Week 17

when

27.01.2020 - 01.02.2020

where

Vrsar, Istria, Croatia

Motovun,Istria, Croatia

Porec, Istria, Croatia

Limski Fjord, Istria, Croatia

Rovinj, Istria, Croatia

Dekani, Istra Solvenia

what

After months of delightful sunshine we finally got some crazy rain, our first really since Scotland nearly 4 months ago! We started our week by fitting new tires to Ziggy the van in Zadar before hitting the road for a very long drive straight up to Istria in the far North Western corner of Croatia and our last stop before heading to Slovenia. Just as we left Zadar the absolutely torrential rain beat down on us and only worsened as drove north. 4 hours later and extremely pleased with our decision to get new all-season tires to replace our bald ones we approached Vrsar, our base for adventure for the rest of the week in Istria.

As if some unseen hand wiped the sky clear for us just as we parked, the sun came out again and thankfully stayed out for the rest of the week. Our luck continues.

This week really felt like a holiday, partly because we had a home base from which to explore and partly because to the slow and relaxed pace we took for the week. Each day we would go for a little excursion; the hilltop village of Movotun, the beautiful seaside towns of Porec, Rovinj and Vrsar and eating ourselves silly with huge oysters pulled straight from the water in Lim Fjord.

I can only really summarise Croatian Istria with the feeling that we had when there, as opposed to every little thing we did, saw and ate. This little piece of land has been under various rulers over the years including Illyrian, Celts, Roman, Venetian and Austro-Hungarian. Their influence can all be felt in the unique architecture and traditions and even the language used from village to village. Each place we went or thing we observed was like a collage of all the best places we have been in Europe. So everywhere felt familiar and comfortable while also being new and exciting and weird. But all of it certainly beautiful.

On our last day as we packed up the van to head North, we were really sad to be leaving Croatia. I don’t know what I expected before coming here but even in the dead of winter, Croatia has honestly blown us away. The people are warm, welcoming and courteous: to foreigners and to each other. Croatians are extremely proud of their country and it shows in how incredibly clean it is everywhere, the streets, parks, highways, everywhere. It was a big change from southern Italy in which we were hard pressed to find a place, no matter how secluded, that wasn’t covered in trash. In addition to its people and cleanliness, the food, wine and history can stand up to anything we have seen in Italy, Spain or Portugal. Pat and I have both been to Europe before and can not believe we have never been to Croatia.

So into Slovenia we went and, in what will be a shock to our friends and family, headed straight to a winery to do a tasting and park up for the night. Arriving in some pretty heavy mist to Bordon wines, just north of the border from Croatia, we pulled up onto their stunning and verdant estate to their beautifully restored original farm houses. Eva, the matriarch of the Estate, met us and what ensued can only be described as a glorious afternoon. We wanted to do a tasting at a winery that had some history, was a little more off the beaten track (for foreign tourists anyway) and a little more authentic and intimate than doing one of the easily accessible wine tours. I mean these guys don’t even have a presence on any English review site we could find. So our hour tasting became almost 3 and a half hours of drinking excellent quality, organic wines from a fully family run producer who do everything from vine to bottle. We hung on every word Eva spoke, played with the family dog Jimmy and enjoyed endless stories about the family and estate and asked (probably) too many questions.

We loved it so much that we wrote a really detailed article about it here.

After saying goodnight to Eva and heading back to the van for bed we couldn’t help but feel that this was quite a high bar now set for Slovenia. Lets see what the next two weeks brings!