AUGUST 2024
We drove half of Croatia from Umag to Zadar. Falkensteiner Premium Camping Zadar was a banker but it appeared, that not only Polish Hel Peninsula’s campsites can be fully booked😰…Apparently it was supposed to be this way because otherwise we wouldn’t have got to Zaton Holiday Resort. I tend to avoid places named ‘resort’ because they often mean everything we found at Camping Park Umag💥😵💫but Zaton Resort is not the case. The new reception resembles a small airport, e.g. Bydgoszcz Airport, but it has more check-in counters;). You get a map and a list of pitches/parcels available for a long RV and start …hunting – kind of escape room but IN instead of OUT;). With these 1,100 pitches 80-100 square meters each 😱 it is a little town! The first night, I returned to our RV following Google Maps and ‘find my car’ tag. Seriously! We chose pitch #420 – easy to park, in the shade of huge pines, next to the fig and pomegranate tree path taking you to the most beautiful bathrooms in Zaton. Sanitary Block #2 – the blue one with waterfalls🥹 Chemical toilet (I elaborate on them in another post;), refrigerators, circle of stone BBQs and vine gazebos nearby.
I read a review by Andrzej from Poland about this “fairy-tale-like campsite behind 7 mountains and 7 forests, (in Polish meaning ”far from everywhere”😜) Well… if you sleep in mobile homes, you can be 1-2 km away… from anything, but hey! every 15 minutes a melex passes by and takes you wherever you need. Zaton Resort is huge but neat and tidy. And it is still expanding – another water park is scheduled to be opened in 2025. The complex of swimming pools and wading pools is large, but already full of people. Parents and children appreciate the colorful attractions, fountains and other water attractions making kids scream and shout🤪, but we appreciated the quiet beach. The coastline is so long that everyone will find a place and even a type of descent for themselves: flat pebbled, stony or concrete stairs (be careful! super slippery algae!) And here’s a surprise – this is the only place in Croatia where I happened to enjoy sand as soft as ours in Hel Penisula, Chałupy – the depth is also similar to the one in the Bay of Puck – waist high. The clean, white sand starts here a bit further from the shore, the water is crystal clear and lagoon-like-turquoise. At 40 degrees of Celsius the air kinda lacks oxygen🔥, you don’t want to get out of such water. I wouldn’t be able to bask in the fiery sand on a deckchair but I saw those who like it and some…were a bit disappointed. Paying almost €100 per night, they do not expect that these most ordinary sunbeds have an additional fee…🤦🏽♀️
Food? Well, large variety of options! Ventula Restaurant & Lounge by the beach, with a rooftop bar, terraces and a pizzeria (great ’lignje pržene’🦑, bruschetta and ’pizza tuna’🐟). In the main street of Kalelarga, there is also Croatian maritime style Konoba Bepo (a delicious salmon steak with truffle puree, and ‘lignje na žaru’, well… not like in the little octopuses from the north:( – here big, tough and chewy. DON’T!. Right next to Bepo there is Mercato restaurant with HB buffet and drinks (water, beer, wine also included in the price), we did not try the place out though. There is also a cafeteria, gelateria, bread box, Craft beer garden, Gradele-grill with live cooking, snack/burger/Presto takeaway bars in various parts of the campsite, shops, boutiques and a solid Studenac supermarket… Do not leave your RV without a map!
Every evening there is a musical performance in the theater. Yes. A Greek one – open air theater. You will learn about everything from the magazine… – the camp publishes its own newspaper, Zaton News.
Check out the photos: https://where2.pl/?page_id=218
