Zagreb, Croatia

When I was asking Mom and Ryan what they wanted to do while in Italy, Ryan mentioned he wanted to visit a former Soviet Bloc country and said someone told him Zagreb, Croatia was a beautiful place.  So, we figured, why not?  I asked one of our Croatian friends here for some ideas of what to do. She didn't seem too impressed with Zagreb and said she hoped we didn't come back depressed from our trip there.  It's about a 5 hour drive away, so a few days after Venice we headed east.

We made a quick stop in Postojna, Slovenia for lunch and to do a little sightseeing. I had planned for us to do a tour of a huge cave they have there--it's so large that a big portion of the tour is by train.  But we got there a little late and missed the train to the cave by minutes so that didn't work out.  There was a little river and park there though, so we spent a little time stretching our legs and letting Michael walk around a little bit.

Then we drove a short distance and found a restaurant for lunch.  I don't think we got any pictures of it, but it looked like something out of a James Bond movie from the '70s. It was a nice restaurant, but the tables were separated by long, white fringe curtains.  None of us really knew what Slovenian food was, but we ordered a cheese and fruit plate, and some meat and pasta dishes.  It was good, though I'm still not clear on exactly what Slovenia is known for food-wise. After lunch we walked around a little more before getting on the road again.

Driving into Zagreb I think we were all a little nervous.  There were tons of old Soviet-style housing buildings clearly built to hold people, not look pretty. It all looked pretty bleak, and like our friend said, kind of depressing.



















But then we got into downtown Zagreb and found our hotel near the center of town. The view out or window was this gallery:

We checked into our little apartment and went out to walk around town and find some dinner.  We all really loved the downtown area.  It was so busy and full of neat old buildings and sculptures.  The streets were still decorated for Christmas, and there was a big ice skating rink set up in the middle of a big square.  The public transportation bus/train thing zipped by every few minutes and even though the city itself isn't huge, it had that big-city, hustle and bustle kind of feel to it.

We walked around for awhile and found a little Croatian restaurant for dinner.  I ordered a "hamburger" which was just a giant patty of meat (no bun) and a bean dish.  I think Ryan and Robbie both got some kind of spicy stew.  It was all very good, but so much food. I felt like I kept eating and eating (and sharing with the baby) and still didn't make a dent in it. Our bill was 358 kuna, which we calculated to be roughly $70.  Not too bad for four people leaving completely stuffed!

We walked around a little more and found this replica of the city that we thought was neat.  A little light was shining on it to show where we were.  It was getting late and Michael was tired, so we stopped quick to pick up some breakfast food for the next morning and headed back to the hotel to get some rest.

The next morning we woke up and started exploring Zagreb.  Churches are always high on my list of things to see and we had seen this gorgeous cathedral all lit up at night and I was excited to go inside.

It was very beautiful. It looked much newer than some of the cathedrals and churches we've seen in Italy, but construction on it started in 1083.  It was destroyed in 1242, then built back up in the 15th-17th centuries. It was badly damaged in an earthquake in 1880, and the two big spires were built as part of that restoration.  One of my favorite parts of the inside was this life-size depiction of the crucifixion:

The Zagreb cathedral houses the tomb of St. Stepinac, the archbishop of Zagreb from 1937-1960. Many people were waiting in a line to file past the tomb and see his remains.

Of course, Michael's favorite part of the church (and maybe the whole trip) was all the pigeons in the courtyard he could look at!

We continued walking around, got some hot dogs for lunch, and strolled through the Christmas markets that were still set up all over the downtown area.  We found the "Grounded Sun" which I had read about before our trip.  This is a to-scale model of the sun and all of the planets are located around Zagreb in their actual (to scale) distance from the sun.  We didn't find any planets, but the sun was pretty obvious!

It was about this part of the day where Michael was getting tired, so I took him back to the hotel for a nap while everyone else continued exploring.  They found some other cool churches and some points with really good views of the city.

They met me back at the hotel for a bit to relax and regroup, then we hit the road again for dinner.  We found this performance artist out in the big public square. He looked a lot like a painting! Robbie gave him a few coins and he posed for us:

Walking up the steep street to all the restaurants and bars in downtown Zagreb, we passed a little waffle house.  I have a hard time turning down waffles, so we went inside and each got a waffle.  They were so good!  He had lots of different fruit toppings with a delicious chocolate sauce on top.  Mom and I each picked our own kind of loose leaf chai tea as well. We talked to the owner a little bit (we were the only ones in there) and he was telling us how he had just opened a couple of weeks prior and business had been really slow.  He said lots of people stop and look inside but then don't come in, and that most of the people who had come inside were tourists like us.  He was really sweet, the food and tea were great, the decorations were lovely, and you could tell he and his wife had put so much thought and effort into designing both the menu and the restaurant space.  We left wishing we could go back every day, and I hope things have picked up for them since!

We did a little more walking--they showed me a few of the cool places they found that I had missed for nap time. We walked back to the square and to see the cathedral lit up at night, took a few pictures, then Mom and I took Michael back to the hotel for bed while Robbie and Ryan took a couple of extra hours to experience the Zagreb night life.

The next morning, we got up early to check out an antique market we had read about that is open in a little square about 2 km away from where we were staying.  Besides churches and waffles, European antique markets are another of my weaknesses.  This was a big one, and had lots of interesting stuff.  Unfortunately for me, Michael wasn't really into it so I decided to take him back to the hotel. Robbie picked up some cool old books (in Croatian) for me to add to my new cool-old-books-from-European-antique-markets collection!

With that, we checked out of our hotel, hopped in the car, and made it back home without incident and with another country checked off on our mental "places we've been" tally.  It was a great trip, and I can't wait to go back to Croatia to see more of what there is to see in that beautiful country!