If you’re at all interested in the sorts of things that will take place on a cruise ship on a sea day then the following scans of Horizon, P&O‘s daily programme delivered to the room each evening beforehand, may enlighten you. These sorts of activities are fairly standard not just on P&O but on most lines, and enough people obviously take part in enough of them for the cruise lines to vary them very little. We enjoy the quizzes but very little else, and that’s fine by us because a day at sea on our balcony, catching some sun if there’s any around, reading our books, listening to the sound of the ship breaking through the waves, sipping the odd drink or two, is the perfect counterpoint to those days ashore engaging in more cultural, social, or physically-demanding activities.

We decided to eat at The Glass House for this last night, a casual dining venue on P&O ships that does a small selection of usually very high quality food for not much money. I’ve written about this particular experience before (see: P&O Azura Fly-Cruise To Malta: The Good And The Bad) but I’ll go over it again because I know you well enough by now to know you’ve no intention of clicking that link.

We were seated fairly quickly in a little, tucked away section of the restaurant, and there were two other couples sat nearby. Nods, small smiles, that sort of thing. And we waited. And waited. Waiters rushing around everywhere but nobody in our little section. Twenty minutes passed before one member of one of the other couples got up to find a waiter and soon after someone came along to take a drinks order. Wine is good value on P&O ships so we ordered a bottle and started to drink while we waited for someone to take our food order. A starter arrived for one of the other couples but we’d almost finished the bottle of wine by the time anyone asked what food we wanted so we ordered a second bottle and decided we’d skip the starters and just go straight for a mains and dessert.

One hour and forty minutes after sitting down, and well into our second bottle of wine, food turned up for our three tables. My wife’s was lovely, mine had clearly been prepared too early and left out under a heat lamp but I ate the plate of disappointment anyway, and at least it wasn’t as bad as one of the other couples whose medium rare steak was burnt to a crisp. They summoned the head waiter and gave him a piece of their minds then left. The other couple also left after eating their mains and I jokingly asked why they weren’t staying for dessert; by this point they’d been there two hours.

We were pretty hammered, quite amused by the whole dining debacle on Azura, and decided we’d stick around for dessert just for the hell of it and that at least was very nice.

However, yeah, this Glass House experience was just hilariously awful.

We dropped off into Malabar to finish this final evening and got to listen to Andrew Browning performing as George Michael. He had the look and the voice and was nice enough to hang around and pose for photographs.

One final sight on the way back to our room was that of a fellow passenger who’d clearly been married or renewed vows on the ship. She was happy enough to pose for a photograph too.

And so to the following morning, back in Valletta where it all started a week before, and the only time on any cruise where we’re up around the same time as the sun. We’re very much night owls.

That brings this 2023 Adriatic cruise on Azura to an end. Food and service on the ship were not the best but unlike a lot of our fellow cruise bloggers we are experiences and destination-first cruisers so we can overlook this to some extent; these things can and do happen and you just have to be in the wrong venue at the wrong time on the wrong ship. So, for us, I’d have to say that this cruise that allowed us to visit Malta, Croatia, and Slovenia, all for the first time, was fabulous.

We’d not left it until the very last shuttle bus to return back to the cruise port on account of us not being insane but that didn’t stop it being a very packed bus arriving back alongside the ship at around the same time that a number of tour buses were also returning to drop off more passengers. Boarding was therefore not swift – not bad, but a bit more shuffling than you’d like – and the likelihood of getting into a lift to rise the five floors to our room in any short time was poor. We therefore did what we like to do a lot in this sort of situation: we walked a few floors, then stopped for a drink to break up the climb. Actually, if the gangway had been towards the centre of the ship instead then we’d have walked forward and used the forward bank of elevators to get to nearer our room but that wasn’t the case this time around so a drink in Brodie’s was the answer, followed by another one to then take up to our room.

The sail away from Dubrovnik wasn’t the most impressive by a long shot but we got to see a decent view of the Franjo Tuđman Bridge, named after Croatia’s first president, and of the USNS Carson City, an aluminium, catamaran-design, fast expeditionary vessel. We like bridges and we like ships so this was pleasant even if neither were fabulous examples of design in their respective fields.

It was hard not to be reminded of leaving Montenegro many years before when looking at steep and rocky hills dotted with pale buildings with orange roofs along the Croatian coastline out of Dubrovnik, although the former was far prettier and we had far better weather for it. A light but solid cover of cloud had come in just as the day started to cool down.

The waterway approach to Dubrovnik clearly wasn’t particularly dangerous or tricky for ships to navigate as our pilot wasn’t aboard Azura for very long at all before re-boarding his boat and zooming off back to land.

We didn’t have a lot of Croatian coastline to enjoy before the cruise ship made the turn to the south that left us with a more simple view of nothing but the Adriatic Sea but we spent all that time out on our balcony because it’s one of the reasons we book a balcony cabin on cruise ships for.

After we’d got ourselves showered and dressed for the evening but before we headed out for some food and drink and entertainment we were treated to a sunset, the colours of which reminded us a little of cruising past Argentina many years before, but only a little bit. Nothing will ever truly compare to that particular experience.

To finish, dinner then for this penultimate night aboard Azura, and because P&O Cruises are still a bit old-fashioned in this respect this meant reluctantly donning the tuxedo and formal dress for the pair of us so as to not be severely limited in venues we’d be graciously allowed to attend. We don’t mind the odd formal night and we quite enjoy them when everyone is free to dress as much or as little as they like, but throwing in restrictions is a dated concept in cruising that’s trying to appeal to a younger demographic and it needs to be thrown overboard.

Anyway, it was a celebration night meal, and it was at least nice to see some effort made from the cruise line to reward those who’d made the somewhat enforced effort to dress for the occasion.

There will be one more post to come in this Adriatic cruise travelogue series and that will cover the final day at sea on the way back to Malta and some final thoughts about the week-long cruise as a whole, because that’s the traditional way to wrap these travel writings up around here.

But I’m getting ahead of myself here.

With nothing firmly planned for the day we could afford to have a little bit of a lie-in, a leisurely breakfast, then head down to the shuttle bus into the old town area of Dubrovnik when we saw that the queue had died down. We were docked near the Dr. Franjo Tuđman Bridge and had briefly entertained the idea of walking to where all the more interesting things to see were – under four kilometres – and if the route had been a flat one then we might have, but flat it was not.

We didn’t see the queue diminishing in size at all after breakfast and didn’t want to keep our steward from cleaning our room any longer so eventually headed down and joined a long line in the sunshine. There were some grumblings about not enough shuttle buses being put on but I don’t think we were out there too long. Once we’d actually taken the bus we realised that the small drop-off point near the old town was a limiting factor to how many buses could reasonably make the journey to and from the ship without blocking the road up. Locals in popular cruise destinations get grumpy enough as it is without that sort of thing adding to their frustrations.

We were dropped off close to the sixteenth century Pile Gate and joined the crowd threading its way through it and into the old town. We immediately saw signs for the Wall Walk, converted the value from Euros to Sterling, said “Fuck that for a laugh!”, and decided we’d explore inside the walls instead for no money. We’re not tight – far from it – but we like to get value for money, and the cost was hard to justify for what we imagined would mostly be a slightly elevated view of what we were going to see anyway but with less access to anything and likely no shade at all. Nah, not for us.

Dubrovnik was exceedingly pretty at first glance with walls of white stone glaringly bright under the bright sun. Much of the city was flattened in an earthquake in 1667 but some gorgeous rebuilding work took place to produce the incredible sights you can see today. That earthquake did cause some loss of history and architecture, naturally, so there are elements of fifteenth century Onofrio’s Large Fountain – the most obvious structure we first saw upon passing through the gate into the city – that are lost forever.

We slowly wandered the length of Stradun as it looked like the main street of Dubrovnik’s historic old town based on the volume of fellow tourists, peering down each alley we passed on the lookout for anything of interest. Surprisingly, we didn’t see a lot, but we were loath to divert from the main route at first as it seemed we were more likely to see “the big sights” of Dubrovnik by sticking to the wider thoroughfare.

We reached the end of Stradun and the first of three churches that we would end up taking a look inside. This one was St. Blaise’s Church, named for the patron saint of Dubrovnik, and delightfully Baroque, architecturally. A Romanesque church had stood on this spot since the middle of the fourteenth century when the Black Death made its appearance and it was felt a church might just remind God to protect the people (don’t roll your eyes; people don’t think vaccines protect you these days and we’re all supposed to be a lot smarter than medieval peasants), and you might be thinking “Ah, yeah, but you’ve already mentioned an earthquake so I guess it didn’t survive” and, no, it actually did. However, Blaise’s by name and, as it turns out, Blazes by nature, because in 1706 it burnt to the ground instead.

Back into the Croatian sunshine, a quick check of the map, and we headed in the direction of the old port area and bastions surrounding it. Eastwards, in other words.

Now, I told myself when I began writing this travel account of our day in Dubrovnik that I would not mention Game of Thrones, partly because everyone mentions Game of Thrones, but largely because we’ve never seen Game of Thrones and therefore knew nothing about Game of Thrones, but I have now mentioned Game of Thrones five times in this paragraph and that’s because we started associating Dubrovnik with fabulous doors and decided we were going to call it the Game of Doors city instead. I suspect it won’t catch on.

The port area of the old town of Dubrovnik was exactly how you’d expect a boat-filled marina in front of a stone landing area beside high-walled fortifications to look, and yes, we always like to see the sea whenever we’re travelling anyway, but it was also nice to get away from the glare of the solid white stone architecture of the city.

To the second church next, or more accurately, Dubrovnik Cathedral. Unlike the first church we’d seen, the cathedral that had formerly stood on this spot was mostly destroyed in the 1667 earthquake and had needed rebuilding. Interestingly, the basilica that had not survived had been partially funded by Richard the Lionheart as thanks for surviving a shipwreck just off the coast during his return from the Third Crusade.

The façade of the cathedral had some lovely Corinthian order columns and a pair of statues erected high above the main entrance. One was of Joseph and the other of St. Blaise. A gold-plated arm, leg, and skull of St. Blaise are amongst the building’s most important relics although we never got to see them.

We carried on in an approximately clockwise, generally random walk through Dubrovnik’s narrow alleys, constantly on the lookout for… anything.

Now, if we’d paid a lot more attention to the map than we had, if we’d zoomed in enough for items to appear, if we’d done any sort of proper research beforehand, then we might have noticed that we were remarkably close to a maritime museum and an aquarium, and we would absolutely have visited them. But none of that happened and we headed off another way entirely.

We found another church. You knew one was coming because I’d already mentioned there’d be three.

Baroque in style, once more, this was the Church of St. Ignatius, and probably my favourite of the churches in Dubrovnik that we saw. I’ve only shared a few photos from inside it but there seemed a bit more atmosphere and more variety in its relatively small interior. Work had begun on the clearance area for its construction in the seventeenth century when the earthquake put a halt to proceedings, and work didn’t subsequently begin until the next century making it the most modern of the three buildings we visited. The church’s belfry houses Dubrovnik’s oldest bell, cast in 1355.

One thing we did spot on our map was a bar just outside the city walls, apparently with lovely views out to sea, and a must-visit place according to lots of people who visit Dubrovnik, and it was close by so we headed towards it. We found it without incident but to say it was popular would be doing a disservice to the word popular. It was heaving. I took one photo from outside the wall we’d passed through and that was in the split second that I wasn’t being jostled on the narrow steps down to the location. It looks quiet and peaceful. It was not.

The idea of having a drink in a bar was now firmly in our heads – I’m not fooling anyone here it’s always firmly in our heads – and we could see that we’d mostly wandered the insides of the expensive walls as far as interest appeared, so we tried to work out the most direct route back towards the tourist heart of Dubrovnik’s old town as that was where we could see bar symbols appear on the map with enough frequency to suggest we might get a seat out of the sun somewhere. It was quite surprising how high in elevation we’d climbed without completely being aware of it.

We passed a couple of busy places that seemed to primarily cater for those wanting to eat before suddenly spotting a sign that said “Local Beer” and that won us over. Shade, beer, and toilets which we were both in need of by this time as it had been thirsty work walking around the hot, bright city.

The drinks were fine but what we had amounted to the limit of what was available so I did a little more checking on the map while we sat and rested and located somewhere that sounded a lot more interesting. A few minutes walk brought us back along Stradun then down one of those narrow alleys we’d bypassed earlier in the day, and then to Glam Bar.

We were immediately reminded of our visit to Kotor years before, sitting outside a bar in a narrow, stone-walled alley, drinking beer. It was cool and the range of very local beers and other national offerings was huge and very varied. We thought we might stay for a couple of drinks but three people sat down next to us; a man a little younger than us and his two more elderly parents, all fellow cruise passengers, though we hadn’t seen them before this. It turned out that he was a keen craft beer drinker too and his parents were tolerating his visit to this bar. We all got talking, and then we realised that with three of us keen to try as much as possible we could start sharing drinks (not glasses; we’re not mental). His parents suggested they go back to the ship and leave him with us until the last bus home but he decided not to do that, though not after the lot of us had probably worked our way through the vast majority of ales on offer with some of the pastry sours being some of the most wonderful things we’d tasted. Glam Bar was a fantastic place to drink in Dubrovnik for craft beer lovers.

We didn’t leave it quite to the last shuttle bus back to Azura but it wasn’t far off before we took the short walk back to where the bus would be and joined the queue nearly as long as the one we’d been part of in the morning.

We liked Dubrovnik but we weren’t wowed by it in quite the same way a lot of other people seem to be, but a few hours and no planning always comes with that risk. The city’s reconstruction following its earthquake lent everything a similar look that was initially wonderful, but soon became a little bit monotonous. There wasn’t enough of a variety in the architectural design we’d have liked to see.

However, we missed out on the museum and aquarium that would have changed things up a lot, and we didn’t take time to wander up and down all the alleys that likely hid a multitude of interesting treasures. That means that this is a city we could and should return to and explore more some other time, and we know for certain they’ve got at least one place that does fantastic beer. We still won’t do the walls walk at that price, though.

In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll be back aboard the ship for the sail away from Dubrovnik with a sea day to look ahead to at the end of our week in the Adriatic.

A mandatory photograph of Azura is below. There’s an old maritime law about having to take a photograph of your cruise ship from the port as you get back on and us cruise and travel bloggers don’t like to flout with these casually-enforced rules just in case we’re never allowed to board.

The view from our starboard-side balcony before we departed didn’t offer much for the eyes to feast upon but a flat blue sea and the silhouettes of hills isn’t bad nonetheless. Some locals were also out and fishing near the port.

After casting off, though, Azura did a one-eighty and proceeded northwards along the Croatian coastline bringing views of distant mountain ranges and the signs of human construction and habitation that inevitably forms near the sea.

Rhapsody was in the port of Zadar too. A cruiseferry operated by GNV now and capable of carrying around two and a half thousand passengers and over seven hundred vehicles, Rhapsody is of some interest in having previously collided strongly enough in Marseille during strong winds to take on water and list in the harbour. At that time she’d been known as the Napoleon Bonaparte and she was eventually bought by MSC, refloated, then sold to GNV.

The remainder of the sail out was spent just enjoying the sights from the balcony – it’s one of the reasons to choose balcony cabins when cruising – and seeing if we could recognise any parts of the old town of Zadar we’d explored earlier in the day as we cruised past.

I’ll finish with a look at the evening’s dinner aboard Azura because there will always be someone who wants to see pictures of main dining room menus and the food on a cruise ship.

There’s just one more port of call on this short Adriatic cruise aboard Azura and in the next post in this cruise travelogue series I’ll cover what we saw on a day in Dubrovnik.

This post will simply serve to show some phone photos of some of the exhibits you could expect to see should you visit Zadar, and if you’ve a passing interest in ancient history or if you’ve gained some interest just from seeing what’s out in the public spaces outside the museum, then this is a museum that’s well worth a look around. It’s very cheap to enter but, at least when we were there (and likely because it was cheap and wanted to avoid card transaction fees), it was a cash only establishment, whether for the entrance fee or any of the souvenirs in the gift shop. As we only had a little physical money on us this limited what we’d have liked to do which would have been to buy something in addition to looking around. That’s us, though, and I know that other people – like the museum – are still positively twentieth century about the whole money situation.

From a window on the first floor of the museum we could see the forum outside, the church and tower, and people enjoying the area, and you can see for yourself just how utterly beautiful Zadar was on the day of our visit.

Zadar was the penultimate port of call on our 2023 Adriatic cruise aboard Azura and we’d decided not to take any excursions while visiting. This meant we could be a bit more leisurely about waking up, enjoying the sights from our balcony, having breakfast, then making use of the shuttle bus service to get us to the city as where we were was not even remotely close. I reckon we were docked about five kilometres away from anything you’d really like to see and, having taken the bus, it’s not a route I’d have enjoyed walking. I mean, I don’t particularly enjoy walking anywhere at the best of times but it wouldn’t be a visual feast for the eyes for anyone who does anyway.

The bus dropped us off at the very tip of the peninsula on which the old town of Zadar was situated, and it would be from this same spot that we’d be picked up later in the day. The amount of blue everywhere was staggering; this was a gorgeous part of the world to visit when we did. Piercing blue sky over deep blue, calm water, and blue silhouettes of the land masses of the Zadar Archipelago, the group of islands forming a natural protective barrier to the mainland.

If you’re trying to determine from a map precisely where we were then do a search for the Monument to the Sun and that’s it. This impossible-to-miss circular patch of glass set into the blindingly white stone tiles of the surface is made from three hundred glass panels containing solar cells that power the light show that turns on each night. This large piece of public art, as its name tells you, represents the sun, but if you walk along the peninsula then you’ll find small circles set along it for each of the planets of the solar system.

In the background of that photo above you can see people sitting down on a stepped area down from the main level, facing the water. They’re enjoying the views, of course, but that’s also where Zadar’s famous Sea Organ is located. Created by Nikola Bašić, the same architect responsible for the Monument to the Sun during the reconstruction work along this part of the waterfront, the organ uses the natural movement of the waves pushing through a series of tubes to generate sounds. It’s a fascinating thing to hear for a short period but if, like us, you have to stand next to it for twenty minutes as you wait for a bus at the end of the day, then its random tones might just get a little grating.

We’d known before visiting Zadar that it had a lot of ruins out in the open, originally part of a Roman Forum, but we hadn’t expected there to be quite so many. It was absolutely wonderful to see things of this sort of age and arguable historic importance in plain sight.

While this land along the Adriatic had been inhabited sporadically since the prehistoric period, a merging of various tribes from about the fourth millennium BCE onwards created a new ethnic group called the Liburni, and Zadar as a proper laid-out settlement arose in the ninth century BCE. With good coastal access they gravitated towards sailing activities, gaining a reputation for their seamanship and trading, and had established a large area over which they effectively governed before the Romans started to spread across the continent in the second century BCE. However, because their trade was important, the Liburni were able to avoid most of the conflicts in the region, even when the Romans were engaged with allies of theirs. This lasted until 59 BCE when civil war in the Roman empire between Julius Caesar and Pompey dragged the people of Zadar into the conflict on the side of Caesar. At the conclusion of that war, the victorious Caesar awarded Zadar the status of Roman Colony and settlement by Roman citizens then followed, along with the sort of architecture that you find in ruins all around the Mediterranean to this day.

The tall column below is known as the Pillar of Shame as it was used to tie those accused of bad deeds to so that the public could taunt them.

It wasn’t just the forum itself that was fabulous, but some of the buildings around it couldn’t help but be admired too, and the one that stood out to us more than any other was that of the Church of St Donatus. Constructed around the ninth century CE this was built with some elements taken from the forum so it’s still possible to see some Latin inscriptions and Roman decorations on stones inside despite dating from centuries after the empire’s collapse.

We went inside because we were nosey but also because we felt that it would be cooler out of the blazing sunshine on this part of Croatia, but our respite from heat and sweating was quickly eliminated when we realised we could climb up part of the building’s twenty seven metres in height, and proceeded to do so even though neither of us really wanted the extra exertions.

Back outside, and directly opposite the church was Zadar Archaeological Museum. We like museums. We like archaeology. We liked Zadar already from our short time there. We paid a visit and took some photos, and you can read that here: Zadar Archaeological Museum.

After our enjoyable visit to the museum we decided to head roughly eastwards towards a park. We passed some bars on the way and, amazingly for us, fought off the temptation to grab a drink, then came to Five Wells Square. You won’t be surprised to learn how many wells were there. The area dates from the medieval period, around the sixteenth century, when the city came under threat then siege from the Ottoman Empire, and defensive walls and a secure water system from a public cistern became necessary. Gates set into the walls can be found around the old city of Zadar and the one we passed at this point is considered the most attractive, sporting a Venetian lion sculpture above it.

We then arrived at Queen Jelena Madijevka Park, an oasis of green amongst all the white buildings and orange tiles under the blue sky we’d experienced thus far in Zadar. Leaving my wife on a bench at the bottom – getting her up one set of unexpected steps in the church earlier was quite enough for her for one day – I made my way to the top of the hill that forms the centre-point of the park and affords a lovely view across the old city in every direction. A lovely spot, but not very large, and not a must-see by any means if you’re visiting Zadar to be fair.

We decided we’d make our way back to the bus at this point, and if we passed anywhere that did local beer then we’d stop for one, but our route along the shoreline was devoid of anything that would quench a thirst and so we soon ended up back where the bus had dropped us off.

We had quite a wait as a lot of cruise ship passengers were already queueing and it wasn’t until the second bus turned up that we were able to get out of the baking sun reflecting off the blindingly bright surface near the Sea Organ. As I’ve already mentioned, this also treated our ears to tens of minutes of its random, occasionally harmonious, more often discordant tones.

We really liked the old city of Zadar a lot. Great history, great sights, by the sea, easy access to ruins, a nice variety of historic periods and associated architecture to admire, wonderful little alleys with plenty of indication that the nightlife would be wonderful here in the summer. Certainly, we’d not be unhappy to return for a longer visit at some point, but for this occasion the remainder of our day would be spent back on board Azura for the sail away.

We’d planned on doing none.

It was great to get back into our air-conditioned cabin, hit the shower, freshen up, get into clean gear for the evening, stick devices onto charge, make a cup of tea, and sit out on the balcony, admiring the views we had of Trieste while the sun started to set.

Naturally, it would’ve been even nicer to have something stronger than tea but P&O lag a long, long, long way behind Princess when it comes to cruising niceties like enjoying cocktails delivered to your room, preferring to stick to the old system of “Go get it yourself. What do you think we’re doing here!? Providing a service!?” that they’re now also introducing in some of their venues on board. We were feeling lazier than normal after our exertions and full day ashore so decided we’d make do and treat our taste buds to that special type of foul tea you only get from shipboard water and UHT semi-skinned milk.

The time for departure came, and the time for departure went, and still the ropes kept Azura connected to the port and the gangway remained open. From the arms-crossed stances of the bridge crew we could tell that they were waiting for people to return. Ships will wait if tours organised through them run late, if they can, and it’s touted as one of the reasons to book through the cruise line, but it does come at a premium cost, and more experienced cruisers will be able to make informed decisions on a port-by-port and tour-by-tour basis there. We spent the time enjoying the darkening sky, the interesting cloud formations, and how the light was bringing different aspects of Trieste’s skyline into view.

As it turned out, however, there was no tour group late back to the ship, but rather three passengers. Their cocky walk back and waves to people booing from the balconies suggested they were well aware they were late, they’d possibly just been drinking ashore somewhere, and they couldn’t have given less of a toss that they’d held the ship up or that they’d risked being left behind. Don’t be like these pricks. They got lucky that they were with P&O and possibly that there were no penalty fees for the ship had it not left on time; certain other lines with less-forgiving captains would have departed on schedule and left the selfish gits to make their own way to the next port, and we’re generally supportive of that approach.

So, a little later in the evening than planned, Azura finally cruised away from Trieste.

One of the reasons I stayed out on the balcony in the cooling evening air was to see how close Azura would pass to an interesting-looking vessel I’d spotted earlier in the day. It had looked like a sailing vessel but with a hull shape that seemed to suggest it was built for stealth. Naturally, that’s the sort of thing I wanted to get a better look at but with the sun having set my view was considerably dimmer than I’d hoped. The vessel turned out to be the Sailing Yacht A, formerly a Russian billionaire’s toy (with masts built in Portsmouth) but at the time, and still at the time of writing, seized by Italian authorities as part of international sanctions against cunty regimes that launch wars to hide their own failings from their populations. She looked lovely against the twilight and knowing that some Russian had lost her makes the image even more attractive now.

To finish this travelogue from Trieste, the traditional look at what we had for dinner on the cruise ship that night. It was all rather uninspiring and we ended up following this up with the purchase of a bottle of wine to take back to the room in order to read, watch TV, and pop out onto the balcony to look out for stars.

In the next post in this series we’ll be making another port call in Croatia when we explore Zadar.

Oh well, we thought, you can’t have everything; and thought no more of it.

Getting off the bus after our return from the excursion to see Lake Bled we started to head towards Azura, looking gorgeous in the Italian sunshine (a big change from the overcast conditions and drizzle that had been with us earlier in the day).

“Oh, if anyone’s not been to Trieste before,” said our guide as we were stepping off the bus, “then it’s well worth a look around. You’ve got a few hours until the ship leaves.”

“We thought it was quite far away,” we replied.

“It’s there,” the guide mentioned, pointing over our should and down the road. “There’s a public square right there, about a hundred metres away.”

Well, lesson learned there that it’s always worth checking an actual map at some point and maybe even opening your eyes and looking around, because, yes, we were a very short walk indeed from what would turn out to be lots of fantastic architecture, statuary, and historical ruins, not to forget loads of cafés and bars and just great views too. A very fortunate interaction with the guide otherwise there’s a good chance that we’d have followed the majority of the rest of the tour group back to the ship. As it was, I think six of us turned around and headed across the road to look at the city.

A minute or two later, we found ourselves in Unity of Italy Square (Piazza Unità d’Italia), considered to be Europe’s largest public square next to the sea – which sounds like one of those made-up categories just so you can be first in it – and occasionally the venue for music performances in addition to serving more political roles hosting world leaders.

Surrounding the square were impressive-looking buildings including City Hall but the only feature within it was a fountain. This was the Fountain of the Four Continents, constructed in the middle of the eighteenth century and showing off Trieste’s importance as a trading seaport by representing Europe, Asia, Africa, and America with sculptures within the pool area of the structure, and representing four major rivers in the way water was delivered to the pool. The fountain has been affected by history, surviving an attempt to remove it entirely in 1920s, then actually being removed ahead of World War II so that Mussolini could use more of the space to compensate for this tiny fascist penis, being returned in 1970, being moved to its original (and current) location at the start of the new millennium, then becoming subject to attacks by small-minded vandals in more recent times.

Obviously, we didn’t have any plans about what we wanted to see and so to start with we picked a direction at random and started walking. This brought us past the opera house into Piazza Giuseppe Verdi initially then along to a statue of Gabriele D’annunzio. He was quite the character and well worth reading about on that link; suffice it to say that he was associated with decadence and occasionally occultism, and a poet, journalist, playwright, army officer in World War I, had argued in favour of Italy siding with France and the UK against Germany, became a fighter pilot, and was ennobled as the Prince of Montenevoso. We’d passed buildings of some unknown importance and grand architectural design on the way, including the Meridiana Interattiva set into the ground floor of the Palazzo della Borsa; this was a twelve-metre-long sundial marking used by ships to set their marine clocks when arriving at Trieste. We also came across another fountain, this to the Roman god Neptune, and as keen sea-goers it’s always nice to see something like that.

The Leopold Column commemorates a visit to the city of Trieste in 1660 by Leopold I, the Holy Roman Emperor.

We took a moment at this point to actually take a look at the map and see if there was anything we particularly wanted to see nearby now that we actually had a chance to look around Trieste.

“There appears to be an amphitheatre just around the corner from here,” I told my wife. As you might be able to tell, we like seeing amphitheatres when we travel.

“It’s not going to be like Chester, is it?” she asked. That had been surprisingly naff, to be fair.

“There’s only one way to find out.”

Trieste has been inhabited for several millennia, firstly by Illyrian tribes, then into the second century BCE becoming incorporated into the Roman Empire. Naturally, therefore, Roman ruins exist because the Romans built pretty well, and the amphitheatre we found ourselves in front of a couple of minutes later dates from very late in the first century CE, likely around the time of Trajan’s rule. The hilly landscape just back from the coastline acted as a natural support for the amphitheatre’s sloping seating.

After we’d admired the ruins for a short period we checked the map once again and spotted a tower and a castle relatively close by. However, while the map wanted to keep it a surprise, we could tell that this would involve some increase in elevation as our eyes could see buildings raised up from where we were in the direction we’d need to take; that hilly landscape I’d just mentioned. We are not particularly fit people anyway, but one of us also carries a long-standing injury that makes climbing up steps painful so this wasn’t a decision we took lightly, but we figured that we could take it at our own pace, rest often, and just see how we did.

The walk up was not particularly thrilling or enjoyable but we reasonably soon reached the Tor Cucherna, a medieval watchtower dating to the fourteenth century and positioned along the city walls that existed at that time. In 1719 Trieste became a free port and the city’s expansion that this required necessitated the destruction of almost all those fortifications, but the tower survived as it had found a use as a house. Fairly interesting history-wise but I wouldn’t say it’s something you should go out of your way to see.

Continuing upwards we reached the highest point where the Castello di San Giusto was located. With absolutely no research beforehand we hadn’t known what to expect and if it had looked small enough then we might have taken a look around, but we quickly realised there was a lot more here on this plateau overlooking Trieste and that to really do it justice we’d need to come back and dedicate more time to this spot. That’s what we intend to do if we’re ever on a cruise that makes a stop in this part of Italy in the future.

The castle was constructed over the course of a couple of hundred years from the middle of the fifteenth century onwards and many aspects of its design reflect whatever was typically regarded as the best defensive shape for the period in which it was being built. The rounded bastion comes from the Venetian period of the early sixteenth century while some straight-edged examples can be dated later in the century and into the next.

A monument to fallen soldiers stood at the end of a tree-lined space, itself next to ruins of a Roman forum beside the castle. Completing the sites of interest on this hill in Trieste was a medieval cathedral too, apparently known for mosaics and frescoes. This will definitely all be on our list to visit when we inevitably return to Trieste.

We decided we’d walked around enough for the day and made the decision to head back towards the ship. At least it would be mostly downhill, although in parts no less easy to negotiate than coming up for my wife. Everywhere we seemed to look there was something to catch the eye.

It wasn’t long before we were back in front of Azura, ready to take the weight off our feet, freshen up, and maybe treat ourselves to some refreshments. Looking around Trieste had been a bonus for us on this day and the perfect sort of one that makes you want to come back for more. You get a feel for a place, and Trieste really rates right up there in terms in favourite places in Italy just from the small amount of time we had in the city.

At the cruise terminal entrance we spotted a final statue on this day that had featured many of them. This was to Nazario Sauro, recognised as a hero in Italy for his actions in the navy during World War I.

In the next post in this Azura cruise travelogue series we’ll enjoy some time on the ship in the port waiting to leave Trieste.

Have I mentioned that Lake Bled is popular? I have. Good. Then you won’t be surprised to learn that this is reflected in the amount of traffic that heads there throughout the year and we encountered a fair amount of it in April so should you be thinking of visiting this bit of Slovenia during warmer months then brace yourself for a lot of crawling along in jams.

Anyway, we eventually arrived, parked up, and were led down to the lake, catching some glimpses of the local parish church and the impressive-looking, eleventh century Bled Castle built on a precipice overlooking the water.

The weather wasn’t perfect for our Lake Bled visit. We had cloud cover – which we were fine with even if it did mean there would be none of those ever-so-pretty and vibrant (sometimes overly vibrant) pictures as a result – but we also had persistent, very light, very spitty rain. None of this spoiled the view across the lake to the Assumption of Maria Church, though.

Our guide gave us the time and place at which we were to meet back up then left us all to our own devices. We were told that we could probably head up to the castle if we went straight there, didn’t waste time, and didn’t spend too long at the top. We were also told that while we might technically be able to get around to one of the special boats taking people to and from the island, get over there, have a quick look, then get back, the timing of crossings wasn’t to a set schedule, might result in us being left behind, and this was highly discouraged. We were finally told that we might, maybe, possibly, could have just enough time to walk a complete circuit of Lake Bled if we were fit, fast walkers, and set off immediately. We sniggered at that suggestion.

We’d already decided we were simply going to walk around part of the shoreline of the lake for a bit at a leisurely pace and see if we had time for a snack and drink on the way back.

Our short walk started from roughly the north eastern edge of Lake Bled and would proceed clockwise for about a third of its circumference before turning around and retracing our steps. Initial sights of interest included a sculpture called Ciklama by Slavko Oblak; Slovenia appeared to enjoy abstract sculptures and that’s handy because so do we. A marker stone also commemorated the design of the park adjoining the lake by the Swedish landscape architect Carl Gustav Svensson in 1890. And, of course, Bled Castle could be seen in all its glory now.

Fans of selfies for social media were catered for with the presence of a heart sculpture and a small wooden jetty jutting out onto the lake. We are not fans of selfies for social media but you possibly already knew that. There was a queue of people lined up beside, taking turns to race out and grab a snapshot for posterity but I was still able to grab a photo without any of them in it.

The type of boat that takes tourists across Lake Bled and to the island is a pletna. They are a flat-bottomed boat similar in shape to gondolas, hand-made, and propelled by two oars. They’re generally considered to have been in use since the sixteenth century and from 1740 onwards the oarsmen could only come from twenty two noble families in the region following a decree by Maria Theresa of Austria, the head of the Habsburg dominions at that time.

You might think that, crowds of people notwithstanding, Lake Bled would be a very peaceful area but that wasn’t exactly the case around the southern shore where a road that at one point passed through a tunnel in the surrounding rocky landscape carried a constant stream of traffic. The views across the lake were still very nice but picture them accompanied by the white noise of car after car driving through for the proper effect. There were also some buildings around this part of the lake’s edge, some hotels, some looking rather abandoned but still appealing.

We spotted a viewpoint that would give us a reasonably close look at the Assumption of Maria Church on Bled Island and decided that would be the point at which we’d turn around and head back as the light drizzle was starting to soak through our hoodies by this time. A church on the island has long been a destination for pilgrims and the present Baroque church dates from the late 1600s although with some Gothic decorative elements recovered from an earlier incarnation on the spot.

We broke up our return to the tour bus with a stop in a café outside which we’d seen a sign that simply said “Beer”. We like beer, especially local beer, and will tolerate it even if it’s a rather generic lager. We also tucked into some of the local speciality, the kremna rezina, a puff pastry, custard, and cream slice cake. Tricky to eat without making an absolute mess of yourself and also exceedingly sweet, but nice.

Lake Bled was lovely and with a full day to enjoy it we’d have definitely made our way up to the castle and across to the lake, but this was a cruise ship excursion and they never have enough time for that sort of thing. Our only cause for concern was the volume of traffic given that the area around the lake wasn’t that packed with tourists as you can see from the pictures. We couldn’t help but shudder at imagining the location in the heart and heat of summer.

In the next post in this Azura Adriatic cruise travelogue series we’ll return to Trieste where our expectation was that we would simply get back on the ship until a chance comment from our tour guide made us change our minds.

We had reached Dragon Bridge, easily identifiable thanks to its dragons. Like much of Ljubljana – and you’ll know this if you’ve read the first part of this exploration of the city; you have, haven’t you? – the bridge dates from the early twentieth century during much of the city’s rebuilding following the earthquake. Dragon Bridge was one of the earliest bridges in Europe to use reinforced concrete and the architectural style is from the Vienna Succession, a more all-embracing offshoot of Art Nouveau.

We then started coming across lots of public art sculptures, made from bronze, abstract, with varying themes including myths (Adam and Eve, Prometheus, a Satyr), human faces, and wildlife (birds, a tentacle, a wolf). These were almost exclusively the work of Jakov Brdar, and we loved them. Upon one of the many bridges over the Ljubljanica – Butcher’s Bridge – we also saw a lot of that most popular of pastimes for travellers with an odd sense of romanticism about them, padlocks, some of which were attached to some of the smaller sculptural pieces. My thoughts about attaching rusty eyesores to monuments is less than positive but that’s subjectivity for you.

After admiring the public art sculptures we continued towards the square we’d originally been dropped off at, taking in a few more sights of the architecture and just overall pleasant feel of Ljubljana along the way.

We were back at Kongresni Trg with plenty of time to spare (no rocking up late and spoiling other people’s plans for us, thank you very much) and that gave us the opportunity to take a quick look at the university building on the south eastern corner. Its entrance was approached by a curving path around a fountain and lined with busts of prominent men connected with academia. Only men, apparently. Different times. Anyway, a few are shown below but you can always hunt down the others if you’re so-inclined, and you can always visit Ljubljana to see them for yourself.

The siren call of the water reached out to us and drew us down some steps towards the river we’d crossed a few times already during the day, and here we passed another abstract piece of artwork – a cylindrical monument to lost lives in World War I – plus a bronze statue of Gustav Mahler. Early in his musical career he was appointed as a conductor of operas and operettas in Ljubljana.

The final few photos were from in front of the Ursuline church that had attracted my attention earlier in the day and of a pillar which I’d not been able to get near before on account of another tour group – not from the cruise ship – gathered near it. The Corinthian order capital was topped with a sculpture to the Holy Trinity.

That brought our time in Ljubljana to an end. As with all cruise tours (and probably most tours in general) there wasn’t anywhere near enough time to see as much as we’d have liked. We’d have loved to visit the castle, for instance. Additionally, the day and timing of our visit made for a quiet experience; it would have been nice to see more things open, more sense that this was a bustling capital. Ljubljana at night, for instance, feels like it would be a vastly different place, and it’s something we’d love to see. We came away from our visit to Ljubljana loving the architecture and layout, adoring the abstract public art pieces, and thinking it would be a superb destination for a weekend city break.

We still had one more stop to make in Slovenia before heading across the border and back to the Italian port, and that would be to the very popular tourist destination of Lake Bled.