Snapshot from Croatia: Sibenik and Krka National Park

"Two of the greatest gifts we can give our children are roots and wings." -- Hodding Carter

We woke to a chilly sunny October morning at the home of one of our favourite people, Teta Mila, who lives in Unesic not far from Sibenik. At breakfast we were visited by sweet little birds we had not seen before, with little yellow waistcoats which I believe are called Great Tits.  We also had a beautiful view over neighbouring farm land.

We were on the road again, this time to deliver Nada back to Zagreb for her flight back to Australia but we added this stop to see Mila again and to visit Sibenik and Krka National Park.

We had arrived the afternoon before and had spent the afternoon in Sibernik, another perfect medieval Croatia seaside town.

We particularly enjoyed visiting the Cathedral of St James, which was breathtakingly beautiful. I often ask Emma when we enter a church what style of architecture it is but it seemed in Sibenik a little bit of all styles had been adopted resulting in chin dropping beauty.

My eye was immediately drawn to the roof, an incredible barrel vault supported by iron ties and I immediately was throw centuries off believing this to be a much older church. I enjoyed learning more about its history later. The church is actually from the renaissance when architects drew on the beauty of styles from earlier periods, particularly ancient times. It was interesting to read that this church is the only structure in Europe made entirely of stone, though when Unesco made this statement we assumed they were ignoring the iron banding supporting the amazing stone plates for the vault.

We would have enjoyed spending more time in the beautiful baptistery with its impressive cherubs and angels but we were interrupted by a tour bus full of people, who magically disappeared later and left us to wander Sibenik virtually alone. Outside we found Adam and Eve looking exactly as we had seen them on the portal at Trogir.

Mila and Nada head off home to chat and prepare us a delicious dinner whilst we decided to visit the fortress at the top of the town. Just when I thought the kids had seen enough castles to last a life time they were enthusiastic to see yet another.

We were glad we did as watching the sun set from the ramparts of the castle was stunning. There are many islands off the coast here and they perfectly completed the picture.

The castle itself was something of a disappointment to the kids as it has been converted into an amphitheatre for concerts and performances. It made for a quick visit which was lucky as it was getting late, the sun is setting much earlier now and we had a our visit to Krka planned for the morning.

 We had long been looking forward to a visit to Krka National Park, as we had read many reviews which  say that its waterfalls rival Plitvice, which has been one of our favourite destinations. And so we set out to decide for ourselves.

The weather could not have been more perfect, and travelling with a local meant that we were given special treatment. Rather than catching the bus from the car park at Lozovac we were able to drive ourselves down to the jetty for the boats, where we parked with all the other cars with a Sibenik number plate.

After a short walk reminiscent of Plitvice, we found ourselves on boardwalks over fast flowing white water. It was a awesome walk through trees that are just coming to realise that it's autumn, though the weather for the past few weeks has been warm and sunny. We hopped off the boardwalk to investigate holes in the trees close to the water and imagine who might be living there. 

The trees sent twisting roots down into the clay soil and we enjoyed investigating their beautiful twisting and turning paths. 

We could have spent half our day doing this but we had booked on a boat trip that started in half an hours time and so we climbed back onto the boardwalk, which was very crowded given we are now outside of the season, and we walked faster than we would have done if we had all the time in the world.

We were attempting to reach the Krka's famous waterfall, "Skradinski buk", but time was our enemy and Teta Mila advised us to again abandon the boardwalk and we ventured off to find a vantage point to see the beautiful falls. It was mot the best viewpoint but is was certainly an impressive view. 

 Of course we planned to return after our boat trip but by the end of the day this plan went by the wayside as it is quite a walk and the kids were keen to head home for a late lunch.

At the jetty we farewelled Rob's mum and her cousin, who were looking forward to an afternoon of catching up over old photo albums, and we boarded our boat.

We were lucky to find outside seats which would have had lovely views, if other people had not come and stood themselves in front of us, much to the frustration of a number of the passengers.

And so we would take a brief peek around them every now and then ended up settling in for a good conversation with a lovely couple from Germany and their well travelled Schnauzer . We were given some very good advice for our Christmas trip to Austria, which reminds me that I really better get on and make some plans. After cruising for about an hour we reached an island in the middle of the river where we stopped to visit the Franciscan monastery.

We followed a tour guide around the island but once we entered the museum we realised we were better off on our own rather than listening to the guide give his interpretations of the religious artwork while crammed in with the other visitors. And so we moved on to the second room and looked at thousands of years of interesting historic artefacts including a copy of the smallest book ever made, returning to the first room when the group moved on.

The chapel was itself left us fairly unmoved, unlike the beautiful simplicity of the Franciscan churches we had visited.  The highlight of the visit was the lovely views from the island. We almost missed the boat, stepping on just as it was preparing to depart.

Our next stop was at Roški Slap after journeying past a beautiful waterfall which sprayed us with a refreshing mist of water. We had a hour in which to explore the area and we were keen to enjoy a walk in the forest. We made our way to the information building to get directions. The very helpful lady told us that visiting on the boat left no time for anything other than a coffee or a visit to the museums. 

She advised us to come back by car and walk up to a mountain top lookout and catch a boat through the next section of the lakes. Like Plitvice it is a place that needs quite some time to really explore and I hope we find time to come back again.

With hindsight with only a half a day I would have preferred to really explore at Skradinski buk, taking our time rather than taking the boat trip, but it gives us an excuse to return.

And so we enjoyed a very energetic game of Pooh Sticks and explored along the waters edge until it was time to go home on the boat again.

And so now I suppose I must give my verdict of Krka versus Plitvice. Many people enjoy Krka because generally you can swim there, but with the amount of rain this summer swimming has been banned, otherwise the swimmer might find themselves very quickly in Sibenik.

I finding it terribly difficult making a comparison, both were moving and spectacular. But if pressed I would say that I prefer Plitvice and it is worth the trip if you have the time. But Krka is wonderful and if staying only in Dalmatia it is a must see destination.