Sea-tunes and Salutations

We were only in Zadar, on the Croatian coast for one night, but it was enough to see two pretty unique sights. As we strolled along the waterfront, we saw and more importantly heard, the world’s only sea organ. It was designed by a local architect and is a series pipes and whistles, set into the steps which descend directly into the sea. To the naked eye, the organ looks like simple holes in the pavement, but as the water rushes underneath and air is pushed through these pipes, a random yet strangely beautiful tune can be heard. If you sit there for long enough, the ocean’s music almost sends you into a trance-like state as you listen to what reminds you of the sound of panpipes.

Not far away from the Sea Organ, was the Sun Salutation, a 22m circle cut into the pavement, filled with 300 multilayered glass plates that collect the suns energy during the day to produce a very trippy light show at night. We returned later to discover what looked like a dance floor plucked right out of ‘Saturday Night Fever’…..and of course we couldn’t help ourselves and out came the classic moves. Psychadelic moving patterns, infiltrated with changing colours kept us entertained for the good part of an hour.

According to Lonely Planet, Zadar is one of Croatia’s underrated cities and even after only one night, we can definitely agree. The seaside Old Town is no less beautiful than others we have seen, it has a busy port, which makes it a lively place to be and it also contains some very fascinating ruins. It is famous for the best morning market in Croatia and we were looking forward to visiting the following day, which turned out to be bucketing with rain and no sign of it letting up. Our best bet was to get on the road again.