The Adriatic Sea

April 20, 2013
Yesterday was a day at sea and with two lectures and the cocktails and Captain's dinner along with the 140ith birthday of Holland America Line. It turned out to be quite a busy day. The travel guide talks about our upcoming ports and where the ship will be docked and whether there will be a shuttle bus to take us to town and the layout of the area as well as the tours that HAL offers. The dinner was great and we sat with the doctor and his wife along with a retired teacher and a lovely lady whose native tongue was Spanish and knew little English. So upon returning to our already cramped cabin we find that HAL has given us a lovely almost 800 page book on the Mediterranean titled THE GREAT SEA which is in the ship`s library. Glancing through it the author traces the history from 22,000 BC right up to 2010. Great book even if it does weigh 5 pounds!
Today at 7AM we docked at the beautiful port of Dubrovnik, Croatia and we will leave at 4 AM tomorrow as we only need a few hours to reach Kotor, Montenegro. I toured north along the coast to the town of Ston which has the 2nd longest wall in the world after the Great Wall of China. The old town of Dubrovnik is circled by a wall which a number of passengers said they had walked on. The wall of Ston is over 6 kilometers and I did get some pictures of it. We continued on to two different family wineries one which does export to Canada and the US so I decided that I would purchase a bottle when I get home. The Adriatic Sea looked like a lake today, no waves, but the day was sunny. Dubrovnik is on the UNESCO world heritage list and since the 1990 war many buildings have been fixed or rebuilt. They have a new bridge over a channel built in about 2005 cutting 18 miles off a trip north as they used to have to travel to the end of the channel to get to the other side. During the war Serbian ships blocked the channel putting a seige on the city from October 1991 until the summer of 1992. The residents had no water, electricity and the roofs of houses were shelled for 24 hours straight. Food could not be shipped in and many people died of starvation. Croatia has 4.5 million people with about 15,000 living in Dubrovnik which is in the southern part of the country on the east side of the Adriatic Sea. The capital is Zagreb which is in the north. Croatia has 1000 islands which they manage. Dubrovnik existed as an independant city republic for 500 years with the Venetian empire on one side and the Ottoman Empire on the other. Napoleon conquered it during his reign. More history than I am able to relate. Lunch was at a family run winery. The family home was over 500 years old and the area we ate in had been the wine cellar until the new one was built. Back in Dubrovnik`s heyday during the 15th and 16th century it had the second largest merchant fleet after Venice. We also stopped at a small quiet fishing village that had been totally burned during the war with Serbia. At some point Serbian military was needed in Bosnia so they left and Dubrovnik started the clean up. Currently, the country is planning to join the EU in July and Slovania plans to join later. Croatia has a very winding coastline and there are plans to build a highway, but the route needs to go through about a 5 mile section of Bosnia. There are legal and political ramifications with the plans. Find a map and you will see that Bosnia almost comes right down to the Adriatic sea. International help came from many countries to rebuild and in 1998 the tourists started coming back. The Dalmation Coast was and now is a very beautiful area once again attracting people from northern Europe. Many big name hotels have been built and the rocky mountainsides are being terraced to grow grapes. Oyster and mussel farms and salt production are smaller exports than wine but the area is doing well with its tourism and shipping businesses.
Since Montenegro was only a 3 hour trip from Dubrovnik we left there at 4 AM and docked in Kotor about 8 AM. Montenegro means black mountain which is what the Venetian sailors saw as they approached the harbor. The mountains are still quite forrested making them look dark. Montenegro was part of Yugoslavia until May of 2006 when it voted to become a republic. As with all the Balkin countries history overlaps, boundaries change, wars and seiges occur so I will leave it to the reader to do research if interested. Venice did have control over Montenegro and it shows in their Venetian and Baroque architecture. Boka Kotorska is one of the most picturesque natural inlet on the Adriatic coast. The population of the country is 680,000 and Kotor has 40,000. The capital is Podgorica and has 220,000 people. As we travel throughout these long established regions many old walls are still standing which were used to protect the city from pirates, invaders, and conquerors. The old city walls are 3 miles long, 60 feet high and 45 feet thick. Montenegro's 53 mile Tara River Canyon is the world's second largest and deepest gap behind the Grand Canyon in the US. Our tour was a taste of Montenegro and took us high up into the mountains. We traveled a one lane road with switchbacks that had a few passengers wondering if they would make it back alive. I sat near a window and I knew there was only one duel tire on the road as the other was over the edge. The scenery was spectacular if you could get past the narrow winding road. There were 37 switchbacks and as we approached buses coming at us I wondered what their policy was . Who backed up? But we made it to a high valley for wine tasting and snacks. I bought a brandy that is used for medicinal purposes. It is made with white wine, a carob pod and a number of herbs. One puts everything in a glass jar and leaves it in the sun for 45 days then strain and bottle. Take one tablespoon in the morning. It goes down with a very warm almost hot feeling and is used by locals for almost every common ailment. After our snack we continued on again on the winding road with stops for photo opportunities along the way. It was an exciting day as we were all returned to the ship safely.
April 22 - We anchored in the bay off the coast of Korcula which is one of 1,000 islands of Croatia. The island of Korcula belongs to the Dalmatian archipelago. It is the 6th largest Adriatic island with an indented coast. It has two mountains: Klupca at 1,864 feet and Kom at 1,670 feet. The economy is tourism, grape vines, olives, fruit, fishing, and fish processing. It lies just off the mainland of the Dalmatian Coast and ferries operate to the mainland 18 times per day. Korcula has an school and students from the penninsula on the mainland get ferried across to school daily. We were told stories about life on the island. There is a hospital but it has no obstetrics department. There is one midwife but quite often babies are born in cars while trying to get to Dubrovnik for delivery. As the young people age they leave the island as the opportunities for work are greater in the larger cities. This quiet quaint island is concerned about its future. It has a history dating back to the Mesolithic and Neolithic eras. Korcula is also the name of the only town on the island as the rest are villages. Korcula island has about 17,000 people whereas the town has 3,600 people. Our guide said that the residents know one another and though there is a police department most problems occur with drunken visitors. Korcula island is 47 kilometers in length and 4 to 5 kilometers wide. The island has an average of 41 days of rain per year making great weather for grape growing. The island has many vineyards and there are places as we drive along that are brand new fields. With some questions we learned that no new vineries can be started once Croatia becomes part of the EU. Croatia has a 20% unemployment which is better than Greece's at 27%. Our tour took us to the far end of the island to Vela Luka where we enjoyed coffee or a walk along the seaside promanade. A cultural difference I noticed was that coffee is not taken out. People sit for hours and read the paper and chat with one another in sidewalk cafes. The cafes have no paper cups and you are served your drink at a table outside. No one is in a hurry to leave and no one walks off with their coffee cup. Coffee is a very social time. Vela Luka has more residents than Korcula town at 5,000 plus but is still a village. One interesting thing I learned was that a variety of grape ( I hope I spell this right ) known as Plavac Mau has similiar DNA to Zinfandel. Researchers are trying to decide which came first or whether they might be the same grape originally but because of soil , sun, water etc the DNA slowly changed. I have certainly taken the opportunity to do a lot of wine tasting. There is an island in the archipelago that is known for its stone which has been used torebuild many of the areas damaged historical buildings and also the stone was used in the building of the White House.
April 23- The mist or fog made the entrance to Venice less than desirable but has the bad weather became more sunny the view was delightful. Venice has piles of history and much of Venetian arts, culture and history affected many of the countries we have visited. I viewed building after building from the cabin window as we came up the Giudecca Canal. I hurried to the top deck to take some arrival pictures of the small canals as we passed. I saw the Renaissance and Byzantine styles of buildings.The center and the most famous part of the city is Piazza San Marco, known by North Americans as St. Mark's Square. St. Mark's Cathedral and the Doges Place are two of the most important and imposing structures in Venice. Both of them have been rebuilt due to fires over the centuries. Both of these buildings have histories back to the 800s. The Bridge of Sighs connects the prison to the palace and was the route that prisoners were taken to and from the judgement hall. There are 117 islands that make up the city of Venice. Lido is a long island that has been very important to Venice. It is known as an island that tempers the tides, but as global warming occurs engineers scramble to find a way to protect the 550 plus square kms of the lagoon that Venice sits in. Two well known islands are Murano and Burano. Venice is well-known for its glass "candies" which were traded in the time of Marco Polo. The glassworks were moved to Murano by a decree in the 13th century because of fire hazard. Burano is known for the fine lace work which is done with precision. The city is laced with 150 canals and more than 400 bridges linking them. Some islands are linked by ferries and there is only one road, 3 miles long, to the mainland. Venice began as a place of refuge for those fleeing the Barbarian invasions in the 5th century but today it is a vibrant, interesting city filled with nightlife, magic and mystery. Was Marco Polo born here? Some say yes but others say he was born on Korcula. What we do know is that he traveled the waters that are being traveled today. The ship is in port all day tomorrow so I hope to get out and ride the water buses tomorrow if time allows, but today I had a wonderful tour around Venice sightseeing. The boat I was on did not go down the Grand Canal, but I hope to find the closest Vaporetto station and take a ride tomorrow.