Croatia 23-26 October 2021

Day three. Zadar.

We expected a rainy day but the forecast got it wrong.

We first had a dip in the sea. The beach is a narrow strip of pebbles. The strait separates us from the islands of the Zadar archipelago.


We headed along the sea towards Zadar. This is a well/fountain by the sea.	The seven-headed dragon with eagle's claws and bat wings is the coat of arms of the Venetian builder of the Zadar fortress. The Latin inscription "Ut cumque" is translated "at any cost".

Zadar was under the Venetian rule for a long time, so the city gates feature a winged lion, the symbol of St. Mark.

Just behind the city wall there is a small park named after Queen Helena. We found many unusual plants here, including this tree (Osage orange (Moraceae)) with unusual fruit called the "Adams apple". The bark produces a bright yellow pigment.

Five wells Square, under which there is a large tank with drinking water. This helped the city to survive Turkish sieges in the 16th century.

Two fishermen.


The centre of Zadar is very small, it did not take us long to explore it.	Another well with St. Mark's symbol.

The second gate of Zadar depict two fat angels and a winged lion. The city was badly damaged by bombs during World War Two.

The church of St. Krševan. This was a monastery church and male Benedictine monastery.


The wall of the same church with twisted columns. The streets of old Zadar are paved with stone, which is so polished that it always seems to be wet.	We came across this abandoned house yesterday evening. The garden is overgrown with vine. We managed to find it again today.

The church of St. Donat and the Roman Forum from the bell tower of the cathedral.

Old Zadar city.

The church of St. Donat was built using the stone from the ruins of the Roman Forum.

Monument to the Sun is a glass circle 22 m across with many solar panels which produce a light show in the dark. We visited it in the evening and came back again during day time. We even found all planets of the Solar system.

Sharon fruit in someone's garden.

Bougainvillea spectabilis.

We had lunch at an abandoned airfield. We drove into the forest, left the car and walked towards the sea. This is an interesting place marred by the incredible amount of dumped rubbish.

The blue line shows our track. Shift-click on the track link will open it in nakarte.me.

Arbutus. We saw many of these fruit trees in Parc del Garraf in Spain.

The seaside here resembles Finland bay: low pine trees and cloudy weather.

Local fossils.

The mountain range which we visited yesterday.

The runway.

This airfield was built during the Cold War by the Yugoslav army, and then abandoned.

As the Nin salt museum was closed, we visited the famous Nin beaches.

Mountains on the other side of the strait.

Nin was as deserted today as it was yesterday.

The church of St. Nicholas built on a mound a couple of kilometres from Nin. The church looks like an upside down crown. It was built at the end of 11 century. Seven Croatian kings were crowned in Nin, and each one visited this church after the coronation ceremony.

We only spent three days in Croatia but it was a busy trip: we explored the mountain gorges, went swimming in the sea, visited old Zadar and Nin and even managed to explore an abandoned airfield.

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