Deterrents are rarely so precise. Gazing through the sights of a communist clifftop canon, its rusting barrel pointing due west towards former capitalist foes, my eyes perfectly align with the dying sun as it bleeds into the Adriatic. “This feels like the end of the world,” sighs my ponytailed guide, Pino Vojković. “We waited but nobody came.”
They certainly do now. Vis, home to the abandoned Cold War base on the outer edge of the Southern Dalmatian Archipelago, enjoys A-list status among foodies, conservationists, and movie location scouts. One of the most secluded of Croatia’s 1,200-plus islands, it blends pristine, crystal-clear waters and hidden bays with raw, authentic local culture.
Fall, when the Mediterranean’s summer furnace subsides to a peachy warmth, is the perfect season to sail a chartered yacht around the splatter of photogenic islands. I first visited this slice of the Balkans as a reporter in the aftermath of Bosnia’s brutal war, greeted by NATO troops and landmines. Happily, the past is a foreign country. We weigh anchor from Trogir in its Venetian finery, all Renaissance doorways, alleys, and balustrades.
Our Croatian skipper, whose CV includes ocean racer, champion triathlete, and military marksman, inspires total confidence. After navigating Šolta’s protective finger, we unfurl the mainsail, exploiting 25-knot gusts. Dolphins showboat around us in the white-capped sea. Exhilarating is an understatement.
It blends pristine, crystal-clear waters and hidden bays with raw, authentic local culture
Hours later, we reach Vis Town’s spectacular bay among steep-sloped peaks. Early evening light washes across the serene waterfront where two locals offer impromptu wine tasting. As night falls, the Franciscan monastery, occupying a cypress-lined peninsula, appears to float on the inky water.
Cue days of languorous exploration on boat and foot. We putter around a coastline serrated with lovely tranquil inlets including Stončica, Stiniva, and Barjoška Bay, all dreamy locations for 2018’s Mamma Mia! sequel. Their seductive, shimmering sea is part of Vis Archipelago’s UNESCO Global Geopark – a legacy of the island’s past as a Yugoslav military base that prevented mass tourism and overfishing. Expect bottlenose dolphins, loggerhead turtles, and bluefin tuna, seagrass meadows and limestone caves frescoed with corals and sponges.
In blazing sunshine, we savor a high-octane speedboat blast, crossing to neighboring Biševo. Car-free and with just 20 locals, the island’s big draw is the Blue Cave whose Hockney-esque electric-blue water hosted a famous 1944 skinny dip for Yugoslav Partisan leader, Josip Tito and Winston Churchill’s personal envoy, Fitzroy Maclean: the art of naked diplomacy. We stay in our trunks to swim across to the “Jesus rock,” 100 yards from wave-lashed cliffs but mere inches below the surface for ostensibly miraculous walking-on-water selfies.
We’re fueled by some of the Mediterranean’s freshest food. Vis is blessed with both a fabulous culinary heritage and superb local ingredients. Beneath lime trees in Restaurant Pojoda’s courtyard, where the renowned late-chef Zoran Brajčić rejuvenated traditional Dalmatian recipes, we devour divine monkfish and lobster stew. Next day, on the southern coast at Mala Travna, beneath hills of tamarind and pine, we savor a slow-cooked feast courtesy of chef, philosopher, and poet Senko Karuza, including wild asparagus soaked in vinegar, and sardines rolled in capers. “It’s not a restaurant,” explains the barefoot Senko, who distills a wicked fig grappa. “It’s an experience.”
Our most memorable meal isn’t down to food, however. It’s about our arrival. At Konoba Jastožera in Komiza, a former 19th-century lobster storehouse turned seafood hotspot, we steer the boat beneath a stone vault and dock in the heart of the restaurant. It’s as unique as the island’s cricket pitch, one of only two in Croatia. (Sadly, we don’t catch a match.)
Time’s up. We unfurl the sails and make for the mountainous mainland. A stop in chic, sophisticated Hvar, which feels like a major city after the wilderness, before we continue, rounding Šolta and Brač under star-slathered skies to anchor in Trogir’s moonlit harbor: a final sensory autumnal treat.
Sail Croatia offers a range of sailing experiences from Trogir with a skippered week in a four-person yacht from $4,164 including transfers, fuel, insurance, and local tax; sail-croatia.com. Vis and Biševo excursions; alternatura.hr
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