We started out day with coffee and breakfast items on our balcony. The day looked breezy and crisper than the previous ones. About 8:30 AM, we took a good walk (about 3.2 miles round trip) along the path at the shore up to the next small village, Brist. The town has mostly lodging, much less in the way of shops and restaurants and even small groceries. The area was a mix of small but nice vacation houses and apartments/rooms for rent, small hotels. We then walked up to the road and headed back, stopping once again at the Studenac mini-market for some breakfast items, and took them back to our room. The photos of Vila Amalia are over a few days.

View from our balcony on Day 4.

View from our balcony.

Vila Amalia garden.

Vila Amalia from the beach (a few days later).

On the way to Brist.

We went back out to get a coffee and bumped into two people from our group and sat with them and chatted. Eventually we headed back to the room to get ready for our 11 AM meeting for a trip to Vid, passing through Metković (which is on the Neretva River near the border with Herzegovina), to visit the Narona Roman archeological museum and to walk around the town, to be followed by an afternoon meal at Braco's home (which has been in the family for a long time) back in Metković. Before the museum, we drove up the hill in Vid and stopped at the Gospa Ledena church and checked out the view. We then drove back down to the museum.

The museum displays artifacts from the Roman city of Narona, a in situ museum situated on the spot where a Roman temple dedicated to Augustus stood. It displays a unique collection of marble statues and artifacts such as pottery, mosaic flooring, columns, household items, coins, etc. between the first century BCE and first century CE. In addition there are some artifacts from the Middle Ages. The research started in 1995, ground was broken in 2004, and the modern museum structure opened in 2007.

The area around Vid/Narona has been inhabited since prehistoric times, included by the local Illyrians and then the Greeks, followed by the Romans. The Neretva River provided both access to the Adriatic and to the interior, and Narona became a large Roman city of 100,000 people.

The whole area is very fertile and provides many agricultural products.

The museum.

Statues and people (except Win) :)

Mosaic.

After the museum, we walked around a few surrounding streets, as Mirena pointed out where Roman blocks and other structural stone were incorporated into the surrounding houses.

Then we walked down to a restaurant on the Norin River, a tributary of the Neretva. This restaurant, Đuđa & Mate, specializes in eel and frog, and has small tourist boats that were once used to navigate the river and canals in the area.

We headed to Metković, driving uphill, parking, and walking the rest of the way up to Braco's delightful home and garden. We met his daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren, walked around his garden, looked at his fig, apricot, and orange trees, and his chickens and ducks. We tasted the local grappa, along with Braco's dried orange rind and dried figs. Then we sat down to an amazing meal. The main course was to be various fowl and some lamb and carrots and potatoes cooked in a classic Dalmatian method – under a " peka" – a metal dome covered with wood coals (in an outdoor oven). We had chicken (rooster) soup, the main course (the peka) arugula salad with cucumbers and tomatoes, a kale dish, and an asparagus dish, all from his garden. We finished up with coffee and home-made pastry filled with fruit from his trees.

We parked and walked up the rest of the way.

Mirena and Braco.

The view.

Dinner under the fig and apricot trees.

Dinner under the dome (Peka)

It’s done!

Yum!

Time to cut it up and eat.

We thanked our host and his family, and headed back down to the car and back to Gradac. We rested a while, took another long walk, and joined the tail end of a dinner that some of the group was having, and learned a lot from Win about the history of Yugoslavia and the conflicts that followed.

Day 5