This year I decided to take a late summer or early September vacation in Croatia, including a short stay in Opatija. Opatija is a small town in the north of the Croatian coast and is known as one of the most beautiful pearls of Croatian tourism with more than 160 years of tourism tradition. The town is located at the foot of the mountain Učka the eastern side of the Istrian peninsula.
The town of Opatija became a touristic site in the middle of the 19th century, and the first tourist object was Villa Angiolina, where Empress Maria Anna, wife of the Austrian Emperor Ferdinand I, spent almost three months, which drew the attention of the Viennese aristocracy to Opatija. The architecture of Opatija is made up of Habsburg villas in which numerous hotels are located. The first hotel Kvarner was built in 1884 and was initially intended as a sanatorium for lung diseases for dignitaries and nobility. Already in those early days, Opatija was known as the imperial climatic health resort. The crystal palace of the Kvarner Hotel, renovated after a fire in 1919, is still used for numerous cultural events.
Opatija has a very romantic sculpture of a girl with a seagull on the rocks in the sea. It is the most photographed sculpture in Croatia, and interestingly the place where it stands was previously home to the statue of Madonna del Mare, placed to watch over the soul of a Count Arthur Kesselstadt, who disappeared at sea in a spring storm in 1891.
I would recommend a visit to Opatija to all my friends and readers of this blog. However, I would advise a short stay because Opatija is an extremely expensive destination. I stayed in a three-star hotel and I paid 140 euros per night for bed and breakfast. On top of that, prices in restaurants are as high as in London.
However, this does not take away from the objective beauty of Opatija. Personally, I am also connected to Opatija by memories of a youthful love. I haven't seen my first boyfriend David, that lives in Opatija, for more than 30 years, and I didn't know how he would react when I contacted him. We met and over a wonderful dinner we reminisced about shared memories, but also shared the important things that happened to us in more than three decades of life.
Finally, it is not surprising that I left Opatija filled with beauty, happiness and friendship in my heart, with a promise to myself that I would return with my Sara.
Love,
Kristina
Thursday, September 8th, 2022
Opatijo bajna
Ove sam se godine odlučila na kasno ljetni ili rano rujanski odmor u Hrvatskoj u koji sam uvrstila odmor u Opatiji. Opatija je maleni gradić na sjeveru Hrvatske obale i poznata je kao jedan od najljepših bisera hrvatskog turizma sa više od 160 godina turističke tradicije. Gradić je smješten podno planine Učka na istočnoj strani Istarskog poluotoka.
Grad Opatija je započeo sa turizmom sredinom 19. stoljeća, a prvi turistički object bio je Vila Angiolina u kojoj je carica Maria Anna, supruga austrijskog cara Ferdinanda I, provela gotovo tri mjeseca što je skrenulo pažnju bečke aristokracije na Opatiju. Arhitekturu Opatije čine habsburške vile u kojima su smješteni brojni hoteli. Prvi hotel Kvarner izgrađen je 1884. godine, a inicijalno imao namjenu sanatorija za plućne bolesti za uglednike i plemstvo. Vec u tim ranim danima Opatija je prozvana carskim klimatskim lječilistem. Kristalna dvorna hotela Kvarner, uređena nakon požara 1919. godine i danas služi za brojna kulturna događanja.
Opatija ima veoma romantičnu skulpturu djevojke sa galebom na stijenama u moru. To je najfotografiranija skulptura u Hrvatskoj, a ima i svoju povijest. Naime na tom mjestu na stijenama prethodno je stajao kip Madonne del Mare, postavljen da bdije nad dušom grofa Arthura Kesselstadta, nestalog u proljetnoj oluji na moru 1891.
Posjet Opatiji preporučila bih svim svojim prijateljima i čitateljima ovog bloga. Ipak, savjetovala bih kratak boravak jer je Opatija iznimno skupo odredište. Ja sam boravila u hotelu sa tri zvjezdice i noćenje sa doručkom platila sam 140 eura za noć. Povrh toga cijene u restoranima su jednako visoke kao u Londonu.
Ipak, to ne umanjuje izvarednu i objectivnu ljepotu Opatije koju treaba doživjeti. Mene za taj divni gradić vežu i sjećanja na jednu mladenačku ljubav. Svog prvog dečka Davida koji tamo živi, nisam vidjela više od 30 godina i nisam znala kako ce reagirati kad mu se javim. Našli smo se i uz jednu divnu večeru evocirali smo uspomene, ali i podijelili ono bitno što nam se događalo u više od tri decenije života.
I na kraju, zaista ne čudi da sam Opatiju ostavila ispunjena ljepotom, srećom i prijateljstvom u srcu uz obećanje samoj sebi da cu se vratiti sa svojom Sarom.
S ljubavlju,
Kristina
Četvrtak, 8. rujna 2022.
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