My Friend, Filip
My favorite way to spend a weekend in Croatia is exploring castle ruins. These often are located on mountain tops and other out of the way, remote spots. Most of the time there are no directional signs, so in order to find the castles I need to ask for directions from the locals. What better way to encounter friendly Croatians? Last fall I drove to the Vinodol Valley, which is near the Adriatic coast just south of Rijeka. I wanted to explore a castle ruin called Grižane. As I approached the village of the same name, I could clearly see the castle, which is spectacularly situated on a cliff. But there were no trails leading up to it, or at least none that I could see. I asked a woman for the way, but she opined that there was no way I could find it by myself - she turned out to be correct. She offered to have her eleven year old son, Filip, lead me to the castle, which he cheerfully and energetically did! At the very outset Filip scrambled up a wall and traversed the top of it, above someone’s back yard. I followed gamely, teetering on the wall, wondering what I had gotten myself into. There was an ill defined path, but no trail markers. It's almost completely covered by brush. Filip practically ran up the steep path, and it was all I could do to tag along behind him. We were both sweating profusely when we reached the castle after about 20 minutes. Filip pointed out the various sights in the valley to me. I asked him how old Grižane is. He thought for a minute and then, holding his hands as wide apart as he could, exclaimed, “Really old!” He’s a handsome, bright young fellow. Filip and his mother were very kind to me, so I took his picture and sent them a print.

Two Different Worlds
I have climbed up to Milengrad Castle several times. It’s one of my favorites. Located in the Ivanščica Mountain range between Zagreb and Varaždin, it is one of the better preserved ruins in Croatia. One time after descending from the castle I met a farmer while I was stretching. Wearing a straw hat and overalls that were pinned together where the buttons had fallen off, “Zoran” stared at me while I was going through my routine of calisthenics. I sort of had a conversation with him. I say "sort of" because it was very difficult for me to understand Zoran, not just because my Croatian is not very good, but also because he was speaking in the Zagorje dialect, which even many Croatians not from Zagorje also have difficulty understanding. I could only pick up bits of what he was saying. It was pretty frustrating for both of us. He was thoroughly bemused watching me stretch - he asked me several times what I was doing. I tried to explain that I find it necessary to stretch after intense exercise, but understandably the concept of exercise for the sake of exercise, much less stretching, seemed a bit foreign to him. Plus he was amazed that I am an American, and that I wanted to explore ruins. “Why would you want to do that!?” he asked. “I’m interested in their history,” I said, but Zoran was still puzzled. I gave him my business card just to fill in a long gap in the "conversation", and he was completely puzzled by that, too. I don't think Zoran had much formal schooling. Nonetheless he struck me as a practical, wise man. He was also friendly and hospitable enough to invite me into his house for a coffee.

The Over Eager Guide
Go to any rural area in Croatia and you are bound to see some elderly widows dressed in black, including a black scarf over their heads. One time we were searching for Ključica, another spectacular castle ruin, located in the Krka National Park Ključica Castle . We asked several villagers for the way to the castle in the nearby town of Ključ (which ironically means „key“), but there were so many dirt tracks leading out of the village that their well intentioned directions didn’t get us very far. Finally we enquired with an elderly woman clad in the usual black. She pointed in the direction of the castle and then motioned for us to follow her, walking off at a good pace. We were already on the outskirts of the village and she was headed off into a rather desolate, arid area. My god, I thought, is she going to walk all the way to the castle (which turned out to be about 3 kilometers further) while we follow in the comfort of our car? I asked her to join us in the car, but she refused. We were relieved to come across another villager, who persuaded our guide not to continue on and confirmed that we were headed in the right direction.

Novigrad
Another time we were trying to find our way to the ancient castle fortress above Novigrad, near Zadar. As usual, there were no signs pointing the way, so we just started climbing some stairs that ascended towards the castle. An old woman with two canes was seated at the top of stairs, so we asked her the way. She told us that we needed to continue another 10 meters and then turn left and follow the trail up to the castle. “I’d like very much to go with you,” she said. “The view up there is great. I used to go up there every day, but it’s been 40 years since I could manage the hike,” she added forlornly. She greeted us again animatedly on our way down, asking whether we had enjoyed ourselves and again expressing regret that she couldn’t have gone with us.

No Hike, But We Found the Castle
One Saturday in June 2006 my wife and I went looking for a Frankopan (well known medieval Croatian noble family) castle ruin called Gradec, near Vrbnik on the island of Krk. We must have asked five different villagers how to get there. We got conflicting directions, retracing our steps several times. We never did find the castle that day, although we enjoyed ourselves walking in the woods. We even picked a basket of cherries. About a year later we enlisted the help of a nice lady, Sanja, from the Vrbnik Tourist Office. She said she had been to Gradec and could help us find the way. However, Sanja had gone there only once many years ago and didn't feel so confident about finding it again. So the morning we arrived she recruited a local villager named Josip to help. He wore overalls and drove a real rattletrap. We followed Josip about 3 kilometers down a well graded gravel road and then reached a turn off, at which point the road deteriorated into a rough track. At that point we assumed we’d start walking. However, Josip clearly wasn't into hiking and insisted on driving down the track probably farther than we should have pushed our cars. My wife was really nervous - she was sure we were going to have a flat tire or roll off the road. From where we finally stopped it was only about 300 meters to the castle. What we should have done is parked at the point where the road deteriorated, and walked from there. Had we done that it would have been about a two kilometers walk gently uphill through the forest. But not to complain, we had two generous people to guide us, and we found the castle.We wanted to compensate him for his time and effort in guiding us to Gradec, but Josip refused any payment. Quite the contrary, he invited us to his house for refreshments. It was such a pleasure to relax with someone who was not concerned about time and didn’t think twice about helping a stranger. It hit upon us that day that is a major reason why we enjoy exploring castle ruins in this country. Croatians are just that friendly.

story by Tocher Mitchell