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Cruise Along the Dalmatian Coast

Explore Dalmatia Islands On Your Own

DISCOVER A LOST PARADISE
By Steve Alexis & Sanja Janes

Squeezed between the two rocky mountains and nestled in a lush, jungle-like valley at the end of dirt road, about 17 miles from the nearest city on one of more than 1200 Croatian island lies the Tudor family’s long abandoned, forgotten and lost village. The mailman comes here once a week, and that’s only if there are several mail pieces for the two lone residents.

Far away from modern yachts and luxury hotels this place looks like an ideal movie set for some adventurous movie, a movie with appropriate tittle “Raiders of the Lost & Forgotten Village” or something like that. Surrounded by Mediterranean machia and cacti, the village is cut out from the outside world except for the tiny dirt road that not even taxi drivers want to take. There is no electricity, no running water, no sewage system and no telephone lines. Even cell phones have a hard time connecting with the outside world. The only sign of modern civilization is probably the glazed house number “16” on Barti’s house.

The old church has a clock on its tower showing 11:00 o’clock; we don’t know if it’s AM or PM. We will never know what day or year it stopped ticking, but for Mr. Barti Tudor that doesn’t matter. He can tell the time just by looking at the scorching sun. “They say it’s 11 o’clock somewhere in the world” quotes Barti, the unknown wise man.

Barti and his wife Katarina are the only residents left in this village and have no plans to move anytime soon. Actually the family graveyard not far from village gets a new addition from time to time. Apparently most Tudors, no matter where they live, want to be buried here. The most recent member buried here came from America.

At one time about 20 families lived in this village making a living by growing grapes, vegetables, bees, some domestic stock and olives. But the land has become stingy and could not support so many mouths. One by one families started moving away looking for greener pastures in bigger cities where there are more opportunities for work, and a better life.

Mr. Barti’s face is red and burned from constant sun exposure since this Croatian island claims to have more sunny hours than any other place in Europe. Actually, some local hotels advertise and promise “free stay for every rainy day.”

And while everyone else saw the end of life in the Lost Village, Barti saw an opportunity. About 25 years ago when Croatia gained its independence from former Communist Yugoslavia, he decided to start a little enterprise in his forgotten village. He opened up a place where people could come and experience food prepared in a very unusual way. Actually, he went back several hundred years and revived old Croatian traditional way of cooking “ispod peke” or in an open fire. Raw food and meets are laid in cooking pans and covered with iron bells, then placed in the fireplace and buried with hot chunks of natural wood and left to cook. When the meal is brought to the table, the smell and the taste will blow you away. Words cannot describe effective the taste. But it is delicious, and it is washed down with family own wine of exceptional quality. Barti’s business is simple; so is his business sign hand painted, along with the menu on a board by the kitchen door written in big letters so everyone from every table in the yard can read it. There are only a few items on the menu, but each better and more delicious than the other. Barti and his wife Katarina both speak very good English and he will proudly display a copy of an article clipped from New York Times Travel Section published in 2014 where he was a feature story by a NY Times reporter who accidently stumbled upon this hideout.