No Stress on Cres

 Cres Island, Croatia * otok Cres,  Hrvatska

Cres is the biggest Croatian island, situated at the northern tip of Kvarner gulf. It is a long, narrow, mountainous island stretching 66 kilometers(41 miles)long and only from 2-12 km (1-7.5 m) wide. 
The coast (total length 248km/154m)is indented with plenty of coves, bays and fine beaches to explore on its western and southern side, while northern and eastern shore is rather steep and rocky - 

All with some spectacular scenery.

To celebrate our anniversary, 
this year we spent a few fine days on Cres Island. 

Driving from Zagreb to Krk, then boarding the Valbiska to Merag ferry, 
we were on Island well before noon. 
We rented a studio apartment in the 'old town' of Cres 
(on the west coast, the ferry docks on the east.) 
The old town is mostly an auto free zone, so we parked our car in a lot right outside the town gate.

 Each morning we walked down to the docks, 

which is the main square, to relax over a cup of coffee. 

Then we packed lunch and taking our bikes we spent a few hours riding, 

swimming and enjoying the spectacular coast.

Cres has a path that winds around the cove,  

I couldn't find much info on it, but the U shaped path seems to run about 10 miles from point to point. Besides the cove, marine and many beaches, the path runs alone marsh land, pine forest and an olive grove. On the side farthest from Cres docks, the last couple of miles are newly paved and I spied 2016 written in the cement. At the end, marked by a small green lighthouse, we carried our bikes further around the point, finding a great place to snorkel and eat lunch. 

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In the late afternoons we hopped in the car to explore.

Did I mention the Island has only one main road that run down the middle.

So to get to the several villages, some at the bottom of the mountain, some high on a cliff, you need to travel on small narrow, sometimes unpaved, roads. Most being the only road in and back out... at times someone has to back up or pull over into very tight (scary;) places!

Noted: a few new guardrails and a couple paved spots to pull into!

Heading South...

Lubenice - 4000 yr old tiny village, high cliff 378 meters above the sea
 - stunning beach below- park and walk.

If you keep heading south, you come to the Island Of Lošinj.
 Long ago Cres and Lošinj were the same island, 
but are now connected via a bridge. (over the Osor channel)

We stopped for dinner and a stroll in Mali Lošinj. 

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Heading North...

Porozina - great hike, weeds as tall as us, amazing views and 15th century ruins of an Franciscan monastery and an old Gothic church.. 

Beli - along the way we saw the famed griffon vultures circling the skies!

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If you ever get out this way, you will not be disappointed! 
So much beauty and of course amazing history. 
And for us, close enough to Zagreb, we hope to go again!

 On foot, or bike, touring the narrow streets and alleys of old city Cres. 

Okay, I'll stop with the pictures...

(Happy 31st Anniversary to us:)

For those of you that want more history: Cres and Lošinj were the same island, but are now connected via a bridge in Osor. 

FYI: The Cres-Lošinj was once called Apsyrtides during the roman times, the name is linked to the mystical hero Apsyrtu.

   It is recorded that the first known residents of the islands were the Illyrians who inhabited the area since the 7th century B.C.. As skillful seafarers,  they established their first settlements at Apsoros (Osor) and Crepsa (Cres). It is still believed today that the Illyrians dug the artificial channel separating the islands of Cres and Lošinj to provide faster maritime transport in North Adriatic. 

   Once part of the Venetian Republic, in 1797 the ile passed under Austrian-Hungarian rule. After World War I, it was given to the Kingdom of Italy. In 1947, it was incorporated into Yugoslavia. In 1991, it became part of present-day Croatia.

   Today Mali Lošinj is the largest town on the islands  (20011 cenus - 8,116 inhabitants) It is situated right at the bottom of the bay. By 1868, there were as many as eleven shipyards, and it became the place with the largest and most developed merchant marine in the Adriatic Sea.

  Today the town of Cres has a population of about 2500. It is a typical small Mediterranean town with plenty of narrow and high small houses attached to each other and little street and alleys winding in a maze, seeming to always come back to the center and all with many characteristic remains of the Venetian influence … 

Love it's motto - "There is no stress on Cres”

Lubenice - This ancient mountain village has an amazing view of the sea and neighboring islands. You park in the lot and walk around. Today there are just 40 Buildings and 7 permanent inhabitants. The buildings are mainly constructed out of the same material as the surrounding cliffs, and parts date back to a former settlement of ancient Romans. If you have enough water, you can hike down to the beach below, it is said it can be done in 45 minutes, but it looks long and hot and getting back up would definitely take twice as long!

Beli - 2000 year old village, on the northern part of the Island at the end of a long and very narrow road, is home to the endangered Griffon vulture.

Porozina - Is the other ferry terminal to Brestova on the Istria mainland. Besides the port, the old town is situated upon a hillock above the port, and is worth a look around on foot. On this site today sits the ruins of an old Franciscan monastery of Saint Nicholas and an old Gothic church, dating to the 15th century.

Besides these, the island includes the following villages, some of them only accessible by dirt road and with only a few locals remaining or even uninhabited: Dragozetići, Filozići, Grmov, Ivanje, Loznati, Mali Podol, Martinšćica, Merag, Miholašćica, Orlec, Pernat, Predošćica, Stanić, Stivan, Sveti Petar, Valun, Važminež, Vidovići, Vodice, Vrana, Zbičina i Zbišina… With a few more on Lošinj.

for more info I have linked a the sites I used below…

gleaned from: tzg-cres.hr/en/, .island-cres.com/Island-Cres, camps-cres-losinj.com/, 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki,  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History,  jadrolinija.hr/en/ferry-croatia

CELEBRATE Thanksgiving 2014 post and record of

Well on Thanksgiving, I was able to say hi and see some of you at Poli's house, (thanks to FaceTime). So I thought you all might like to see my first attempt at preparing a traditional New England Thanksgiving meal, here in Croatia.
The official American holiday falls on the fourth Thursday in November. It is not a holiday here.

 When I think of a typical Thanksgiving meal, I think of turkey with stuffing and gravy, fall vegetables, mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce. Tom thoughts are of Pumpkin pie with whip cream. 

Last year we had only been here a month and, with the exception of potatoes, I really could not find anything familiar nor similar to even attempt cooking. 

Thanksgiving 2013 - Our first holiday in Zagreb. Having met this family only the Sunday before Thanksgiving, they were gracious to invite us to spend the day with them! Enjoyed good food and company. Not many Americans here, but we meet two, just five days before Thanksgiving!
God is good:-)

Now in 2014, having been here just over a year, I have a better idea of where and what I can buy. I have established a food shopping routine, have a supply of spices, and have figure out how to adjust my oven temperature. 
Plus family has sent a few items from home.

A few things I have learned 

• When you do see, buy - it may not be restocked, and some items are only available in season or have a limited supply.
• Cooking from scratch is the norm - not much prepared foods...you can not buy canned gravy or boxed stuffing, no jello, corn bread mix nor do they sell pumpkin in a can.  It really does take more time and you do need to remember to plan ahead. {I frequently make and freeze chicken broth and use up our old bread to make bread crumbs and stuffing} I am thankful my mom cooked from scratch and I did learn from her (just a few things:) The bonus to all this is you really can’t beat the taste and it is healthier!
• Getting a turkey - well not the norm here, plus my oven is too small to fit one. So after looking over my options, I bought a boneless, skinless turkey breast in one store and a turkey wing in another.

The Menu:

Roast Turkey wrapped in bacon stripes with sage butter and (my frozen chix) broth, over stuffing, mashed potatoes, mashed butternut squash, carrots, and gravy. 

The early morning prep work, (and the prep worker:)

The results!

Bonus: The opening of the long awaited, first IKEA store in Zagreb - they sell really good jarred cranberry sauce. {Yes I have been there more than a few times}

dobar tek

Desert menu:

Pumpkin Pie, Apple Pie, Banana Cake Bread, & M&M oatmeal raisin cookies.

Lazy man apple pie

Pumpkin Pie! I had to make two, one to pay the prep man and one to share.

Oh the smell in the air...fall spices are the best!

For future reference and my disclaimers:

• I have not made pie crust from scratch in years! There is no "crisco" here, so it is a butter recipe, and I used the tried and true method of 2 knives to cut in with. Taste great, but a little tough. I need more practice, work on a lighter touch, (always was my problem).
• Butternut and acorn squash are the only ones i recognize. Orange pumpkins are green and I have yet to see turnip... but zucchini is abundant here, just like home!
• I won’t  ever make pumpkin from scratch. The canned pumpkin is from America, thx Poli! the canned milk I got the last time we were in the Netherlands. 
• Pureća translates turkey and prsa is breast, so although the turkey package translates "class A turkey breast" ... possibly pressed ... krila is wing, it was a wing.
• I made the bread for the stuffing the day before, left in cast iron pan. Adding everything in am. Also left chicken broth frozen so it would melt off top slowly.

We love Thanksgiving - it is a great holiday to relax, eat great food and thank our God for all our blessings and all he is doing. We fixed and ate a great dinner and then had a few people over for dessert and coffee. It was fun to introduce "american" desserts to our neighbors and one family brought over traditional Croatia strudel...still hot from the oven! Yes I did eat to much, fat and happy in Croatia...   

Some Thanksgiving facts:

*The first American Thanksgiving was celebrated in 1621, to commemorate the harvest reaped by the Plymouth Colony after a harsh winter. In that year Governor William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving, a feast of gratitude for God’s blessings. The colonists celebrated it as a traditional English harvest feast, to which they invited the local Wampanoag Indians. 

Days of thanksgiving were celebrated throughout the colonies after fall harvests. All thirteen colonies did not, however, celebrate Thanksgiving at the same time. *Wikipedia

**New Englanders remembered the Pilgrims’ effort for many years through regional celebrations of Thanksgiving. Sometimes American Presidents would set aside a day for the nation to be thankful. In 1789, for example, President George Washington proclaimed November 26th as a national day of thanksgiving. Here’s the core of his presidential proclamation: “Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor–and Whereas both Houses of Congress have by their Joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

…The national controversy over the day of the holiday continued, until Congress passed a law on December 26, 1941, making the fourth Thursday of November the one, official, national day….**Copyright © 2011 by Mark D. Roberts 

All cleaned up!

A trip to the Zagreb Zoo

So for our anniversary we decided to check out the zoo.

Zoo selfies with Bison, Lioness (asleep behind the log), and camels

I think he smelt us or maybe the zebras?

Up close - You can see the lions, and they can see you! In their cave through glass,
observing them from outside, you can look down on or across the water, at eye level - kinda close!
New housing for African lions - Lion's rock Kidepo,
 Lionesses Ayana and Nyota and Leo the Lion
the one sleeping behind the log, woke up and she was fantastic to watch.

Things behind glass: reptiles, amphibians, fish and invertebrates.
Some were very strange. The 1st turtle is motionless, just waiting for something to swim into it's mouth, I thought he was fake or dead, but his "tongue" moves. The 2nd one is a soft shelled turtle, and the 3rd is some kind of strange croc! Lots of neat frogs, took me a while to find the one center-right...I took a lot of pictures, but most look better in person.

The landscape was fantastic! 

One thing that would really help, a brochure in English with a map! Now that would be very beneficial! (but no one asked me my opinion and there is no comment box:-) 

After spending a few hours in the zoo, we walked a couple of the paths in the park.  We had been to the park before, but from a totally different neighborhood, and at the time had no idea there was zoo or that is is so big! It is quite a beautiful area and trees make it seem a lot cooler on a hot summer day! We got hungry, so took the tram back to the center for dinner. A very nice *celebration*.

Interesting facts:

In Croatian: Zološki vrt grada Zagreba; located within Maksimir Park in Zagreb, accesable via trams and is literally across the street from Zagreb's Stadion Maksimir, home of Dinamo Zagreb, (where major football matches are played and rock concerts take place).

• Zagreb Zoo is the oldest zoo in southeastern Europe, was founded by Mijo pl. Filipovic and opened on 27th June 1925. 
• On the opening day there were only three foxes and two owls.
• At that time, the park (Maksimir), was located on the outskirts of the city, now it is surrounded by many of the city's neighborhoods.
• Today the zoo covers approx.7 hectares (17-acre), and are 275 species of animals {2,225 individuals}, from almost all continents. Represented are mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish and invertebrates. 
• Reconstruction of the old zoo began in 1990. The new Lion area was just finished and opened June 2014. (Leo is new too!)
• Maksimir Park, was founded in 1787, is approx. 316 hectares, (1,005 acres), was the first large public park in South-Eastern Europe, and opening in 1794 under Bishop Maksimilijan Vrhovac (1752–1827).It was named Maksimilian's peace or Maksimir for short.
• Besides the Zoo, the park has big meadows, numerous creeks, five lakes, and forest, with big old trees. {The remainder of the original forest survives as a girdle to the park}
• All the things needed to spend the day (i.e. coffee shops, ice cream & food stands, WC, picnic, music, sports and playground areas)

http://www.zgzoo.com/hr  

http://www.park-maksimir.hr

Yep, squirrels !!

FYI - They have a squirrel house, looks like New England, with scrub pines and all! I have never seen a squirrel here, and I live in a selo (village), so if they were here, they would be here.

Still have so much to learn,

Christine 

(**** my symbol for fireworks***)

*Celebrated* 29 years married! 6-30-2014

Where are you at - this Easter?

I knew God was real...

 I knew about him . . . Year after year I would sit in church and think,

 “God where are you? 

Why am I here? 

What is the purpose of life??”  

It's what Jesus did, on the day we celebrate as Easter, that made it possible for me to have a personal relationship with the Holy God of the Bible. 
It's Jesus Christ's blood, His sacrificial death on the cross AND the fact that God rose Him from that death!

On August 26, 1984 

I bowed my knee, confessed I was a sinner - making Jesus my Lord and my Savior.  

God touched me there, made Himself real! I know what I was and who I am and He loves me anyways. He is faithful to show me and change me. Really I have never been the same since!
I now understand the real meaning of Easter! 

I believe there are a lot of people like me, that want to know their Creator better, but are ignorant, mislead or confused. 

I believe I can make a difference in other peoples lives by telling them the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ! 

Romans 10:9 - That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

It's more than believing. It's living what I believe. 

Don’t believe what others say, go directly to the source. Pick up the Bible, 

(a great place to start, read the gospel of John).

 Even if you’ve sat in church for your whole life, tell Jesus you want to know Him personally. Don’t let anything get in your way – not the imperfect church, not your own prejudices, not false teachers, not your own personal fears. Something within you rises up at the hope that there is a God in heaven. Don’t let that hope go unexplored. 

Get to Jesus.

Seek Him this Easter ... CC April 2014

John 11:25 - Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:

Romans 1:4 - And declared [to be] the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead: 

The Resurrection of Christ;

Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 

1 Corinthians 15:1-4 (NIV)

This post was inspired as I was reading a few thought and writings of other - namely C.S.Lewis. 

...Some people are living a life marked by unrelenting sorrows, following religious rules with no understanding and no hope of finding life within those rules. Some are enjoying an outwardly satisfying life but inwardly knowing no joy, no hope, no meaning. Some are facing a future of escalating physical limitation...Source: C.S.Lewis 

All photos are mine, I used Fotor to add & edit. 

December 2013 #3, Slovenia

This post is the third in a series of photos I took, while Nick was visiting us in December. 

    

To go coffee, small - but it is catching on!

Christmas Eve day we took a ride to Ljubljana, the capital city of Slovenia. The weather was still pretty mild for winter, making it great to be outside.
The square was all decked out with lights, vendors, food, festivals, & entertainment. My favorite was an Acapella group that sang quite a few Christmas songs, many in English.

We also took time to explored the Ljubljana Castle, (seen over looking the city in the photo; below/left) It is a great place to view the whole city and beyond, stunning! plus learn quite a bit of history.

Ljubljana, Slovenija - December 2013

 *Ljubljana Castle, a medieval castle with Romanesque, Gothic, and Renaissance architectural elements, located at the summit of the Castle Hill that dominates the city center. The area surrounding today's castle has been continuously inhabited since 1200 BC

*The castle exhibition is divided into six parts along the historical timeline: prehistory and the Roman period, the Middle and the Early Modern Ages, the 19th century and WWI, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and WWII, the socialist Yugoslavia and the independent Slovenia. It presents the societies of the different periods, the state formations, the political, social and economic circumstances, migrations, transport, culture, architecture and the everyday life.

The Bible was 1st transported to Slovenia from Germany in 1584, in barrels.

Did you know: The Bible is not only the best-selling book of all-time, it is consistently the best-selling book of the the year, every year. Currently, an estimated 25 million copies are sold or distributed in the U.S. every year, approximately one new Bible for every 12 Americans. 

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*St. George's Chapel, originally built in the Gothic style and later rebuilt in the Baroque style, is one of the oldest parts of Ljubljana Castle. It is decorated with 15th century frescoes and 1747 wall paintings of the coats of arms of provincial governors-general and five Austrian rulers

A provincial prison is now fully restored offers an insight into the role that Ljubljana Castle played in the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century. The exhibition includes several cells built between 1868 and 1895, original objects of the time, and a presentation of the life of prisoners.

St George's Chapel and the prison cells

Day trip - December 2013

Gurber Canal - October 2013

We live pretty close to the border, it's like going to NH...

These photos were taken on our first trip to Ljubljana. The center is definitely set up for walking. The architecture is a mix of styles; that  along with the historic Squares, the Gurber Canal & rivers, at least five notable bridges, and of course Kafiča, make for a great day trip!

 Day trip - October 2013

Devine coffee! 

(click to read  December #1 or  #2   post)

click here to return to A 3 week visit

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ljubljana and  *http://www.ljubljanskigrad.si/explore-the-castle/visit-the-castle/