Is this the imprisioned Australian? No, definitely Australian ,but not imprisioned.
Is this little fish or one of its friends the poor imprisoned Australian? No , just a really cute aquarium in the shopping centre.
Zagreb was , and is the centre of Croatia business and culture. The characteristic of the city, it is most proud of , is its walks and green spaces. Today we thought we too should experience these. We walked to the railway station through gardens. It is an impressive structure once on the Orient Express route.
Just along from the railway is the Botanical Gardens. It is here, hiding among the plants ,we found the imprisioned Aussie.
Here?
There?
On on the bridge,? No , that’s Sue and Pauline admiring the tortoises and hoping the little one can get up the bank.
No over here, quickly, it’s trapped!
It’s a Wollomi Pine. Somehow Europe lost all of theirs, (so careless) , so had to trap one of ours. Poor little pine tree. We reassured it by saying it was surrounded by its European cousins , and , when it was just a bit bigger, it would be allowed out of its “playpen”.
Further along, there was a heated glass house with huge lily pads and pretty lilies in bloom.
How would you like these roots growing under your house?
In the afternoon, Pauline and John bravely ventured out to discover the mystery of driving from one country , and coping with tolls. It seems you need green stickers and green cards, purchased from a service station, before you leave the country.
We deserted them and went to the Museum of Illusions.
Would you like a head on a platter?
Same room, giant or dwarf
Lake Bled tomorrow. Mike and John driving with a help from the magic GPS, we will be the first class passengers in the back. See you there.😉
It is hard to describe Zagreb. There are some beautiful buildings that survived the earthquake of the 1880, and the following occupation of the Communist, after World War 2 . A perfect example is the huge Cathedral. It’s steeples were damaged by the earthquake and then quite a lot of repair work was completed by 1900’s. Quirky fact, most of the clocks stopped at just after 7.00 am and never started again.
At present Zagreb is enjoying the last of the warm weather before winter. There were markets during the day, lots of people enjoying coffee at restaurants and cafes, and tonight there was music in the main market square….(it was actually warmer tonight than this morning), The atmosphere is of a positive lively city.
Just outside our hotel is this beautiful garden that extends three city blocks. There are trees,gardens and fountains at one end with formal,buildings dividing it. The railway is at one side and the entrance to the main square at the other. There was an amazing clock that told the time, temperatures and had a barometer.
A bit chilly ,but colder tomorrow . We are off to see the rest of the gardens, and who knows whatever else we will see.
As you can see, there are a lot of people. We did not even attempt to enter any of the buildings as the queues were extremely long, and that was without the official tour groups.
Souvenir markets are all the time, Monday is fruit, Tuesday is fish. We were told to go early for the best choice, think I might be busy.
Today was our last major train trip. We spent the morning in Verona exploring the Roman fort and other buildings on the archeological site. On our way we passed two churches , built in the 1100’s ,which of course have been modified by different generations and fashions. Both were very simply decorated outside, but beautifully painted with murals inside.
Stairs, where are the stairs. Of course, what would the day be without stairs.
They were all downhill. It was a lucky day, because it was first Sunday of the month , when the archeological museum is only 1€ and , it was open. The Museum has been built in an old monastery, and the monastery , had been built into a Roman theatre. Many parts of the building have been excavated, but it is still progressing.
So tomorrow we will explore Venice, starting early , before those pesky tour groups arrive.
This was part of the town wall . The wall itself was added to with new gates ,but eventually ,as the city grew was demolished.Now they have remove 2-3 metres of building materials to reveal the hidden past below the street.
The murals in This church had marks where the plaster had been nicked so the new plaster could be put on top. The murals were only discovered 100 years ago and decades of plaster were removed.
Tempting as this seems to weary travellers, we resisted. Dinner was at a local, not tourist restaurant. It did not open till seven and even then the owners were surprised we wanted to come and eat then. We avoided such delicacies as horse meat and cuttlefish, were doubtful about the cockerel, no salmon so took safe route of beef. Perfect.
The next adventure before we catch the train to Venice in the afternoon
like in Heidi.
As you guessed, bags are packed and we travelled to Zermatt.
We decided to get a little closer to this famous mountains by catching the Gornergrat Train. This takes you up to just about 1000 metres below the peak. There was snow lying in patches even though it was sunny and quite warm. The crevasses were easier to see as cracks in the glacier. The view, you ask.
Are you astounded at the beauty of nature? We were.
At the end of the day , we retraced our morning journey , but returned to Lauterbrunnen via Grindelwald , and its views of the valleys. Tomorrow , just catching the train to Zermatt is going to feel a little quiet after such a great day.