| viharnik18. 07. 2013 18:37:34 |
It's nice by the sea if you have a bike with you and can ride peacefully through the karst areas of eastern Istria, observing nature around you and enjoying the boundless sea views.
I started the tour to Brdo in camp Tunarica at 10m above sea level. Then followed a 2km ascent to the main road, which takes me via Brovinj to the mountain climb of a beautiful scenic road full of curves, zigzag ride. On the mountain shoulder is a nice viewpoint of the landmark St. Lucija, who cried on Brdo 475m because locals despite her request didn't build a church for her. At night she fell asleep up there. When she woke up, her tears carved two pits-springs into the stone, which according to today's locals never dry up, not in summer, not in winter. They sent the water for analysis to Zagreb, where they couldn't define it; later they found extraordinary healing properties, especially for eyesight treatment - for eyes, they say. The spring is a bit off to the left of the path below the summit and is not touristically arranged, thank God, so I didn't find it either (now I know from talking to locals). From Brdo the view reaches quite far, all the way to Pula, Lošinj or Rijeka. After a breakneck 12min descent I'm already in Ravni village, where Austrians dominate with private houses. From there to Labin it's still 1h of hills, to Rabac a pleasant 300m, 4.5km long descent inspires. Rabac has developed extraordinarily with many large hotels, houses built up 200m into the hill. It has a wonderful Riva promenade full of konobas, but few owned by locals. Šiptari and people from the former Yugo interior predominate, who make money here - tourist instant business. For good spots you have to go out of the main coastal streets, locals say. Their dialect is something special spoken only here in the wider Labin area (mix of Slovenian, Italian and Dalmatian language). Labin is also European famous for the unique Labin miners' uprising in 1922 against Italian fascism. The uprising lasted only 33 days, as Italian occupiers quickly smothered it. Later Labin-Istria came under Austro-Hungarian monarchy administration. Locals here are pure people, quite different from west Istria and don't like foreign influences much, not Zagreb, not Pula, which has gone completely astray with constant grabbing of tourist money and sky-high prices. In Tunarica camp I met a special guy who catches cuttlefish and octopuses and fish with a special Batana boat (double bottom, glass in between for underwater viewing, with 6m forks he stabs along the boat on the sea bottom. He says, hard job, in winter all on the mountain, but yeah I go alone to Lošinj in storm and freezing for fish hunt. Once he earned even 5000 kuna selling to restaurants, also one of the best seafood chefs around there. There was plenty of exploration of pristine nature, with Ubac peninsula, which has been a reserve for wild animals for years. If you have a boat too, then you have completely won with excellent sandy beaches and crystal sea, not far from Tunarica camp. Tourists this year are saving a lot, so the konoba in the camp was almost empty despite reasonable prices and pleasant young local waitress girls. One is even deciding for microbiology study in Ljubljana, where I helped her with the faculty enrollment form. Yeah, even Swiss (architecture designers) cook themselves in the camp. Seven days of wonderful vacation were positively filled with lots of impressions and things seen, experienced. The local said I learned more about them than they will for centuries, ha ha, I laughed. I did the other tour before Pula and through all Pula peninsulas to Kamenjak with 70km ridden.
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