New Year's Day

Hello first day of 2024!

Zagreb took this day seriously with no shops open so we could not resupply our groceries. Mid morning we headed out into town to locate the attractions of note as per the guidebook in the apartment. There is a canon fired at mid day every day which we heard but didrsee as we walked into town.

As we hit the main square we could hear marching drums, and just as we arrived we had a great view of a small group of military looking personnel with a few of them on horses. I later looked this up to find this was the Crabat Regiment which was a 17th century soldiers parade where they change the guard. These days only performed on weekends and three other days throughout the year of which New Year's Day is one of them. We found the Dolac farmers market but it was closed today.

We then walked up to the old town to see St Mark's Church, with this old town nothing like the ones we have seen everywhere else. To enter we passed through the only remaining stone gate entrance to the old town built in 1266. There is a tiny little chapel built into it with a few church pews off to the side.

Zagreb has been a weird mix of new construction, loads of old buildings virtually shrink wrapped as though something is happening to it, and most other buildings in a state of disrepair and in urgent need of significant maintenance, and covered in graffiti at street level. It looks drab, and grey and uninviting, not charming like the other places in Europe we have been to. Kind of like a poor man's Vienna. That said, there are so many online reviews saying how great it is and their reasons relate to aspects we are not seeing now because it is winter.

After lunch in the main restaurant and coffee bar strip, we were so cold we all came home to warm up. There is a weather station in the park down the road which has been maintained since the 1800s. It told us it was 7° on our way home, but definitely felt a lot colder. I came home and got straight into bed under the doona to warm up, for several hours!Read more