Travel

February 17, 2020 - The newly united Hvar tourism boards present their cycling credentials at the Cosmo Bike Show in Verona.  Even though I no longer live on Hvar, I follow island life closely and still very much enjoy my three mandatory visits - Easter, summer and the family olive harvest in November.  And it is nice to see how things are slowly changing for the better in many ways, and how some initiatives are starting to pay off.  The main reason that the Total Project started way back in 2011 as Total Hvar was because the tourist infromation was…

February 17, 2020 - The latest news from around Croatia’s airports for new flights to Croatia with updates from Rijeka, Dubrovnik, and Zadar.  Avio Radar reports that Latvian national carrier AirBaltic has announced that is will reinforce the new route from Lithuania to Rijeka - Vilnius-Rijeka, which has already been scheduled for one flight per week, on Thursdays, with traffic starting in May this year.  However, the airline has strengthened the new route before it has even launched, with an additional second flight per week, on Saturdays, from June 6 to September 26, 2020.  The Airbus A220-300 will service this line. …

February 17, 2020 - There are SO many obscure traditional Dalmatian games that are local to individual villages that are slowly dying out. So why not revive and celebrate them with the Traditional Dalmatian Games Olympics? Get involved! Almost 8 years ago, a new wine festival in an inland village on Hvar was announced. It was to be a celebration of the local Bogdanusa grape variety, as well as different aspects of culture of the village of Svirce.  Among the attractions was a game called Zoga Falo, a traditional game played mostly in Svirce, as well as occasionally in the…

February 16, 2020 - TCN recently started a discussion on why there are no budget winter flights to Split, which got a lively response. And now we have an expert view to consider.  One of the many fabulous discoveries I made about Croatia in the last couple of years is a fantastic Swiss company called ch-aviation, which is the market leader in aviation data. Fantastic because their data and analysis has been a great source of information for me for stories about flights to Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia. And a fabulous discovery because they opened their main subsidiary office right…

February 16, 2020 - The final schedule of the One Day or Day One #hrturizam2030 conference has been published, bringing together some of the top names of Croatian tourism's public and private sector.   I have never seen a conference organised from a conversation over a kitchen table to realisation before, and it has been really inspiring seeing the progress of Goran Rihelj and his indefatigable wife Mirjam to make 'One Day or Day One #hrturizam' a reality at Congress Centre Forum Zagreb on April 2.  Goran, of course, was the man whose initiative to bring Days of Croatian Tourism to…

Fancy a coffee in the basement of the fort and "stealing" a recipe from a medieval pantry, seeing three different museums, and visiting the top of the southern part of Medvednica and enjoying a breathtaking view of the Croatian metropolis, Zagreb? At the end of this year, visitors to the legendary Medvedgrad fortress will be able to enjoy all of the above. The beautiful Medvedgrad fortress was built in the 13th century to defend against Tatar attacks, and has never been conquered. As Vecernji list/Mateja Jezovita writes on the 15th of February, 2020, construction work on the Medvedgrad fortress' third…

As Slobodna Dalmacija writes on the 14th of February, 2020, there are more than 200 underwater archaeological sites below the surface of the sparkling Adriatic in ​​Split-Dalmatia County, ranging from isolated finds of small artefacts to preserved shipwrecks carrying amphorae and shipwrecks from World War II. Archaeologists Sasa Denegri, Silva Kukoc and Tea Katunaric Kirjakov, an archaeologist and art historian at the Art Academy of the University of Split, have produced a cultural and tourist guide called "The Underwater Heritage of Split-Dalmatia County". The aim of this guide is to promote Central Dalmatia's rich underwater archaeological sites in order to…

February 15, 2020 - The Croatian Tourism Ministry has issued a public call for grants under the 2020 Public Tourism Infrastructure Development Program, for which up to 25 million kuna has been earmarked for local and regional self-government units. The public invitation is open until May 1, 2020. HRturizam reports that the program will co-finance projects for the development of marine and other swimming areas, the continuation of construction, upgrading, reconstruction, or renovation, as well as multimedia equipment for visitors and interpretation centers and public tourist infrastructure in the function of active tourism. “Sustainable tourism is based on quality management…

February 15, 2020 - Vesna Ferenac, director of the Novigrad Tourist Board, emphasizes that their ultimate goal is more efficient promotion, that is, visibility of the destination and raising the quality of the offer in the city.  "Last year we achieved record results: three percent increase in arrivals and a two percent increase in overnights, exceeding 1.3 million overnights. This is a great result considering that the beginning of the preseason did not start well due to terrible and cold weather. The period before and after the season is very important for us, so this year we are focused on…

February 14, 2020 - Where to go to maximise the number of experiences in one place in Dalmatia? The case for Trogir.  Tourism is changing, and people these days seem to want to get the most out of a holiday. With the Instagram god to feed, the days of sitting on one beach for a fortnight are becoming rarer.  But sometimes you don't have to keep from place to place to enjoy unbelievable experiences on a daily basis.  Take Trogir for example - a destination which has SO much to offer, but which is often overlooked in favour of its…