Rovinj for 2

It has to be Rovinj! It was already summer and me and my boyfriend still hadn’t booked anything for our first more-than-3-days-getaway together. It was a big deal and here we were, with a month to go and prices higher than London’s sparkly Shard for about any sunny destination. One thing led to another and we found ourselves in Rovinj, Croatia, a place we have never heard of, in a country we never really bothered to know much about.

It turns out Rovinj is this small historic town in the Istrian peninsula, which is actually really well-known (not for ignorants like me, it seems), particularly by the neighbouring Italians, who often spend swap their scenery with the one across the Adriatic. You see that from the get-go with all the pictured-menu restaurants along the port, all inviting you to serve some truly special pizza, pasta or gelato. But once you step in the historic centre, it’s a completely different story: narrow, cobble streets full of artsy boutique shops and quirky restaurants, colourful window shields, stripy street cats and peaks of blue water in-between buildings. Nonetheless, this enchanting old town still doesn’t make you feel like a local with the flood of tourists being their enthusiastic selves and trying to take pictures while holding/ pushing/ picking up an island far in the distance.

So, I rented a bike and decided to admire this wonder from the outside, in a hidden spot far away from the eagerness of the masses. Yet, my unprepared self had no clue about the possibility of renting a bike, the existence of the national park nearby or about how insanely clear the water is, so gems were surely not even close to being written on a list. I followed the road into Zlatni rt (Golden Cape) Forest Park, at the advice of a local.

(ad)Venturing away on the barely visible side tracks, I come across one of the most stunning beaches I have ever seen. It seemed as if it was made for 2 people: small, in the shape of a semi-circle, secluded and carved into the solid rocks, below ground level. So you felt protected and hidden, but had the whole sea in front of your eyes, giving you a burning feeling of freedom. It was one of those places that you see in movies and instantly lose hope (if you ever had any) that you’ll ever find anything like that. So we just sat there and drifted away, letting the sun and waves do their job.

That was the perfect angle to see Rovinj from.