2021 was the last year we were there. The hotel we used to stay in has become more expensive, more like every other four-star hotel everywhere. All changes of the last years were for the worse. The nail in the coffin was, that entering the lawn was forbidden in that final year. I had loved it in the shadow of the pine trees on the lawn by the pools. Being forced to be on a big, hot concrete terrace was enough.
Another hotel? Well, in Rab and Croatia in general, most four- or five-star hotels belong to the same chain. They were the successor to the single hotel chain in communist times. Around maybe 2015, they were part of TUI for a few years, and that’s when the downturn began. If you are in one of those hotels anywhere, and if you don’t look out of the window, you can’t tell what country you’re in.
I won’t give up on Croatia, but I guess I will need to spend at least two weeks there. Of the Kvarner islands, easily reachable from Vienna and dear to my sentimental heart, Rab is already the optimum, and of Rab, Suha Punta is the part I like most. As a child, I was in Lopar, that’s on the more rocky north-eastern side. Today the unrelenting sun there would kill me.
Let’s see. Maybe next year.