Roman in Trieste

We’ve finally reached Croatia and for the next three nights the Silver Machine is parked up in Camping Porton Biondi about two kilometres walk along the beach from Rovinj, a very picturesque town on the Istrian Peninsula. It’s a huge site with 300 pitches and a mix of pitches and posh lodges. The access roads are really narrow and it was a bit challenging to get to our pitch, which is up a hill at the top of the site. It seems there’s a bit of a recurring theme building here. But we’re here now and it’s a nice situation. It’s been raining since we arrived so it looks like it’ll be tomorrow before we get a chance to really explore further.

It’s only about 70 miles from Trieste but to get here we had to drive 15 miles through Slovenia. You could certainly say we entered Slovenia by the back door. We set Google Maps to “Avoid Tolls” to avoid having to purchase a GoBox similar to the one we had in Austria. Unfortunately Mr Google took us along a very narrow road, verging on single carriageway for the first 5 miles. It was a bit white knuckle in bits but we’ve certainly seen a part of Slovenia where few tourists dare to drive.

We had another spectacular drive from Villach to Trieste, following the River Gail, for the first twenty miles until we crossed into Italy. The River Gail was an amazing translucent, almost pale turquoise colour.

The Silver Machine landed at Camping Obelisco, situated on a hillside about 2.5 miles from Trieste, with spectacular views over the city. It’s a narrow steep road to access the site and, then everything after that continues to be narrow and steep. It’s really is on the very edge of being unsuitable for a 7.5 motorhome. We had to park next to reception until the owner found our booking so we suggested that we would be happy enough to stay there. He seemed relieved and we certainly were!

It’s only €3.40 for a 24hr travel ticket for the bus and you can catch any of three buses to to the centre that pass close to the campsite. We didn’t really know what to expect of Trieste and it turned out to be a really lovely, relaxed and interesting city. We were ambling into Piazza della Borsa when a Roman Legion marched round the corner. No idea what was going on but they were very serious, very impressive, and verging on very scary.

The Cathedral and Castello sit next to each other on a hilltop with fine views of the city. The 14th century cathedral is built on a Roman temple and is known for its byzantine mosaics. You can climb the tower to get right up close to the bells and even better views of the surrounding landscape. Fortunately we just missed them being wrung for 12 o’clock.

The castle was free on the weekend we were there so that has to be a good thing. There were volunteers all over the site dressed as soldiers which made the tour fun as well as informative.

Evidence of the early Roman origins of Trieste pop up all over the city. The theatre is literally viewed from the pavement. The Roman Arch, we just happened to pass it on the way down from the Castle.

We only had a day to explore Trieste and in terms of the things we wanted to see, and this was more than enough time. But Trieste is much more than simply the sum of its parts. It would be really nice to come for a long weekend just chilling and absorbing the atmosphere.

The rain in Rovinj stopped just after supper so we managed to get a short walk along the beach before it got dark. The town itself looks really interesting to have a wander around and hopefully we’ll manage to get a bike run in while we’re here too.