We've been in Croatia for about a week now, and have been taking it relatively easy compared to some of the places we've visited. In both Zagreb and Split, though they are the two biggest cities in Croatia, the main sights are all right next to each other in the center of town then they sprawl out into residential areas. We wandered both cities a bit during the day and then would relax back at our apartment at night. It's been nice to not be running around like crazy people, but also there hasn't been as much here that has peaked our interest as other places. It seems like just about everyone in Croatia has an apartment to rent to you and they are always a better value than other types of accommodation (especially in low season). So we've stayed in some nice places and Croatia shows a lot of TV in English with Croatian subtitles which is a nice way to relax when you haven't watched much over the last couple months.
But here's some of what we actually did. Above is St. Mark's Church in the old section of Zagreb. Just down the street is the Museum of Naive Art where Croatian peasants paintings (mostly on glass because it was what was cheap and available) are displayed. Ivan Generalic brought some of his paintings to a show in France and had success and is credited with founding the movement. It's different from the classical stuff and pretty refreshing to see. Since they were mostly farmers there are lots of paintings of fields and more than one painting of cooking a pig.
There is also a museum of broken relationships here where people send a memento along with a description of why the relationship failed. Most are heartfelt, some pretty disturbing, but the best were the few funny ones like the guy who was annoyed that he still had a bag of fancy popcorn from his ex-girlfriend who was a buyer for gourmet grocery stores.
And though you might not think of Zagreb as a great place for food, we actually had one of our best meals so far here at a place called Mundoaka.
Part of the center of Split is called Diocletian's Palace because the old Roman Emperor had a palace built there. It was eventually abandoned and refugees and others built houses and have lived there throughout the years. This means that you have tiny streets and alleyways with houses and shops and restaurants all within walled old Roman ruins. Here's a view from the top of the bell tower in the photo above for a better view of part of it:
It's hard to describe just how narrow and winding some of the streets here are even outside the palace. When I successfully navigated myself back to the apartment I felt a great sense of accomplishment.
Split is on the coast so there is a promenade along the waterfront where we played one of our more epic games of cribbage with a great view.
More to come from Dubrovnik (AKA King's Landing) soon.
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