka falls. A highly popular National Park in Croatia, the park affronts the
Krka River and there is a series of 7 waterfalls in total. In addition to the cascades is also the Krka Monastery,
built above what are known to be Roman catacombs.
All in all in was quite a relaxed
afternoon and kind of nice to get off the boat for a little while and do a bit
of exploring.
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
Krka National Park - Croatia
That evening we were all left to
our own devices so Inga and I went exploring the town itself. What we found was
a style of place that I really love. It was a stone labyrinth of steep
backstreets and alleys, odd twists and turns that could bring you to a new view
or totally different offering in a matter of a few short steps. A medieval
style town that is both mysterious and intriguing, it’s not hard to figure out
the appeal of Sibenek itself and why it acts as the perfect start point for
excursions out into the Adriatic and around the Kornati Islands.
Wondering around this town was an
absolute delight, and now, looking at the DNA chart supplied by Ancestry.com,
it appears that I may indeed have been both walking (and sailing) in the
footsteps of my ancestors. In fact, later that night, Inga and I were at a bar
in town putting back some cocktails (known as Zombies….they were good), and
there was a group of Croatians looking at me directly, commenting amongst
themselves. After listening in a little and making eye contact with them
occasionally I discovered that there conversation was about me and I looked ‘exactly’
like a friend of there’s, in fact the line was ‘On je isti, potpuno isti’, which translates as, ‘he’s the same, exactly the same’. Which now, knowing what I do,
probably isn’t a surprise at all considering ties that I may very well have in
this town.
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Sibenek - Croatia
Return to Zadar
Our final day was another lesson
in what the Croatian coastline can offer. A beautifully blue sky, deep blue
Adriatic waters, the sound of the sails fluttering in the wind and a cook below
deck (aka, yours truly) making his finest chilli con carne for the troops.
Sometimes you just have to give a little bit more of yourself.
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Zadar - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Zadar - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Zadar - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
Zadar - Adriatic Coast - Croatia
It was a great way to finish the
week, one which I’m sure we’ll leave long lasting impressions on us. Croatia
was unexpectedly fun, along with being beautiful and engaging. I wouldn’t have
admitted that at the start of the week, but certainly, I’m happy to admit it
now.
