The Adriatic Highway

Waving goodbye to the friendly home comforts and animals of Camping Dvor, we left Istria and headed south on the Adriatic Highway for a taste of classic coastal Croatia.

The route officially begins at Rijeka, where we got off to a poor start by struggling to find anywhere to park, finally making our way down to a narrow and not particularly nice piece of shoreline which was full of people sunbathing, and having lunch on some concrete steps in the only available patch of shade. A further couple of hours’ drive brought us to a quite amazing campsite sandwiched on steep ground between the road and the sea. The tiny gravel pitches, hottest afternoon yet and exotic insects were made up for by a swim in a sheltered cove with the evening sun lighting up limestone islands across a shimmering sea.

In the morning we were back on the road early, but soon detoured off to walk over some scree to Zavratnica Cove, which was well worth it and relatively deserted. We then took a car ferry to the semi-island of Pag, stopped to buy some famous cheese, had lunch next to a salt flat and continued on to Bibinje, just south of the city of Zadar. Here there was a bewildering array of tiny campsites essentially in people’s gardens, backing onto the sea. Picking one at random, we ended up in an olive grove, which was lovely initially but less appreciated during the evening’s spectacular thunderstorm with olive branches battering on the roof.

The next day we cycled into Zadar along a highly varied route: beachfront Bibinje, an oil storage plant/industrial estate, and Zadar suburbs. We explored the old town by bike and on foot, including an ice cream parlour, climbing up the bell tower of the Cathedral of St Anastasia, and Dave got really excited by the sea organ (Jo thought it was pretty cool too). We liked Zadar.

Zadar marks the southernmost point of our trip. Although Dubrovnik was very tempting, we’ve decided it’s too far, too hot and too busy – and we’ll perhaps come back later on an Easter sailing trip instead. And so we’re now heading north again and on our (very slow) way home…