Italia 2023 (and Croatia). Day 19 - Dubrovnik to Split

I spent the fist half of the day traveling the 200 km from Dubrovnik to Split, most of them along the spectacular Dalmatian coast. All of it is formed by folded and faulted limestones, so in some cases it felt like I was going through the mountains of Mexico's Sierra Madre Oriental (with the added bonus that this is a much more temperate climate and you have stunning views of the sea and the Croatian Islands). Looking at the coast on a map or in Google Earth you might think that the islands are parallel sand banks, as you might expect in a tide-dominated delta, but you would be wrong (as I was), the "flowing" shape of the islands are simply the plan view of enormous folds, enhanced by the differential dissolution of some of the limestone units.

The delta of the Neretva River near Ploce deserves some mention, because of the extensive agricultural development, and because of the use of an ag strategy I have only seen in the coastal plain of northern Colombia: The water table is too shallow for ag production, so they have excavated extensive drainage canals, and with the excavated dirt they have built broad "levees" between the drainage ditches where cultivation takes place. During the rainy season the excess water is stored in the drainage ditches, and over the dry season the ditches passively "irrigate" the intervening plots of ag land. Take a look around Ploce using Google Earth.

On first blush Split looks a bit dingy, particularly when compared with Dubrovnik. The living area is dominated by tall condominium buildings (of the Yugoslav era?) instead of pretty villas. Still, the old town is pretty interesting, as it is centered on the vast palace of the Roman emperor Diocletian, who ruled from 284 AD until his abdication in 305 AD. Diocletian is famous for two things: First, he engineered the splitting of the empire into a western half and an eastern half, and conducted one of the most bitter prosecutions of the Christians (ironically, his successor Constantin I converted to Christianism, and made it the official state religion). Anyway, Diocletian was born in Split, and decided to build his summer palace right here. The palace has a simple square footprint, but is 250 m on each side, and had three stories. The bottom one was the basement, where olive oil and wine were processed, the second floor was the administrative and military center of the empire, and the third was divided between the rooms of the imperial family and those of the military retinue of the emperor. When you look at it today you can see spots of splendor here and there, but the whole of the building was incorporated into the Medieval city of the Serene Republic, so in some instances it is difficult to say where one ends and the other begins.

For the second half of the afternoon I went for a long walk along the Marjan Woods, west of the old city, which might be the equivalent of Chapultepec in Mexico City or Central Park in New York. Everyone was there, jogging, power walking while chatting with friends, taking the kids for a bike ride, or walking the dog (I actually saw my first Dalmatian in the Dalmatian coast!). I should add that today is Sunday, and folks here take the Sunday rest very seriously, which makes it very hard on the tourist because there are no stores open! At the brink of dying from starvation I found a Kebab shop where I could get a gyros, and a bakery where I bought a couple of pastries for breakfast tomorrow morning.

My plan tomorrow is to take the ferry to the island of Supetar.