Only four days ago Team Basil were in Serbia where we could count the total number of motorhomes we saw on the fingers of one hand. We are now on the Croatian coast and we’re drowning in motorhomes on a packed campsite containing more Brits than we have seen in our previous 10 weeks of touring.
Yesterday we had an uneventful drive of just over three hours through much more Balkan like mountain scenery to the coastal town of Trogir and Camping Rozac (43.505657, 16.257613 €18 on ACSI). We had clearly been lucky in the day we chose to explore Plitvice Lakes, because yesterday it rained heavily from setting off to our arrival at a finally sunny coastal campsite.
Camping Rozac is has a very lovely setting on its own small peninsular only one kilometre or so from the centre of Trogir. The whole area is a contrast to our previous stops on this trip, with the coastline being highly developed with mostly small, neat, blocks of flats and hotels on the waterfront and private houses further up the hillside. It all looks rather upmarket.
Today we walked into Trogir. We saw from Google maps that there appeared to be a shortcut over the hill opposite us into the town but the campsite staff assured us it was much easier to walk on the main road, which would not be at all busy. This proved to not be good advice as, especially with dogs, the mostly footpathless main road proved to be a rather unpleasantly crowded route.
Trogir itself is a beautiful little town on the UNESCO World Heritage list. The old town is set on a tiny island off the Dalmatian coast. It was originally a Greek and then Roman settlement of which nothing, as far as I know, is visible. From 1,000 AD it came under heavy influence from the Republic of Venice and from the early 15thcentury it was ruled directly by Venice for over 350 years. It is little wonder then that the old town looks like a very small version of Venice.
It is probably possible to walk round the circumference of the island in 20 minutes or less, although we took a good bit longer soaking up the relaxing coastal atmosphere. Wikipedia says that Trogir is “the best-preserved Romanesque Gothic complexinthe whole of Central Europe” and we wandered around the atmospheric streets and alleyways looking at the beautiful renaissance buildings. In particular the lace like pierced tower of the Cathedral dominates the whole town.
The entire old town is extremely picturesque although the attractive small central square adjacent to the Cathedral is somewhat spoilt by overly large sun umbrellas at the one restaurant with outside seating there.
We had lunch at a not too expensive, but rather good, Pizzeria, recommended in Lonely Planet, on the quayside adjacent to the old town.
On our return journey to the campsite we decided to eschew the main road and tried the Google maps shortcut, which although it involved a fairly steep climb, was lovely and quiet with pleasant views over Trogir and virtually no traffic to threaten our every step.
We’ve had a long chat with an English couple from Cornwall tonight, who have already spent a month or so in Croatia and they have given us some good ideas for places to see which we had not thought of.
The current idea is to visit Split tomorrow and then slowly make our way north up the Croatian coast. However, if the lack of spaces at Camping Rozac is replicated throughout Croatia we may have trouble in fulfilling this plan. We’re hoping this campsite’s popularity is due to its proximity to Trogir, but only time will tell.