Rovinj, Croatia

Sunday afternoon...

I'm sitting on a rocky-pebbly shore in my swimsuit on Katarina Island, off of Rovinj ("rov-EEN-ye", but not all Croatians pronounce it the same way...), after my first swim in the Adriatic. I haven't checked email in many hours, I don't have a watch on, and I've had a cherry strudel for breakfast (thanks for the pastry fund, Aunt Jody and Uncle Tad!) and a pistachio ice cream cone for a late lunch while I waited for the 4:30 ferry for the island. I've been traveling for days like this, just mostly enjoying a nice dinner each evening. It's probably around 6 o'clock. I'm sharing this spot with six other people. When I asked a woman if there was a place to change, she laughed. "Nobody cares, you're not in America," she said. Lots of primary-age girls don't wear swim tops, and here and there is a woman sunning topless. (By the little river I swam in in Slovenia, a man changed from his speedo, just facing a tree.) Everything is so low-key. Even the broken glass on the beach--worn and smooth and dusty--is not a threat. The water is crystal clear.

(Katarina Island, as seen from the top of a precarious staircase, which will make an appearance later)

island companions

I'm loving Rovinj, and immediately decided to spend an extra day here after roaming the town last night. I'm staying in a sweet one-bedroom apartment about a 10-minute walk from the main area. Rovinj has a Venetian feel, buildings rising straight up from the narrow stone streets. Pasta, mussels, olive oil, good cheap wine. Lots of tourists, but mostly in a way that adds to the vibe. People in swimming suits, people riding bikes, people gazing at the sites, people walking with ice cream cones. And honestly, not to be undervalued, a city that thrives on tourism means it's no problem to walk up to an ice cream stand and speak English. (All the menus are in at least four languages.)

(My car, with my apartment in the background.)

Later... 

Now it's a dry white wine, caprese salad, cheese ravioli with truffles (and wow, we're talking the type of cheese ravioli worthy of truffles), sitting off the marina watching a setting sun, with kind and attentive waitstaff. (I wandered up on this restaurant, Bar Rio, but later discovered this was the number-one rated restaurant in Rovinj on Trip Advisor, which is quite a feat, but I'm not surprised.)

There is something so moving to me about a stranger reaching out his or her hand, literally, to help someone. I've had that happen at least three times today and watched it many more, as men helped passengers step off boats. (After my trip back from Katarina Island on the ferry, the man helping people off was delighting kids by lifting them high in the air and setting them down to get them off the boat. Without fail, they paused afterward and looked up at him with awe and delight. A man followed a string of kids, and he and the boat man joked, the boat man lifting the passenger, too, prompting laughter in adults and confusion in kids.) Earlier in the day, when I first began to work my way back down the many scary stairs of the Saint Euphemia Cathedral tower this afternoon, a man reached his hand up to help me down to his tiny platform. Holding hands is somewhat an intimate act, so different from shaking someone's hand. 

(scary stairs, looking back up--after the first flight or so many were only 4-5 inches deep, and they weren't very flat!)

Rovinj: dusty streets that indicate a coast, squawking seagulls, roads far too narrow for two cars to pass, but that doesn't stop them from being two-way streets (quite typical in the whole region). Just lots of yielding. Of course many of the stone roads between buildings rising straight up are narrow enough that in America we would only consider them sidewalks, but motorcycles, little cafe tables with people drinking coffee and wine, and shop stalls all manage to fit.

Later later...

My last afternoon in Rovinj was spent on the coast, at Punta Corrente, a large point at the end of town. I settled into a spot and bobbed up and down quite contentedly for a while--the temperature of the water could keep you there for hours, and by the looks of things, that's just what most people were doing. The winding shore was perfect--big blocks of rock, easy to climb around on and sun on, and with no sand the water was very clear--I could see the bottom well past where I couldn't touch anymore. What delighted me even more was that the vegetation was mostly pine trees, so if you weren't sunning on a block of rock, you were snoozing in the shade on a bed of pine needles. Of course plenty of topless bathers, and some nude. My eye very accidentally landed on a very tanned penis at one point. I'll just end there. 

(This first picture was my spot.)