Day 178: Friday 12 September – Croatia: Krka National Park, by Ken

Motoring Past Mabel First Thing

We woke to clear blue skies. The forecast for the day was good - sun and no rain. We decided it was an ideal day for a boat trip to the Kornati islands which are a national park. After breakfast we drove Smarty into Murter town to book a trip. We tried three places advertising tours to the islands and got the same story in each – the next trip would be Monday. We decided we couldn’t afford the extra day in Murter and flagged the idea of seeing the islands.

Plan B was to visit Krka National Park on the Krka river about 40km away. Our route took us back to the mainland via Tisno. Just outside the town we saw a large restaurant attracting patrons by means of massive amounts of meat roasting on wood fired spits outside. There were three whole pigs, two sheep and about a dozen chickens. They were obviously anticipating a busy day.

That's What I call A Barbecue

Does This Explain The Barbecued Pork?

We took the coastal motorway a short distance south east before leaving it for the town of Skradin where we parked in a field next to a school. Yesterday’s storm had left its mark on Skradin with part of the field being underwater. A fireman was trying to pump the water out with a small petrol driven pump. It seemed he thought the pump was discharging into a ditch. It wasn’t, each surge of the pump sent a fountain of muddy brown water cascading over one of the parked cars.

We walked a short distance into the town to the park’s visitor’s centre where people were queuing for tickets. An attendant told us there was a ferry leaving for the base of the falls In ten minutes and we could buy tickets when we disembarked.

We walked down to the quayside where there was a wonderful old motor yacht flying the red ensign was moored. A plaque on the ‘Fair Lady’ indicated it was built in 1925 at Gosport. It was absolutely immaculate with gleaming paintwork and varnish you could see your face in. Whoever owned it now must spend an absolute fortune to keep it in that condition. There were also a lot of other, less impressive, boats moored nearby.

Majka Danika, the boat that took us the 4km from Skradin to the foot of the falls wasn’t as grand as the Fair Lady but more than adequate for the short trip. We paid our entrance charges and started to walk towards the series of seventeen cascades that make up Skradinski buk. While the cascades weren’t large in terms of height, the volume of water was absolutely enormous, the recent rain no doubt playing a part. In fact the flow of water was such that bathing, which is usually allowed in some of the pools between falls, was banned. That disappointed Jane who had bought her togs in anticipation of a dip.

Skradin Seen As We Travelled Up River

We made our way on a boardwalk across the base of the lower falls that were particularly impressive with spray billowing from the foaming water. 

Lower Falls

On the eastern side of the river were a number of stalls selling fruit and nuts, we bought some nuts. Climbing up the path we passed yet more stalls, we imagined there must be a lot of competition among stall holders to get a position as close to the boardwalk as possible. They were by far the busiest. The path continued upwards close to foaming falls. Further along the path we reached the Jaruga 1 hydro-electric power station opened in 1895 just a few days after the first hydro station in the world was opened at the Forbes dam on the Niagara river. However, Jaruga 1 delivered power immediately to the lights of Sibenik whereas the Niagara station couldn’t deliver power to Buffalo until 1896 when the transmission lines were completed.

Jaruga 1 Hydro Station

We continued climbing passing tiers of very impressive cascades until we reached a group of stone watermills built directly over the Krka river, in some instances complex channels had been constructed to feed the mills as well as the power station below.

Krka River Seen As We Climbed Alongside The Falls

One of The Upper Skradinski Buk Falls

And Another

Taken Near The Top Of The Falls

Water Mill At Top Of Falls

Another boardwalk took us across the head of the falls where water flowed in a myriad of channels. The water in some channels flowed gently beneath the boardwalk while it showed a lot more urgency in others swirling around trees and vegetation that in more normal times would be on dry land.

Upper Boardwalk

Back on the west side of the river our walk took us back down to the landing stage where our boat had docked earlier. After a brief wait the Majka Danika docked and its passengers slowly disembarked – not so much lethargy on their part, more down to the gangplank only allowing one passenger to get off at a time. We thought that they should perhaps take a look at the arrangements used by the Istanbul vapurs which would cut boarding and disembarkation times considerably.

Upper Falls And Water Mills From West Side Of River

We took seats on the top deck and were joined by two British couples we got into conversation with. One pair was from Chester, the other from Preston. They were on a one week holiday in Croatia and staying in tge same hotel. Three of the four were very pleasant, but it quickly became obvious that Preston man was a pain. He talked over everyone, didn’t listen, and everything he talked about hinged around money like his car and that of the managing director’s together being worth £100,000, like his son being head hunted and was one of the highest paid doctors in New Zealand. He prefaced each of his stories with ‘to cut a long story short’ but, unfortunately, he had a plethora of short stories. Approaching a steel arch bridge spanning the river the man said to us “there’s the Sydney harbour bridge – something to make you feel at home”. I was tempted to point out the approaching bridge was closer to Preston than the Sydney bridge is to Wellington, but I didn’t think he would be listening.

"Sydney Harbour Bridge"

Majka Danika Back At Skradin

Back at Skradin Jane and I walked down the main street in search of lunch. Our guide book noted the restaurants in Skradin are among the best in Dalmatia. We wanted to try a fish dish and took a seat under an umbrella outside a restaurant specialising in fish. Unfortunately, multiplying the per kilo price of some fresh fish bought to our table by the weight of even the smallest fish was going to make for a very expensive lunch. Instead, we opted for pork fillet stuffed with cheese and ham.  While eating the Chester couple walked past – on their own. Possibly, they had the same opinion of their new found friend as us.

From Skradin we drove north where we wanted to visit the Krka islet of Visovac and visit the Franciscan monastery on the island. Unfortunately, the recent rain meant the river level was too high for ferry boat so we had to make do with the view from the river bank of the monastery nestling among cypresses.

Visovac Islet And The Monastery We Didn't Get To

From Visovac we continued northwards to Roški slap, a lesser series falls than those at Skradinski buk, but far quieter in terms of visitor numbers. We started our visit by walking down to some water mills. Some of these had been restored and, at certain times, gave demonstrations of the mills working. There wasn’t a demonstration during our visit, but good display boards showed the workings of the mills. They were simplicity itself. Each mill had four pairs of millstones, with each rotating stone mounted on a vertical shaft that was turned by a horizontal impeller located in a channel fed by water from the river.

Roski Slap Falls From Water Mills

Water Mill Below Roski Slap

Mill Stone

From the mills we retraced our steps and then took a circular walk starting along the east bank of the river, crossed the river on a bridge and returned along the western bank to the road. We walked back to Smarty re-crossing the river on the road bridge. It was getting late and Mabel was 40km away, we decided it was time to head for home.

Bridge Crossing Above Roški Slap

Jane did the driving. Approaching Murter town we ran into a thunderstorm. The rain was torrential, much heavier than that I had driven through yesterday. In places the road resembled a stream as water flowed down it a few tens of millimetres deep.

Spot Of Rain On The Way Home

We weren’t hungry after our lunch out and snacked on peanuts. We played one game of Banagrams that Jane won – yet again!