Coming Back From Obscurity
by Wynne Crombie
Vis was christened Issa by 4th century BC Greek settlers. The town site and well-protected harbor of Vis, off the Croatian coast, was once the most powerful Greek colony in the Adriatic Sea, a city state with its own rulers and currency.
We were about to explore the interior. My husband, daughter and I had come to find the village of my Zitko ancestors, Jujeca … all ten dwellings of it.
Off limits to the world by Tito’s military, Vis’ lack of commercial development has kept it in a fairly pristine condition. But, that is about to change.
Our guide was Jurica Zitko, a community leader and paragliding instructor. Dimar, our driver, worked for the San Georgio Hotel where we were staying and just happened to have a Land Rover. Perfect!
Jurica and Dimar set out to take us to what they referred to as sights untouched by most tourists. Jurica began by reciting all the conquerors of Vis throughout the centuries: Turks, Italians, Greeks, Serbs…even the British. Now it’s back to being Croatian. The vestiges of each culture, he added, are the reasons Vis is so appealing.
As our Land Rover climbed the hills above Vis Town, we had a perfect view of Cold War bunkers nestled in several coves. Tito had used the island as a base for co-coordinating partisan military operations. Prior to that, the exiled Yugoslav government and the Allies used caves on the island as World War II bases.
Today, the simple sign, “Tito’s Cave”, at the entrance, announces his former presence. About two hundred steps bring you to Tito’s meeting rooms; another hundred will take you to his living quarters. . Now, all we saw of past military occupation were a few strands of barbed wire, bent over by winds and neglect.
As we rolled along off the main highway, (two 2-lane highways bisect Vis, connecting Vis town with Komiza), the road became decidedly bleaker. At one point, the Land Rover was pushing four-foot weeds out of our path. At the end, amidst wild thyme, rosemary and sage, was a missile launcher site left over from the Cold War – and a scrumptious panorama of the island Dimar brought the Land Rover to a halt amidst pine trees and crumbling walls.
No signs announced the remains of Fort St. George built by the British in 1813 to guard the harbor. After vanquishing Napoleon in 1815, they abandoned the Fort to the elements. Parts of it have crumbled, but most of it, including walls and cannons are still intact. We were the only people there. It seems commercialization has not yet taken hold.
Our attention then turned to the center of the island. Now, it is all vineyards, but during World War II, the British used it as an airfield. The pillars, with red and white stripes that used to mark the runway, can still be seen.
Julicka had inserted a stop at a local winery – a must he said. Marco Hrga, the owner, walked us through the process from grapes to bottles. Of course, nothing would do but a few samplings.
Wine production was halted during the communist era and vines were allowed to ruin. Now, there is great pride in new vineyards and wine is once more being produced.
And, just like Fort St. George, the remains of a 7th century church (St. Mary’s) were without identification or visitors. Only the pines kept it company. Next to it stood an abandoned farmhouse formerly occupied by the Allies.
The inland villages, are very tiny—stone houses with red tile roofs surrounded by vineyards, olive trees and cattle. The vines wind around the hillside and over stone walls. It is totally unspoiled. Life revolves around wine, olive harvests, fishing and local festivals. Wild herbs, such as thyme, rosemary and lavender are hardy perennials.
As the sun was setting, we reached Jujeca; a walking path took us the last few hundred yards. Julika was our interpreter when Antonio Zitko, age 87 said, “We are humbled you came all the way from America to visit us.” It was the end to a perfect day.
The next day, it was time to explore on foot. We couldn’t miss strolling over to the fifteenth century Franciscan Monastery on the narrow peninsula, Prirovo. My grandparents had been married in the church while great grandparents were buried in the surrounding churchyard. Walking among the gravesites is stepping through centuries. Communist stars on some graves showed that the old government still owns some property.
You cannot leave Vis without exploring The Archaeological Museum of Vis in Kut. The museum is housed in an Austrian fort built in 1842. Nineteenth century cannons still lay outside on the grass.
It contains incredible collections of two-thousand year old Greek and Roman artifacts.
I was immediately drawn to three large stone cisterns (used to store water) in the Museum’s courtyard. They stood adjacent to a large phythos (round earthen ware container) Divers had discovered the phythos, used for storage of agricultural goods, during a submarine survey in 1985. The sides had been pierced indicating that the phythos were used to store shells or other seafood.
In addition to savaged shipwrecks are prehistoric finds from the interior of the island. Many ancient graves were found on the site of the ancient (4th to 1st century B.C) Greek town of Issa… where Vis Town now stands. Since most of the graves were unplundered, many artifacts have been found in tact. The bronze coins go back to the 4th century B.C. and were mainly for local use.
But, it was the head of Artemis, the Virgin Goddess of the Hunt, in the museum itself, which first caught my attention. This 4th century bust sits in its own glass case where every angle can be observed. There are the whitish eyes, the smooth skin, and the wavy hair complete with ornamental headband. Her head, with the tiniest smile, is turned slightly to one side. Could she have been the Mona Lisa of her day?
This extensive collection features Greek and Roman pottery, jewelry, coins and sculpture. There are even some 6th century B.C. aryballos, or perfume bottles. Most of all, it gave us the opportunity to see a large collection of antiquity up close.
Our headquarters, the San Giorgio Hotel in Kut, was a twenty-minute walk from Vis Town. It was July. Yachts pulled up and its occupants dined al fresco on the decks. Tourists can have their pick… sailing, snorkeling, and swimming. Not to mention exploring nearby coves and caves. (Sunken ships from the 1866 War are a great draw, also, subs and an airplane or two) Incredibly the water is so blue, you can almost see to the bottom. All the beaches are rocky, but no one seems to mind.
The seniors here all seemed so….vital. Yet, smoking, drinking and sun exposure were so prevalent. When I asked about it, several locals told me the same thing. People do a lot of physical work and eat only what they need. In addition, generations of one family live together to provide emotional support.
A new twenty-four room hotel is being planned for Vis Town. Right now, Vis is unspoiled, but how long can it last?
Highlights of Island Vis archipelago daily excursion with lunch
If You Go:
♦ Croatia Airlines flies from most major European cities to Split. From Split there are frequent ferries to all the Croatian islands.
♦ Ferry from Split $7/one way (4.7 euro)
♦ Hydrofoil $16 one way. (11 euro)
♦ Dimar charged about $70/day.(45GBP) Jurica Zitko, a relative, came at no charge. (We found Dimar through the San Georgio Hotel in Kut.)
♦ Rental cars are available through the Ionios Agency in Vis Town (011-385-21-711-352)
♦ Croatian is the island’s language, but English, Italian and German are widely spoken.
About the author:
Wynne Crombie has a master’s degree in adult education and has been published in Travel and Leisure, Dallas Morning News Travel, Air Force Times, Travelthruhistory and Senior Living.
All photos are by Wynne Crombie:
Our Lady of Caves Church
Remnants of a British Fort (from War of 1812)
Allied Headquarter Building (WWII)
Our cousin Jurica Zitko and our driver Dimar
Relic of the Cold War
Village of Jujeca
Komiza Harbor
The ancient abbey rises out of sea and silt like the most triangular of mountains, seemingly balanced precariously on its rock without an inch of land wasted; and is big enough to be seen from the edge of its bay, over thirty kilometres (twenty miles) away. After I reached its public-access summit half way through my week-long holiday in France, Mont-St-Michel became the peak of my visit in more ways than one; a week that had started unplanned, and turned into an enjoyable trip down memory lane as well as one full of new sights.
I relived some of my traveling past by hiking about 10km from the airport to my hotel, on the southern edge of Saint-Malo. The local bus service does not cater for the airport. I crossed the Rance estuary below Saint-Servan, which was called Aleth when a Welsh monk called Maclow became its bishop in the 6th century. It was from Maclow that a new community to the north took its name; Saint-Malo has since incorporated Saint-Servan within its city boundaries. Brittany still has a Celtic identity.
The next day I moved to Saint-Malo’s only hostel, which is ideally situated only two blocks from the Grand Plage: two miles of beach between the walled old town and the district of Parame. There hadn’t been any room at the hostel on the Saturday night. I spent the next couple of days getting to know the landmarks and beaches of Saint-Malo.
At low tide you can walk out to Fort National, Île du Grand Bé and Fort du Petit Bé. The former was built during the reign of Louis XIV in the late 17th century, and was named Fort Royale until the French Revolution a century later. It is open to visitors during the summer. Malouin writer Chateaubriand, cited as the founder of French Romanticism, is buried on Île du Grand Bé; a hilltop cross marks the site, and views stretching for miles to the western edge of the bay explain its Romantic reason.
The cathedral is a central landmark and highlight, rising high above streets full of gift and clothes shops; crepe and seafood restaurants. Museums, a twentieth-century war memorial, and a central park are also of interest within the city walls; and regular plaques tell the historical significance of streets and buildings. Exiting the walls to the south, corsair sailing ships in the harbour are another reminder of the past.
I took the coach from Saint-Malo to Mont-St-Michel at 9.15 the next morning. It is the only bus on that route, and a 20 Euros return ticket is required. The journey takes 75 minutes, and with the return leaving at 15.45 you have about five hours at the Mont. You cross from Brittany to Normandy on the journey.
There were grey skies when we arrived, but the view was still spectacular. I walked up the narrow winding streets crammed with shops and tourists to the abbey gift shop, where you buy a ticket to enter the abbey and highest tier possible. On the ascent, the causeway linking the Mont with the mainland stretches out to the south, between the grey silt of low tide sea and the green vegetation of natural land; dividing the bay arcing to the east and west. To the north there is only the abbey towering above you, crowned by a golden Saint Michel statue.
On my penultimate day I took the local bus to the quiet town of Saint-Briac-sur-Mer, via Dinard, traveling north of the airport; and spent my final day among the gift shops of Saint-Malo. I walked down memory lane once more before leaving, entering the airport the same way I’d exited it the week before. Although this time I only walked from Dinard, after busing it across the Rance.
It is a sunny spring morning, perfect for a trip to Glendalough, an ancient “monastic city” set in a surround of Wicklow Mountains National Park, about an hour south of Dublin. Our local guide keeps us alert on the bus ride, pointing out the flora and fauna–the beauty of the yellow gorse which in other non-flowering seasons gets pelted with words such as weed, invasive, and noxious, the blossoming white thorn hedges, shades of green in the long vistas. As we zoom past farms and real estate signs, she chats about the state of the nation in this time of recession. “People cannot sell their properties; their mortgages are worth more than their houses. There is no longer a construction industry.”
But the Roman church had crossed the choppy waters of the Irish Sea. Representatives had been dispatched from Rome in the 400s and the escaped slave Patrick had returned as a missionary in that same century. Glendalough was established in the early 500s by Coemgen (Caoimhin), St. Kevin. His Gaelic name means “fair-begotten.” Does it refer to his royal Irish birth or to his good looks? As a child, Kevin was tutored by Petroc of Cornwall, a Welsh-born Irish-educated saint. Kevin lived and studied with the monks and was eventually ordained himself.
What compels me to forgo another day in Dublin for this side trip into the country? Being neither Irish nor Catholic nor even very religious, what can explain my interest in, my attraction to, this site? I have been to one of these ancient monasteries before–to Clonmacnoise on the River Shannon. Is it nostalgia, for that much earlier life-changing visit? It was from the friend who guided me to Clonmacnoise that I learned how to pronounce Glendalough. Glen da lock (loch). Not loo; it does not rhyme with slough, as I had incorrectly assumed that first time. Glenn da locha, the valley of the two lakes. The two communities were connected in the sixth century, by the friendship of Ceiran and Kevin. Both locations feature thirty-metre-tall round towers, thought to have been used like beacons, for navigating, as bell towers to signal distress, as safe storage for valuables such as psalters and illuminated manuscripts, and as places of refuge during times of attack. The monasteries include hermit cells, probably the only constructs that either saint actually touched. St. Kevin’s is a cave above the lake. The chapel, St. Kevin’s Kitchen, the rest of the existing ruins, date from between the ninth and twelfth centuries.
Both monasteries contain a collection of ruined buildings with designations such as cathedral, church, chapel, along with a profusion of Celtic crosses and gravestones. Here those who found a community while living are surrounded still in a community of the dead. Both sites have high crosses–the Cross of the Scriptures at Clonmacnoise and St. Kevin’s Cross at Glendalough, and evidently, a second high cross, the Market Cross, in the visitor centre.
Just outside the double-arched gateway is a midway of tents and caravans. Linen tea towels, woolen “jumpers,” potato scones, postcards. Today the market of souvenir and food vendors does not even make me think of the temple and the moneylenders. After all, everyone has to eat, and it is a recession, and loaves and fishes no longer magically appear.
When the castle was built, Kinsale was a busy port, doing much trade with the Continent, and King Henry VII had granted Maurice Fitzgerald, Earl of Desmond the right to impose a levy on incoming cargoes … especially wine! For this reason, Desmond Castle had the alternative name of the Custom House. The Desmonds rebelled against the Crown in the late 16th Century, so lost this right, along with their lands. Shortly afterwards, the castle figured in what was to become known as the Nine Years War.
In the 17th and 18th Centuries, the castle was used as a prison for Spanish and French PoWs during a succession of Continental wars. It even housed a few American prisoners from the War of Independence. In between wars, it was used to house ‘home grown’ felons, until the 1840s, when it became a Famine Relief Centre and a workhouse, then used for various military purposes until it fell into disuse.
