Sibenik, Rogoznica and on to Tribunj
PAMARZI
Thu 2 Jul 2015 07:25
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For three days we swung to our anchor in Vinišće. We
had a day of high winds and a morning of thunderstorms and torrential rain but
mostly the sun shone the waters were calm and there were only a handful of
yachts in the bay all moored well away from us. Vinišće is a small fishing village its sheltered bay has
brought in visiting yachts and a handful of restaurants have appeared in
response. We had no sooner put our hook down when our first restaurateur
appeared alongside in his boat with details of his establishment. A pleasant
enough fellow but we preferred our second entrepreneur and it was to Kapinica
that we went that evening. Just a short trip from Pamarzi in the tender to the
north east side of the bay where mine host was waiting to take our line and seat
us in his shore side kabano. The food was excellent, the prices very reasonable
and the service charming, it became our regular haunt. The only annoyance was on
our last evening when before we left Pamarzi for supper a thirty foot motor boat
who had tried to anchor in various place around the bay dropped his hook well
within our swinging circle and put down less than half the amount of chain that
we had out. I called across in a friendly fashion whilst waving crossed arms to
indicate he could not park there. They upped anchor and drew near asking what
was wrong, obviously they had no idea. As patiently as I could I explained that
the wind direction might change, that we had out twice the chain that they did,
that we were a sail boat with eight tons of lead in a three metre keel, that
they weighed three or four tons and we weighed thirty two and that our swinging
patterns would be different! I’m still not sure they fully understood but they
slunk away and eventually moored at the head of the bay well away from us, thank
goodness.
On Thursday morning (25th June) we weighed anchor
having decided to continue our northing and headed towards the island
village of Rogoznica where there seemed to be a number of anchoring and berthing
possibilities. Actually Rogoznica is no longer an island as it has been joined
to the mainland by a narrow causeway. We had just about enough wind to motor
sail on the very slight seas, the breeze just off our starboard bow. Glancing
behind I saw a yacht on the same heading as us, similarly motor sailing but with
more throttle were catching us up. As the distance shortened we recognized her
as an Oyster 55. They eventually came alongside to admire Pamarzi and we had a
shouted conversation with them across the waves. They told us that they had been
cruising these waters for the last fifteen years! Sadly their destination that
day was Murter and when we told them where we were going they said oh you mean
‘Roger’s Knickers’. Upon which Lynn pointed out to them that I was Roger. We
decided upon the marina and berthed stern to on a long and virtually empty
concrete pontoon, although the rest of the marina was pretty full with big
yachts and motor yachts. We were eating aboard but once boat jobs had been
completed we went ashore to explore Marina Frapa. Pretty unusual and even quirky
it was to. The marina had been created as an island with a bridge to the
mainland. The long central pontoon paved as were all the pontoons in pink
granite crazy paving was covered by a canopy for its entire length. Ashore was a
complex of apartments, a hotel, swimming pool, restaurants,small shops and boat
services. The architectural style was unusual to say the least with filigree
iron covered bridges and ornamentation. We found a lively petang court and a
garden full of large sculptures along the shore front. We stayed for a couple of
days, exploring the island village of Rogoznica and its surrounds and enjoyed
yet another very good reasonably priced meal at one of the marina’s
restaurants.
We left our berth at Marian Frapa on Sunday morning and
sailed to Sibenik having secured a berth for three days at the DMarin Marina.
Sibenik is approached through a mile and a half long inlet which at times is
little more than a hundred metres wide but then opens out into a five mile long
bay with Sibenik in the centre of its north eastern bank. A river enters at its
northern end which is navigable for some miles up to the town of Skradin for
smaller boats, our mast is too tall for the bridges that one has to pass under.
We were intending to visit the Krka falls some miles upstream but the thought of
a long taxi drive and we learnt that they had become rather touristy put us off,
particularly when we heard that there were some more spectacular and less
commercialised falls further up the coast. We moored side on at DMarin making
ingress and egress very easy. A short taxi ride took us to the old town of
Sibenik with its spectacular early cathedral, fortresses, monasteries and
ancient buildings which we enjoyed exploring. We had been recommended to a
restaurant called Peregrini. Sitting on an airy terrace in the heart of the city
as the sun slipped lower in the sky and the air above us was filled with the
excited chirping of myriads of swallows chasing their insectivorous repast we
dined on salmon mousse topped with a white seafood foam, marinated beef sliced
so fine you could see through it served with tiny balls of pickled carrot and
and red wine mousse, followed by slow cooked beef cheek served on a bed of
celery puree and spinach and finally we oohed and aahed over coffee and
chocolate mascarpone mousse. The wine, the service, the setting were wonderful,
the food quite possibly the best we have had this year and the bill less than a
pub supper at our local.
Time came to leave and on Wednesday morning we slipped
our lines and slid away from DMarin. Although we explored a couple of bays on
the way to Tribunj non were suitable for us to anchor in so we found a marina
berth here and intend to stay for a couple of nights before heading further
northwards towards Zadar.
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