Split: Exploring the City

Center of Diocletian's Palace

After a relaxing evening in Split, we woke up prepared to tackle the city.  It was a crazy busy day!  Our day was broken up into three parts.  In the morning, we took a tour around Diocletian's Palace and the old town.  Then we took a bus out to Salona, the capital of the Roman province of Illyria.  Finally, we spent the late afternoon on a nearby rocky beach.

Diocletian's Palace was pretty neat.  We heard some "traditional" Dalmatian a capella singers in the vestibule of the palace and learned a lot about the history of the city and this area of the Roman empire.  The palace was created as a retirement home for one of the Roman emperors.  It's pretty impressive!

Our next stop was Salona.  It took us about 15 minutes to take a bus out to the ruins.  Salona was the capital of Illyria, so it was a pretty large city.  However, the weather was miserable.  It must have been 110 degrees and we were outside in fields of stone ruins with no semblance of shade anywhere around us.  The ruins were neat.  We got to see an old ampitheater, a forum, a theater, two basilicas, and more.  We only stayed out at the ruins for about an hour and a half because of the brutal heat.

To end the day we walked to a nice rock beach near town.  It took us about 45 minutes to find the beach because we (I) got turned around in the mass of unnecessary Croatian road construction and sidewalk-closings, but it was worth it.  After such a hot day, a dip in the cool ocean was exactly what we both needed. We spent about an hour and a half at the beach and then headed back to the hostel to get ready for dinner.  At dinner I had some of the best grilled calamari I've had in my entire life and Kati had some pretty good Croatian-style tuna.  Finally, after dinner we grabbed a white wine made from an indigenous grape called the Debit.  It was alright, but definitely nothing to write home about.