2CR2302 澳門 / 澳门 Macao goes Croatia by scooter
Our tour will take place around the coastal village of Opatija, near Rijeka in Croatia. The weather forecast for the upcoming week couldn't be better, with temperatures between 23 and 28° Celsius. Every day we will make another loop in order to discover the whole Istrian peninsula with its impressive coastline along the Adriatic ocean, and the southern part of Slovenia.
On our first riding day we will get familiar with the scooters, traffic and roads. The roads are pleasant, windy and of high quality. After our first coffee stop we continued our way to the summer resort on the coast of the Istrian Peninsula of Poreč. This city is almost 2,000 years old and therefore we have visited the historical city center. The odour coming from the restaurants was pleasant, but on our way to Poreč our eyes have noticed something much better: spit-roasted pork. We left the city behind us and headed for the pork! After the lunch we visited the Lim-canal (Limski kanal), which in fact is a fjord with a length of 11.5 km. Quiet impressive! The weather was perfect to take a dip, but unfortunately we didn't have our swimming gear with us. Better luck next time!
Another day, another country. Beside discovering the Istrian peninsula, today we will cross the border with Slovenia to visit the Postojna caves. It is the second-longest cave system in the country and was carved by the Pivka River over millions of years and has a total length of almost 25 kilometers. Quiet impressive! But before we had to make a very quick lunch stop. 35 minutes to be precise, and we made it ;-) After leaving the caves behind us we continued our way to the Predjama castle, which is built in a cave mouth. At least as impressive as the caves
Today is all about island hopping. Croatias two biggest islands, as well as the biggest islands in the Adriatic Ocean, where we will enjoy some nice views, nice windy as well as winding roads and some very good food! The ferry from Brestova took us over the Kvarner Gulf to Porozina. Some road constructions unfortunately kept us up a bit but, so we had to wait a bit longer for some more beautiful views. Finally, time for a photo stop. Our guests were living it up, as you can see in the "backstage" photos. We continued to the city of Cres, on the island with the same name. An incredible lunch with fresh caught fish and seafood was brought to us by Jason. The second ferry took us to the second island of Krk that is connected to the mainland by two tall bridges. This was a very windy part with a magnificent view over Rijeka, Opatija and the bay.
Today's plan is to visit the Risnjak national park. This is one of the places where you can find a lot of incredible predators, such as the brown bear, lynx and the grey wolf. Not only the fauna is stunning, also the diversity of flora on this relatively small area due to microclimates within the park. There is even a chance to find an Edelweiss plant near the top of the Risnjak mountain, how nice is that?! By the way, today is a special day in China. It's the Mid-Autumn-Festival -or Moon(cake)-Festival- which is a harvest festival. Enough reason to celebrate this at a chinese restaurant! Jason even brought mooncakes to share with all of us, just for this celebration.
Unfortunately our last touring day has come. But hey, it won't be the least for sure. After our first coffee break -where the whole terrace was surprised to see such an amount of scooters at once, oops...- we headed to Pula. This is one of the oldest cities along the Adriatic coast. Its was first mentioned over 3000 years ago. And for who don't believe it, the colloseum is a proof. The build of this Roman masterpiece started in 27 B.C. and took 100 years to complete. It is one of the 6 still remaining Roman amphitheatres. We exchanged Pula for Rovinj and next the beautiful mountain village of Pican, where we bumped into a wedding when visiting the church. In the evening we had our goodbye dinner in our favorite restaurant, where we enjoyed good food and great memories!