Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
It's possible to blow a lot of money here. Croatian hotels, especially on the coast, are
a terrible value, and there are plenty of touristy restaurants happy to overcharge you. But
if you know where to look, you can find some wonderful budget alternatives—foremost
among them
sobe
(rooms in private homes).
Sobe
are a comfortable compromise: fresh,
hotelesque doubles with a private bathroom, air-conditioning, and TV, for a fraction of the
cost of an anonymous room in an overpriced resort hotel just down the beach (for details,
Europeans are reverent sun-worshippers, and on clear days, virtually every square inch
ofcoastal Croatia isoccupied byasunbatheronabeachtowel.Nudebeaches areabigdeal,
especially for vacationing Germans and Austrians. If you want to work on an all-around
tan, seek out a beach marked
FKK
(from the German
Freikörper Kultur,
or “free body cul-
ture”). First-timers get comfortable in a hurry, finding they're not the only pink novices on
therocks.Butdon'tgettooexcited—thesebeachesaremostbelovedbypeopleyou'drather
see with their clothes on.
Perhapsbecausesunshineandfishingaresoimportanttotheeconomy,Croatiansarepar-
ticularly affected by weather. They complain that the once-predictable climate has become
erratic, with surprise rainy spells orheat waves in the once perfectly consistent, balmy sum-
mer months. Locals—and, often, tourists—find that their mood can literally be affected by
