I got up early and made breakfast to take away with me. I wanted to take advantage of the cooler weather in the morning to walk around and explore the Marjan Forest Park. It was a good decision (despite being a bit tired and sleepy!) to take in more of the day and the cooler weather in the AM before it gets too oppressive by 11am/noon.
Weather is still warm but not too hot as I set out. Lots of stray cats out at this time. I guess they are trying to also move to where they wanna be before it also gets too hot! The train was on time again as usual and I had my pre-paid ticket ready – no issues. I walked along the water and wandered by the Matejuška place where fisherman hang out and someone was frying fish at like 745am! Apparently it’s a place people like to hang out.
Continuing towards the park, there is a fancy newly developed dock area with park benches all around, fresh pavement, new looking restaurants. Park benches are set up like lounge chairs and it’s very bike friendly. Reminded me of Docklands except with no tall buildings!
I had a magnificent walk through the park…4.5 hours wooo! Totally doable even for those who are just starting to get fit or haven’t exercised for awhile (like me haha). Lots of elements made it very pedestrian friendly:
- Paved road: literally a wide road shared with bikes, buses and cars. They were very careful most of the time and you had enough space on the shoulder of the road to walk. That was for about 40% of the walk around the perimeter of the park. If you walk along the same type of path through the park, there were basically no cars using the road in the morning when I went.
- Flat and gentle incline so a comfortable walk
- park attendants at checkpoints for cars throughout the park. So, someone to help with directions or whatnot if you need.
- Lovely views and nice to get out into the trees a bit, even if it’s not deep into a secluded forest. Lovely coastal view as well
- Easily accessible from the main city. I just walked from the train station straight into the park!
- FREE 🙂
- Very safe: besides the attendants, there was always a few people around too exercising or walking their pups.
- Clean park overall
- Separate bike path for part of the perimeter of the park
- Rest areas to picnic and leads to other beaches and a restaurant or 2 as well.
Not that many bathrooms except at the restaurant/cafe/bar called Kafić Obojena Svjetlost just before you get into the park and it was relatively clean in the morning I when I visited the facilities. TIP: Plot this on Google maps as a reference – no website available at this time. There are some portable toilettes but few and far between plus in this heat, they wouldn’t be desirable.
Overall, I walked all around the park and then through the park to see the peak for a view and then back down south and back around the park to get back to the main old town past that cafe again as well as past Matejuška place once more. Over 4.5 hours (7:45am-12:15pm), including walking to the park and then walking to the final restaurant for lunch, I walked 18.8km! 14.36 min/km… I’m happy about that! 🙂
I walked down to Konoba Hvaranin and it was fully booked out so on I went to Konoba Laganini. Quiet and a bit fancy but they were not phased by my workout wear. My waiter, Andrew, was a local and super friendly and professional. The menu had the cheapest Hvar Gregada I’ve seen at 215kn but I still couldn’t do it… That’s 28 euros and too hefty for soup in my mind. 
So I got a class of white wine which was dry and delicious and some black risotto, which is also a traditional dish. A few more people came in and they are very casually dressed so you needn’t worry. Maybe it’s more dressy for dinner.
Risotto is very al dente; I would have liked it softer but still very nice. Soaks in the squid in sauce so not salty but very flavourful. Many nice chunks of fresh calamari, not chewy at all! Good portion size too! I was very full even though I was hungry after a long walk. Lovely outdoor seating area and very relaxing.
TIP: 10% off if you paid in cash either in Euros, Kuna or Dollars 🙂 Luckily I had enough on me.
Then, I popped over to Stixberry for another iced smoothie as those were delectable! This time I got a raspberry & lemon one and the slightly more sour taste was very refreshing. Then got to the train station. Interestingly, the plastic bottled drinks were loaded upside down in the vending machine to ensure they pop out. Very cool. Train was on time and all easy as usual. There is always an attendant there to ensure people all leave the tracks safely and then, s/he would lift up a sign that is in a small circle with 2 arrows pointing up, like the fast forward/rewind symbol but pointing up.
Early back to home for a nap and I was feeling under the weather. I had a massive 3-hour nap and felt better. Took it easy: had a vegetarian egg scramble, updated my blog, uploaded photos, had heaps of tea. Early night too 🙂
Antics & Adventures 