November 30, 2018 — To most tourists and passersby in Dubrovnik, it’s just a strip of rocks jutting out of the middle of the old town’s port. Or the remnants of an old jetty. But archaeologists think there may be more to the medieval Dubrovnik breakwater - "Kaše."

A project started by the Development Agency of the City of Dubrovnik will research the historical and geo-archeological significance of “Kaše”, located squarely in the middle of Dubrovnik’s iconic harbor, according to Morski.hr.

The agency contends it’s an interesting cultural-historical asset that requires reconstruction, but first needs to be thoroughly researched.

A broad look at the underwater area has already reaped rewards, revealing an older, unknown structure.

The 6 million kuna Dubrovnik breakwater project will fall under the auspices of “APPRODI — From Ancient Maritime Routes To Eco-Touristic Destination”, and funded by INTERREG V-B of the Adriatic-Ionian Transnational Cooperation Program. It will be carried out by the Institute of Maritime Heritage ARS NAUTICA, in cooperation with the University of Zadar, the Croatian Geological Institute, GeoMar d.o.o. and FOKA d.o.o.

Dr. Irena Radić Rossi will lead the research.

It will be the first time underwater archeological research will be carried out on the easily-ignored-yet-historic Dubrovnik breakwater. Even paper-based research into Kaše hasn’t taken a holistic look at all available documents.

Modern geological and geophysical techniques will allow researchers to study the entire old city harbor in greater detail, and to create a historic timeline of its development without endangering the site itself.

APPRODI aims to preserve natural and cultural goods as the foundation for any future development of the Adriatic-Ionian area.

The breakwater Kaše was built during the Renaissance in 1486, according to plans drawn up by the great engineer of his time, Paskoje Miličević Mihov.

The exact techniques used to build the breakwater aren’t known. Based upon its name (a bastardization of “kašeta” or “crate”) it’s believed wooden chests were stacked and filled with building materials.

Historical sources also indicated the breakwater was rejuvenated in the middle of the 16th century, except two wooden boats were sunk in the place of crates.

Today, the breakwater is in a dilapidated condition and in desperate need of repair after an earthquake badly damaged the structure in 1979, according to the Society of Friends of Dubrovnik’s Antiquities. Promises to renew the structure passed by like the waves it’s meant to stop. None came to fruition.

Kaše is just the first part of a multi-phase plan. The breakwater will be followed by a detailed geo-archaeological map of Dubrovnik’s port, as well as a cartographical study showing other interesting ports and islands not just on Dubrovnik’s coast, but all along the Adriatic and Ionian Seas.

To learn more about the Pearl of the Adriatic, check out Total Dubrovnik.

As Morski writes on the 24th of November, 2018, a meeting of the technical working group in the framework of the ECO-NautiNET web project was held in Dubrovnik on November the 20th and 21st, in which the needs of the website's users were discussed. Through the ECO-NautiNET project, activities are being carried out to improve the competitiveness and innovation of small and medium-sized companies in the nautical sector, as well as acting as a means to support their internationalisation and networking abilities.

The meeting saw the presentation of the results of the research conducted so far between the four target groups - the small and medium-sized companies from within nautical sector, broker project partners, and supporting institutions and scientific institutions. Based on the results and conversations with platform developers, the technical working group has managed to define the simplest in which way to include future users, and which tools are needed for the most efficient presentation of the project's products and services, technical and technological achievements, and innovations.

The goal of the ECO-NautiNET web platform is to motivate and involve as many business entities, support institutions, and other innovations in order to take advantage of the opportunity to place themselves on new markets, and to develop the competitiveness and innovation of the nautical sector of the Adriatic-Ionian region as a whole, through easy access to all news and high quality information in just one place.

This goal is highlighted as the desire to become the most important development driver of contact with more than 500 businessmen from the nautical sector from across Croatia, Albania, Italy, Greece and Slovenia, and most entrepreneurs in this field continue to face the same or very similar problems irrespective of the country they come from.

As a result, most of these companies have up to ten employees, and as far as typical issues and problems are concerned, poor cooperation within the nautical sector, a lack of clear nautical sector development policy, and the fact that cooperation with research and science centres is either non-existent or very small stand out as the most common and indeed the most pressing.

Over 80 percent of the respondents are primarily interested in improving competitiveness and innovation by linking small and medium-sized entrepreneurs in the Adriatic-Ionian region's nautical sector with supporting institutions and research and scientific centres through the ECO-NautiNET web platform.

ECO-NautiNET is otherwise project number 398 which is part of the INTERREG ADRION transnational cooperation program co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and IPA funds (IPA II).

Make sure to stay up to date with all things sailing by following Total Croatia Sailing and our dedicated lifestyle page.

Click here for the original article by Jasna Jaklin Majetic on Morski

While Volotea has significantly increased operations to Croatia in recent years, next summer, the Spanish low-cost carrier has made an even more significant leap forward with their new route from Athens to Dubrovnik. 

November 22, 2018 — The Croatian tourism apparatus will now endure its annual post-summer evaluation.

Statistics must be dissected: How many arrivals? How much was spent?

The service industry exchanges anecdotes en masse: Which nation sent the most visitors? Who were the biggest spenders?

Reviews and ratings on travel sites such as TripAdvisor and Booking.com are combed for helpful feedback — or dismissed as pointless ramblings.

Yet rarely does one get an intimate look into the experience of a Croatian tourist from beginning to end. Until now.

Refinery29’s Away Game, a series which chronicles millennial women’s travels and expenses, chronicled a 32-year-old life insurance underwriter’s day trip to Croatia.

The unnamed traveler matches a coveted demographic within the Croatian tourism industry: an American millennial from the suburbs of Washington DC earning upper-middle-class  wages.

The resulting travel diary and/or expense report offers a rare look into the experience of a first-time visitor to Croatia — warts and all.

The piece offers a holistic picture of the Croatian tourism experience: A reasonable traveler guided by word of mouth and not jingoistic advertising campaigns can experience unanticipated delights and exceeded expectations.

Croatia’s Infrastructure: The Dalmatian Sardine Can

Throughout the diary, a theme emerges: Croatia’s crowded. Especially during the height of the tourism season. It spills over into infrastructure headaches.

Immediately on her second day, our unnamed tourist encounters the infamous crowding at Dubrovnik’s Pile Gate, a familiar scene for locals and repeat visitors alike. The traveler must let two busses pass before she finally finding room to hop aboard.

Later during her stay, a warning about four cruise ships depositing its crowds onto Dubrovnik sends her hightailing to Montenegro. She spends close to $150 just to escape for a day, trading the “Pearl of the Adriatic” for an daylong jaunt through Perast, Kotor and Budva.

The hordes make cameos again in her travelogue, in Split, Hvar, Plitvice and later in Zagreb.

This sense of overcrowding reemerges in her jaunts from one location to the other. Her trip from Dubrovnik to Split took nearly six hours because of congestion on the highways. Ditto a bus trip from Zagreb to Plitvice, also extended by crowded roadways.

It was all enough to culminate in a catch-all warning to potential visitors:

“Be prepared, in high tourist season it’s very expensive and crazy-crowded on the Croatian coast,” she writes at the end. “If you’re going to Dubrovnik, pay attention to the cruise schedule and try to avoid the days where there are lots of ships.”

Croatian Service: Delightfully Bespoke 

The writer often valorizes locals going beyond a yeoman's effort to please visitors.

For example: during a trip to the Pakleni Islands, she raves of fresh sea urchin “that our guide plucked from the ocean and pried open right in front of us.”

The pattern repeats itself over and over: an Airbnb host in Hvar takes pains to handle logistics; a hotel restaurant in Split makes an off-the-menu pašticada on a whim; a solo tour goes from worrisome encounter to a delightful friendship.

Along the way, the author learns about the life of a local dependent on tourism: “They work 24/7 during the tourist season and it sounds incredibly stressful, but you’d never know.”

Is Croatia Expensive?

As the travel diary continues, a picture emerges of a conscious, selectively frugal spender. Our unnamed narrator carries her own collapsable water bottle; keeps snacks on hand; and chows on hotel breakfasts whenever possible.

“I am not a fan of hostels or shared accommodations, am willing to pay for good location, and the hotel stays included breakfast so this is where I spent the most,” she writes.

This precise spending reveals itself in her trinket and souvenir expenditures: magnets galore, as well as lavender soaps. But also something more authentic, preferably local. In Dubrovnik, she shelled out extra for filigree earrings and rose moisturizer.

“The earrings and rose cream are very touristy purchases,” she admits, then adds, “but are also so typical of Dubrovnik that they are perfect reminders of my trip.”

She’s also a cost-conscious eater. At no point during her trip does a meal come close to the triple-digit range. Granted, a solo traveler must either splurge on a Michelin Star meal or pig out in excess to cross the $100 threshold in Croatia. She often expresses disbelief at sums on her bills.

Her first meal in Zagreb sets the tone. After people-watching (another cheap-yet-fun experience) on Britanski Trg, she eats at Heritage, a tiny joint specializing in Croatian cuisine which emphasizes the food's local origins.

The bill offers a delightful sticker shock. “When I finish I’m stuffed, and when I get the bill and figure out the cost in USD I’m shocked how much I got for so little.” She paid $9.

Compare that to the $30-plus meals she regularly eats in Dubrovnik and Split.

Price disparities pop up in a myriad other ways. A cab from the airport to the hotel in Zagreb is $30; the same trip cost her $17 with Uber. (Not surprise anymore.)

All told, the traveler spent $4,603.74 in total. That includes airfare, travel, meals, souvenires and accommodations. That’s about $230 per day — days which included trips to neighboring Montenegro and Slovenia.

So... Has Croatia become too expensive?

Avoiding Well-Worn Paths

The tourism industry in Croatia often feels almost obsessed with online ratings and website recommendations. Yet our traveler’s piece limits her tech-guidance and dependency to three main apps: Airbnb, Uber and Viator.

The rest of her decisions are largely based on serendipity and word-of-mouth — either from locals or fellow travelers. It leads her to unexpected places you won’t find in many brochures or promotional videos.

While in Split, she visits Froggyland.

Froggyland?

Yes, Froggyland, “a weird little tourist trap of a museum, but worth the visit and entrance fee,” she writes. “It houses the largest collection of taxidermied frogs, all posed in dioramas performing different activities. 

“It was bizarre, but I kind of loved it.”

She takes a small group tour of the Pakleni Islands run by a husband-wife duo which owns and operates “Amazing Hvar”.

The traveler then goes zip-lining in Omiš. It ends up being one of her favorite and most-dissected parts of her trip, with paragraphs-long descriptions. (Plitvice, by comparison, gets a few cursory and well-worn sentences about natural beauty.)

The tail end of her stay in Zagreb inadvertently coincides with an international street performance festival called “Cest Is D’best”, which provides a fallback diversion on quieter days. She also takes a Secret Zagreb tour, which explores the lesser-seen parts of the city.

Yes, there are obvious overtures to Croatia’s natural beauties and pitstops at all the usual hotspots; Dubrovnik’s city walls, Diocletian's palace and Plitvice all make an appearance.

Yet it’s the strokes of logistical luck which pepper her travelogue with unique and rewarding experiences.

The Intangibles

So what can one learn from this singular, yet instructive experience?

A few choice lessons:

There’s a difference between a traveller and a tourist: Many attempts to guide tourists’ gazes can often backfire, or at least distract people from what they set out to experience. The piece’s author seemed most keen on understanding where the locals ate, hung out and found cool. Some restaurant or dish suggested by a local became a must.

People want to understand and experience the lives of locals and fellow travelers. The traveler in this story seemed willing to assimilate, for however little she visited. She even shelled out $55 for a Croatian language audio course.

“It was surprisingly easy to learn enough to speak conversationally and ask directions,” she wrote (she's in the minority). “But I rarely actually needed to since most people I cam in contact with spoke perfect English.”

There are too many Game of Thrones tours: "I’m going on a Game of Thrones walking tour and am supposed to look for my guide in the square outside the gate holding a GoT flag," she writes, "which isn’t super helpful because there are at least 3 of them.”

Perhaps Croatia’s entire tourism industry can collectively take a few notes.

To read more about tourism in Croatia, check out TCN’s dedicated page.

 Mass emigration from Croatia has become a crisis. According to the official data of the Central Bureau of Statistics, from 2013 until the end of 2017, about 150,000 citizens left Croatia. However, some regions have seen an increase in the number of inhabitants, such as Istria and Zagreb, while in some the depopulation trend is much less severe than in others, reports Gradonačelnik.hr on November 21, 2018.

The latest information on population trends in towns reveals that some towns have seen a trend of drawing residents from other Croatian towns and abroad. This is due to the economic development and jobs which have been created there, mainly thanks to tourism in the coastal areas. As many as nine out of ten towns with the largest number of new residents are located on the coast, with the only exception being Samobor near Zagreb.

The town which has attracted most residents in the past six years – as many as 1,545 people moved there from 2011 to 2017 – is Dubrovnik, which just confirms its title as the best town in Croatia which it recently also won.

The second best is Kaštela near Split, whose population increased by 1,345, followed by Solin, also near Split, with 1,299 more inhabitants. The fourth best is Vodice near Šibenik (612 more citizens), followed by Umag in Istria (562). Among the top ten are also Krk, Poreč, Novalja, Supetar and, at the tenth position, the only town from inland Croatia, Samobor.

Dubrovnik Mayor Mato Frankovic says these are very encouraging numbers. Kaštela Mayor Denis Ivanović points out that the reason for such good results of his town is the fact that it is located near Split. They also introduced new demographic measures to keep young people living there.

Samobor is the only town from inland Croatia among the top ten towns by the number of newcomers. “Samobor is the only larger town without a local income tax, which encourages the arrival of new inhabitants and families who can find here everything they need for a peaceful, fulfilled life,” says Mayor Krešo Beljak.

Novalja is ranked eighth by the number of newcomers (396), but this figure makes it the second-best town in Croatia by the percentage, immediately behind Vis. The population of Novalja has increased by 10.8% since 2011. Mayor Ante Dabo says that the trend of people moving to Novalja was first seen 20 years ago. He is proud that most new inhabitants are well integrated into the local community, with many of them having their families in Novalja and their children feeling the sense of belonging to the local area.

After Vis and Novalja, the list of top ten towns by percentage includes many other smaller towns on the coast: Supetar, Krk, Nin, Stari Grad, Novigrad, Vodice, Hvar and Komiža.

For more on Croatia’s demographic crisis and the mass emigration from Croatia, click here.

Dubrovnik Airport's General Services Manager, Luko Vuletić, talks about the current 225 million euro expansion and the plans for building a new terminal to be used only during the summer season. 

Ever been to NP Mljet? Lying not far from Croatia's southernmost city of Dubrovnik, Mljet national park, otherwise Croatia's most heavily forested island and unarguably among the most unusual, is a must visit place for those wanting a sense of peace. Photographers and nature lovers alike are also attracted in their droves to beautiful Mljet.

As Morski writes on the 11th of November, 2018, NP Mljet, the Republic of Croatia's and the Mediterranean's first properly protected marine area, is celebrating ts 58th birthday today! Established on this day back in 1960, NP Mljet has naturally become the target of numerous visitors from across the world who want to experience some of the Adriatic's pure and rich nature. This year also stands out as a record year for the number of visitors to NP Mljet.

In addition to a huge number of visitors, this year is also significant thanks to the arrival of the first of three electric catamarans for the transportation of visitors to NP Mljet's Great lake, and the signing of the Grant Agreement for a project for Mljet worth a massive 36,618,480,26 kuna. These resources will improve and enhance the popular national park's visitor infrastructure, and enrich the quality and quantity of touristic, educational and recreational content on the island.

The birthday celebrations of NP Mljet began back on October the 22nd with the opening of an exhibition of photographs in the Gallery of the Archaeological Museum in Zagreb. In addition to the exhibition, from October the 24th to the 31st, the Days of Open Doors and a special program for the visiting of NP Mljet for the passengers of the Krilo Star catamaran's final journey for 2018 were held. The celebrations will continue through November when an exhibition on the cultural heritage of NP Mljet opens far from Zagreb, on the island of Mljet itself, all on the occasion of the International Year of Cultural Heritage.

Happy birthday, Mljet National Park!

Want to keep up with more news on Croatia's many national parks and islands? Make sure to follow our lifestyle and travel pages for more.

November 10, 2018 - The latest flights to Croatia roundup, with El Al starting direct flights to Dubrovnik, Ryanair expanding, Volotea moving into Rijeka, and more records smashed at Croatian airports.

New Direct Flights to Croatia - El Al from Tel Aviv to Dubrovnik

Isreali interest in Croatia has been steadily increasing in recent months, with Croatia's controversial US$500 million purchase of Israeli F16s, a shift in the Croatian position in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, as well as a raft of business announcements. The latest strengthening of ties comes with the announcement that El Al will start the first-ever direct flights to Dubrovnik from Israel, starting on June 4. The weekly Tuesday flight will run under the tourist brand Sun d'Or until September 24, and the new route will be in addition to the longer running connection between Tel Aviv and Zagreb. The flights to Zagreb will be three times a week from April 2 to October 23 - all details of timetables can be found via Avioradar. 

Flights to Rijeka - Welcome Volotea!

Volotea's steady expansion in the Croatian market continues, and the Spanish low-cost carrier has announced its first flight to Rijeka, European City of Culture in 2020. And if you are quick, promotional tickets are just 9 euro. The new route will be once a week from Marseilles, and it will run from June 6 to August 28. 

New flights to Pula from easyJet and Volotea

More easyJet love for Istria, as the famous orange and white livery will be connecting Pula with Amsterdam next summer, as already reported by TCN. 

It is not the only new route to Pula to be announced this week. Having already established Nantes to Pula, Volotea will commence direct flights to Pula from Bordeaux once a week on June 5, reports Avioradar.

More flights to Split with Wideroe

No market has opened up to Dalmatia as much as the Scandinavian market with the arrival of budget flights, and national carrier Norwegian can be credited with a major part in establishing the market. Where one goes, others follow, and yet one more option for Norwegian tourists next summer, as Wideroe has announced another charter option from Oslo Torp to Split. 

Cheap Flights to Croatia - Ryanair to add more Zadar Routes

Despite being the first to enter the low-cost market in Croatia back in 2007, Ryanair has not expanded as much as easyJet, Norwegian or some other competitors. It seems that some efforts to addressing this will come next year. 

"The budget airline, which last year held a 5% capacity share in Croatia and was well behind rivals such as easyJet and Eurowings on the market, will strengthen its seasonal base in Zadar next year with the launch of up to eight new routes. The carrier has already scheduled new services from Hamburg, Prague, Cologne, and Nuremberg to the Croatian coastal city next summer. However, it is expected that the no frills airline will no longer have an aircraft stationed in Croatia." Read the full story of Ryanair's plans for both Croatia and the wider region on ExYuAviation.

Flights to Croatia - more record passenger numbers to Croatian airports

The records keep on tumbling. More information on record passenger numbers in two TCN reports this week - Zagreb, Split, Dubrovnik airports set October record, and  Airports See 10.5% More Passengers than Last Year.

For the latest flight news to Croatia, follow our dedicated page

Zagreb, Split, Dubrovnik Airports have continued with great results in October.

Investment in tourism is a machine boasting many wheels which must keep turning and following world tourism trends on a constant basis.

Stagnation in the tourism sector has been threatening Croatia following a few record tourism years, and while many expected such a drop as more of the country's older tourism rivals recover respectively, just how can Croatian hotels keep their rooms full and their offer hot in the face of strong competition from long-time tourism kings like Spain and nearby Greece?

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 6th of November, 2018, over the now rapidly approaching winter period, the well-respected Adriatic Luxury Hotels hotel group will continue its massive investment cycle and focus on properly restoring and redoing some of their highest category hotels located in one of the country's most popular tourist destinations, southern Dalmatia's Dubrovnik area.

After the luxurious ''doing up'' of two top Dubrovnik hotels, Hotel Kompas (Lapad) and Hotel Excelsior (Sveti Jakov area), Adriatic Luxury Hotels have announced that the same will be done to another of their high-end hotels, Hotel Bellevue, which closed its doors to guests on October the 31st this year, in order to prepare for the huge renovation works of the hotel's accommodation facilities and part of the hotel's interior which are due to begin during the winter.

Adriatic Luxury Hotels will invest more than 400,000 kuna per room in the upcoming complete re-doing of the top hotel's rooms and apartments, representing the first significant investment in Hotel Bellevue since its inauguration over a decade ago, back in 2006.

The Portuguese design studio Tereza Prego is heavily engaged in the project, specialising in the interior design of exclusive hotels and other high-end residences.

As things currently stand, it seems that the redesigned Hotel Bellevue will be ready by the spring of 2019.

Click here to see just how the hotel will look upon opening its doors early next year.

Want to keep up to date with Croatia's investment in tourism and see if any hotels in an area you're planning to stay in are about to undergo makeovers? Make sure to follow our business page.