Zadar, Croatia: Roman Ruins, Sea Organs, and Sunset Light

The Sea Organ, on the northwestern tip of the old-town peninsula, is the most unusual public artwork in Croatia: a series of thirty-five organ pipes set into the stone steps of the promenade, powered entirely by the motion of waves and tides. The sound it produces is genuinely musical and changes with the sea state — low and contemplative on calm days, more complex in any kind of swell. Alfred Grubišić designed it; it opened in 2005. The Sun Salutation circle, immediately adjacent, captures solar energy during the day and produces a light display after dark.

The Roman Forum in the center of the old town is one of the largest preserved Roman forums on the eastern Adriatic — more than ninety meters by forty meters of open travertine pavement, with a single standing column from the original colonnade. The Church of St. Donatus, built into the ruins in the ninth century using Roman stonework, is a circular pre-Romanesque building of remarkable ambition for its era; it now operates as a concert hall because the acoustics are exceptional. Guided visits run regularly.

The Church of St. Anastasia, the city's Catholic cathedral, contains a reliquary with the remains of Saint Anastasia herself (brought from Sirmium in the ninth century) and has the tallest bell tower in Dalmatia. The climb to the top takes about ten minutes and gives the clearest view of the old-town peninsula, the islands to the west, and the ferry routes threading between them.

The National Museum of Zadar, housed in a former Franciscan convent, covers the history of the city and surrounding Zadar County from Roman times through the Second World War, with particular attention to the medieval period and the city's rotation between Croatian, Hungarian, and Venetian control. The Venetian loggia on the main square, the longest surviving Venetian loggia in Croatia, is used as an exhibition space and is free to enter.