Cro-A-Ti-A Day 7
The Final Kastela
Yesterday My Friend Jeanie, bonus grands Eleanor and MaggieRose, McB and John and I started at Kastel Gomilice, then headed out down what, for the other 6 Kastelas, is a seaside path to Kastel Sucurac.
It was not meant to be.
Turns out past Kastel Gomilice there is a large harbor area so that the path ends and it's up to the busy street to make your way to Sucurac. A hot, not so shady, very unscenic busy street.
We looked, in vain, for a street that would lead away from said street back to the seaside. When we finally found what appeared to be a viable route, I handed my phone to digital native Eleanor and asked her to check the map to see if indeed this road would lead us to the water. She assured us it would, so the intrepid explorer crew (me, the kids and My Friend Jeanie) were off .
The paved portion soon gave way to a trail which wound through brush and other vegetation.
This is an important aside: Jeanie and I love each other very much. We share many of the same sensibilites and viewpoints about life in general, politics, etc. We make each other laugh. We have those moments when we just look at each other, know what the other is thinking, and know that we agree. But when it comes to the outdoors and outdoor activities, we are on opposite sides of the coin. I love hot weather. Jeanie prefers it cool, if not cold, with a nice breeze. I seek the sunshine, she heads directly for the shade. Her preference is to find a nice place to site while mine is to keep walking and see what there is to discover.
So I turned to My Friend Jeanie, who was being an absolute trouper about this adventure, and said, "You hate this, don't you?" And she said, "With every fiber of my being."
It gets better.
The trail ended at the sea, where we could see in the immediate distance the beach for Kastel Sucurac. However, we were separated from the beach by an inlet of water, which did have a sort of beach that it appeared we could walk on to reach Sucurac. This necessitated crossing a small stream by walking over a couple very unsteady boards, then stepping carefully through the overgrowth down to the water's edge. Naturally the kids navigated this with great ease, while My Friend Jeanie and I, fearful of breaking some part of our body, more hesitantly made our way down.
Water's edge was rather gross and we gladly followed Eleanor who found a path that would lead us to Kastel Sucurac without stepping over the detritus on the water's edge.
Kastel Sucurac, named after St. George, is the oldest defense tower in the Kastelas built in 1392.
In the Anglo-American bombing on December 5, 1943 at 15:05 in the afternoon, 97 locals lost their lives, 65 of them in the church during the mass celebration, when the priest Don Ante Rubignoni was also killed. At that time, Kaštel Sućurac was a place with about 2,200 inhabitants, and in addition to numerous victims, under the deadly load of 36 Allied B 25 bombers, 38 houses were completely destroyed, while around 50 were damaged. There are views that the Allies received information that the Germans were in the church, and that is why the church was bombed. However, there were two churches in Kaštel Sućurac during the war: the old one, where Holy Mass was celebrated, and the new one, which was under construction. If that was the case, the old church was razed to the ground in a bomber attack; many innocent Sućurans were killed; numerous families were left without their loved ones, while the Germans were most likely stationed in the church that was under construction. (Thanks to the translated source, Wikipedia.)
Kastelas completed! Fortunately we had drove down, so there was no forced march back to the house.
I do have a few photos but they're not coming through, so I may add them later.
We had an early evening because a contingent of us are going to Dubrovnik tomorrow, with a planned 6 a.m. launch time.
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