Castles in the Air

Veliki Tabor

Views from the castle

Friday was another rainy day so we decided to go for a drive rather than a walk. We stopped at the little bakery shop on the corner and bought some pastry with meat and cheese fillings for lunch. They cost about 5kn or less than $1 each and were delicious! We headed north out of Zagreb for our first stop – Veliki Tabor.(http://www.velikitabor.hr/html/english/veliki_tabor_castle.htm ) It is a large fortress sitting on the top of a hill. To get there we wound through villages and farms. This is wine region (whites) and most of the farm houses looked very prosperous and well maintained. The vineyards were planted on the steep hillsides. When we got to Veliki Tabor we found it wrapped in scaffolding with “construction, do not enter” signs. So we walked around the outside. It appears the castle is being completely refurbished and should be great when they are done. It was built in the 14th century as a fortress and then transformed into a residential palace in the 16th century.

Our next stop was Trakošćan. This was after a little detour (read that getting lost) and ending up at the border with Slovenia. The border guard was very nice and showed us where we went wrong. Although I did get the feeling he was going to be rolling on the floor laughing as soon as we were out of sight. I don’t take full responsibility for getting us lost – the maps all show different towns along the way and almost none of the roads have markers as to what they are and if they did, the maps don’t so who would know where they were anyhow.

Anyway, we ended up at Trakošćan with all the tour busses. (http://www.trakoscan.hr/sazetak_en.asp don’t forget to click on the little “English” flag for English) Fortunately most of them were leaving so we didn’t have to fight our way through the castle. (I don’t think the children here ever actually spend any school time in class. Everywhere we have been there have been giant groups of them.) Anyway, back to the castle: Trakošćan is another castle on a hill. This one was open as a museum and was very beautiful. It was also built in the 14th century as a fortress and then in the 2nd half of the 19th century turned into a Neo-Gothic residence in the middle of a conservation park and forest. The swallows had built nests in the arches around the towers and we could see them feeding their babies. The castle was very fabulous but not in the same overdone style as the Castle Peleş in Romania was.

Our third castle for the day was at Varaždin, a city near the Hungarian border. This one was started even earlier than the other two and sits in the city near the river rather than up on a hill. It is surrounded by earthworks which once contained a moat. The castle was closed by the time we got there so we were saved from having to convince ourselves that it was really OK to not go in – one castle tour a day is lots. So we went and wandered through the old town admiring the beautiful old buildings.


A little P.S. for those of you who are wondering where I am getting all those cute little letters with the various hats: Windows contains a thing called “Character Map” and it has lots and lots of things like that in every font. Go to your start menu and search for “Character Map” you can then copy and paste the little devils into your document.