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Published: July 15th 2013
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Zagreb capital of Croatia 11 and 12 July 2013
Feeling elated after our wonderful walk along the Plitvicka Lakes and after a lovely shower (even though it is a little cooler up in the mountains (28 degrees), it was still hot walking and climbing), we did the leisurely drive to Zagreb. Even though the E71 was a second level road, it was an excellent road.
We drove through Karlovac which had an Old Town. After that, we joined the A2 motorway. The toll was 33 kuna ($6 AUD). We set our GPS to the only camp site near Zagreb, first by its coordinates. It took us to a site which was an empty paddock, and later we found it was about 500m from the camp. We then reset it to the name of the camp site. The problem was (other than the coordinates being incorrect) we were on the opposite side of the motorway and there was no exit/entry point close to the camp site. We had to go 11 km to get to the right side of the motorway.
Camp Plitvice which is next to Hotel Plitvice was a large, tree covered area. We went into the
Hotel to use their WiFi. We had to walk for about 15 minutes to the bus station the next morning to go into Zagreb. We rode on the bus for ½ hour and then caught a tram right into the middle of the city.
Zagreb was distinctively cooler than coastal Croatia. We even took light jumpers with us for the day but did not end up using them. After getting off the tram at Trg bana Jelecica (“Governor Jelacic Square”), we walked up some steps and through the outdoor fruit and vegetable markets which is particularly busy on Fridays. We also visited the indoors fish markets.
Zegreb is divided into upper and lower towns, with skylight dominated by the neo-Gothic Cathedral and alongside it, the Archbishop’s Palace. It was badly damaged by an earthquake in 1880. More recently, the stonework has been disintegrating so at the moment one of the 2 spirals is being restored (re-pointed). There is a large clock that is on one of the walls surrounding the Archbishop’s Palace and it remains on the exact time that the earthquake struck. Apparently all the clocks in the town stopped.
We walked on and off between
coffee and lunch stops and saw all the sights of the town. We also saw the remaining Old Gate of the city and several of the other churches.
One thing that struck us was the massive number of roadside and laneway café-bars and restaurants. Apparently they are absolutely packed on Saturdays and Sundays. There are several streets that are particularly popular, but one in particular, Tkalciceva, where the one- and two-story 19
th century houses that have largely disappeared elsewhere, is ‘where you must be seen’!!!.
We saw the Croatian Parliament House and many beautifully designed parks.
There were a few cobbled stoned streets but not as many as I had expected. This city has over 1 million people so it’s a big city for Croatia.
We soaked up the atmosphere of the inner city and enjoyed the experience.
We bought some produce from the markets before catching the tram and bus back to our camper. We decided to have a relaxing rest of the afternoon back at camp, meeting some of the people in neighbouring campers – several English people and a German couple driving a Netherlands car.
The evening was cool and very
pleasant.
The next day we were off to Rejeka and Opatija.
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