Croatia – Zagreb

Zagreb, Croatia

Capital of Croatia, yet with a small town feel. Zagreb is full of majestic buildings and a large atmospheric Old Town area. It houses superb museums, green parks and not one but two world famous ancient churches. Check out one of the only public Meteorological info posts in the world – with present and past temperatures and even an earthquake monitor …. oh errrr !

How to go from Ljubljana to Zagreb by bus

This was part of my 3 nation trip that involved arriving in Ljubljana, click here for the post on Ljubljana. I then travelled onwards by bus to Zagreb, click here for the bus Journey post. After a three day stay in Zagreb, I travelled onwards, again by bus to Belgrade. See Belgrade review here.

The coach park was not hard to find as there were lines of coaches waiting in formation next to the front entrance of the railway station. It was just a question of finding my coach as I had pre-booked, paid and printed off my ticket online using the www.getbybus.com website.

I found it a really good site (ticket was about 11 Euros, 2.5 hours trip leaving exactly on time) as it is so easy to book from abroad using a credit card.

I even managed to book the wrong day- my fault. A simple email to them explaining my error and which coach I wanted was quickly replied to and they did it all swiftly and reissued my ticket within a couple of hours with no amendment charge – amazing.

If you are wondering how to get tickets and info on getting to the location in this post, please also take a look at Bookaway. Their website is here https://www.bookaway.com

If you need specific ticket and timetable info on the destination I have featured here on this post, then click here for a link below to their site for this destination.

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I can recommend this site as I use many of the methods of transport and even the very companies they advertise on their site.

Their prices are similar to what you would find on the individual company sites, and often cheaper. The big advantage is that u have one site to visit for all destinations they cover and it is a fast and reliable system that you can depend on.

Hope you make use of Bookaway to ensure you get the best value and service for travel tickets.

The journey was however on a really foggy day and the whole reason for travel by land was to see the landscape between the two countries so unfortunately I saw not much of that. The next day in Zagreb was also a bit foggy hence the slightly blurred look to some photos here.

What to see in Zagreb

A city with an extensive Old Town area on a huge hill that feels more like a majestic 16th Century fortified village. Many buildings are beautifully restored but clearly there are so many that it will take years to complete them all.

Graffiti (often 7 feet tall on top of older scrawl and vandalism) are taking their toll on these buildings and it is not unusual to see huge spray paint graffiti on churches, museums etc that have been restored – so heart-breaking to see the destruction at times.

Out of the Old Town area there is Lower Town – a grand 18th Century area of wide boulevards, palatial buildings, palaces, public buildings, huge Museums etc that are impressive. All walkable but fairly extensive and 2 days is the minimum needed to see all in this city.

I did a route over my two days that was basically one day in the Old Town and one day in the Lower Town. Minimum I think but I like to see as much as possible and I would have happily stayed another day to see a few more places

Zagreb Cathedral

My first visit was to the Catholic Cathedral – full name Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary, St Stephen and St Ladislaus. A bit of a mouthful but there it is. It was originally just a church and proclaimed a Cathedral in 1093. Construction of the eventual Cathedral proper finished in 1217. It went through several rebuilds especially after the 1880 earthquake that destroyed most of it and the two big towers were added in the earthquake’s aftermath.

This is still the tallest building in Croatia  and the twin towers of the Cathedral can be seen from many points around the city.It was very, very dark inside and as flash photography is not permitted it was almost impossible to get good photos, hence the ones here are quite dark.

As it was just after Xmas there was a huge Nativity scene still displayed with small figurines showing the Manger birth scene and the whole mountainside. It was enormous but very intricate and creative.

The Square in front of the Cathedral has a tall column with gilded gold figures and is dedicated to St Mary.

Ban Josip Jelacic Square

This Square is effectively the centre of town and a large tram hub. It is pedestrianised (trams run on one side only) and has shops and monuments at various points around it. The Manduševac Fountain was built above a natural spring that provided Zagreb with drinking water right up until the end of the 19th century. Court records about the persecution of witches mention the spring as their main meeting point.

There is also a legend connecting the spring with the name of the city. Namely, an old Croatian war leader was returning from battle tired and thirsty, and asked a beautiful girl – Manda, to scoop up some water from the spring for him.

So the spring got the name Manduševac, after the girl. The Croatian word for “to scoop up water” is “zagrabiti” and the town got the name Zagreb after the scoop of water.

The statue pictured is of the national hero Ban Josip Jelacic who basically banned serfdom and gained independence for Croatia in the 1800’s.

Just behind this square is the large Dolac open air market selling fruit, vegetables and flowers. Here stands a statue of an elderly lady commemorating all the traditional older ladies who for centuries brought foodstuffs into Zagreb to sell at this market.

Tkalcica Street, Zagreb.

This street is about as close as you get to the pub crawl area/restaurant/entertainment area of Zagreb. It is a long street full of bars that have gradually encroached onto the street with extensions, seats and canopies to create a plethora of drinking and eating places.

It is especially busy at night – obviously – and the street comes alive with folk drinking and dining under the wall lights and lampposts.

Unfortunately the extensions and decking platforms take away the beauty of the buildings behind but the bars and restaurants were stylish and in winter had heated, conservatory-style, outside seating areas,

St Mark’s Church

Well, this is it. The most famous building in Zagreb – St Mark’s Church, (see info here) famous for the Coats of Arms of Zagreb City and the Coat of Arms of the old union of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia on its roof. It is actually quite small, dates from the 13th Century and is in the middle of the square.

Unfortunately it is only open at prayer times and was closed when I visited.

On two side of this square are the Parliament and Govt Offices. One a classical columned 3 storey building and one a much older long sloping roofed 2 storey building. Parliament has quite low security, that was quite obvious, as the front doors were wide open and you can see straight inside, with no guards.

I actually walked up to the door and looked inside! The PM’s car was parked outside and unoccupied, with other grand state cars also nearby – amazing!

Old Town, Zagreb.

The Old Town is quite extensive and is street upon street of restored buildings from many centuries past. Many are grand, hefty looking structures and some slender and ornate, but all very beautiful.

At this point the map got forgotten about and I just wandered for an hour looking at buildings and some little shops along the way.

The city is full of small museums dedicated to various art forms separate to the mainstream – Naive Arts, Illusions, Crafts, just to name a few so I had to limit myself to just a couple at the expense of the others or I would become museumed out and I also did not have enough time for them all.

Zrinjevac Park

This is a narrow but very long park in the New Town area that holds many of the palatial cultural buildings built in the last 200 hundred years or so. It starts at one end with a famous Meteorological Post.

It shows present and past temperatures, has an earthquake monitor scribbling on paper, average temperatures through out the year, a large thermometer and some astronomical measurements, Unique and fascinating.

I know of nowhere that has one of these on public display!

A small square with busts of famous Croatian people – artists, poets, politics, painters, historians, writers – stands in front of the first building you meet in the park, The Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. This building holds Old Masters and works of art of international importance.

As you walk through the park you encounter various buildings, structures, seating areas  and various styles of laid out gardens, fountains and a large bandstand. To the side I noticed more elegant buildings, including the famous Palace Hotel and the area had a feeling of grace and affluence.

I walked past the Library of Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences and on to the Art Pavilion, a building that was transported in pieces and reassembled in Zagreb after serving as an exhibition venue at World expo in Budapest in 1890s. It certainly didn’t look pre-fabricated!

I moved on towards a small square near the end of the park trail to be greeted by the huge statue of King Tomislav – the first King of Croatia way back in 910AD

The park ends with a war memorial and the Central Railway Station – a peach painted long classical styled building and also a major tram hub. Being someone who doesn’t come from a city with trams I am always fascinated by them, how they mix with traffic and operate and couldn’t resist getting a few pics of the older traditional styled trams and the new sleek modern ones.

Lower Town/ New Town, Zagreb.

My park walk finished here but to the side is another trail that goes toward probably the most famous hotel in Zagreb – the elegant (and expensive) Esplanade Hotel. Built in the 1920s, this art nouveau-style hotel, with a fabulous fountain in front, was built for foreigners arriving at the next door station.

It houses 4 restaurants, a cocktail bar and a health spa……… but I was not dressed to enter such an elegant place in my dirty trainers and scruffy walking clothes so I had to gave it a miss regretfully. The route took me past the Zoo and then a right turn at the State Archives Building

My trail was coming to an end and it simply remained to follow the main road back into the centre of town. I was now passing, through gardens and small grassed and shady tree areas beside the majestic buildings and statues that I encountered to my left and right.

Here are again many important State and palatial, cultural buildings, Museums and Monuments, all worthy of further exploration.

However, time constraints and the lateness of the day prevented me from discovering more and I was quite happy to admire them from the outside.  It all ended at Zagreb University building and conveniently my tram stop home was nearby.

It was a fitting end to my time in Zagreb, having been impressed by another gem of a city, that I really felt I had discovered after knowing so little about it before I arrived.

Jan 2018.