Day 23 - Pavin to Poreč - Oh The Places You'll Go - 2025

May 3, 2025

Day 23 - Pavin to Poreč

Back to La La land

After our brief interlude with ‘old schooL’ Croatia it was back to the Adriatic coast for our last hurrah.

This was a pretty easy day, after our initial 20%+ push on the side streets of Pazin to get onto the highway out of town, with about 7 kms of highway traffic then giving way to small country roads that we shared with lots of roadie pelotons out for their Saturday rides.

Around the 20 km mark we were back into vineyard country and the roads were a gradual 2-3% downhill. This is the sort or riding where you can just sit on your bike and watch the world go by. No effort, no drama. Pretty sweet.

Poreč itself turned out to be quite a gem. Yeah it’s a tourist town, but it’s a nice size and does not seem overrun (it’s still only early May).

For the first time in a while, we pulled into town early enough to grab a nice sit down lunch before heading off to our hotel. We had a nice time watching the crowds in one of the main squares on the edge of the old town, and this included a good number of other cycle tourers.

After lunch it was time to check in and we were very pleasantly surprised with our hotel. When you’re staying somewhere different almost every night we often forget the details of where we’re going to be staying. That was today.

Our hotel, the Valmar Riviera , turned out to be a pretty posh place right on the waterfront. We had the little luggage carts to put our bags on, good size elevators that would fit more than two people (we actually got our bikes into one and stored them in our very good size room) and a complimentary champagne and appies ‘happy hour’ at 5 pm. Very nice. To jump forward to the next morning, this place had, by far, the best breakfast spread of the entire tour so far as well.

After getting cleaned up we did our usual ‘aimless’ walk around town. It may look ‘aimless’ to other folks, but our ‘aim’ most of the time is just to explore the places we’re in in an unstructured ‘take what you find’ approach. It usually works for us, and it did today.

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We had breakfast in our apartment in Pazin and then hit one of the many cafe’s for our morning ritual before heading off.

This was the cute little street that our apartment was on.

Heading out of town. The old town of Pazin has a lot of charming, if somewhat ‘rustic’ character

A very steep climb got us onto the highway out of town and provided a nice look back on the town

Lots of little villages dotting the way, all with their requisite church steeples

Quite green quite hilly Istrian interior

After a few km’s of the highway (with very manageable traffic) we were onto very quiet country roads

…. Through olive groves and vineyards. Cycle touring at it’s best

In Poreč on the edge of the old town. Very pretty. There were quite a few people around, but time a shot right and it looks quieter than it is.

Checking in. The little luggage carts are a nice little luxury

Nice comfortable room with everything we needed. There was a place to store bikes just off the lobby but it was pretty packed out (a good sign) and it was very easy to keep them in the room.

Poreč was a real gem in the old town. Although touristy, and there was a ‘plastic duck’ shop, there were a few streets filled with local artisans making handmade crafts and souvenirs. There was some really beautiful ceramics that if we weren’t on bikes we would have picked up, plus some very unique and cute dolls and stuffed toys (for lack of a better description)

Old Poreč street scenes with a modern overlay

Local handicrafts - being made in real time in the shop.

Love these shots of locals living their lives in such beautiful settings

For dinner we had the polar opposite of last night …. Too much choice. As Poreč is primarily a higher end tourist town, the restaurant choices are countless. For us, this often creates a bigger problem than having one or two places to choose from. It’s like going to the store to buy toothpaste. Twenty years ago you had a choice of three brands. That was it. It was simple and you were in and out of the store in no time with your brain untaxed. Now you’re faced with 17 variations of each of six or seven different brands, and they all basically do the same thing. For me, that creates decision paralysis and that’s what we find when we see a list of 50+ restaurants to choose from.

For better or worse, we often resort to the Michelin guide to ‘curate’ some choices. Contrary to popular belief, many of their recommendations are just ordinary good restaurants and often very good value. So we checked out what Michelin had to say about Poreč and they had only one place recommended, The Spinnaker, and it was on the other side of that wall of wine in the ‘check in’ picture above.

So rather than aimlessly walk the streets of Poreč yet again but playing restaurant roulette, be took the easy way out and walked all of 5 meters out the door of the hotel and into The Spinnaker.

It was a great choice. Fancier and more refined than we had originally planned on, but the overall experience was one of the best of the trip so far. More serendipity.

Now on the other side of that wine wall!

One of the fantastic amuses - sea bass with fresh feta and yuzu

We went out on a limb for wine, a 9 year old Croatian Riesling that was 6 months on it lees and then 24 month in oak barrels

Looked like sherry but still had classic Riesling fruit.

Soy and orange marinated amberjack with fermented kohlrabi and cucumber, citrus and dill foam

spinach and nettle ravioli with polenta and a crab veloute

Turbot with scampi, caviar, almond cream and buerre blanc

Pork cheek, asparagus, mushrooms, caramelized celery cream and Demi glace

This was a bonus dessert - orange pearls with acacia flower and crème anglaise - this was superb

And then all the ‘just because extra’ sweets at the end

SOTD

Flip Side by Norah Jones

‘Cause today was the flip side of Croatia from yesterday. Both good but both very different, just like the A side and B sides of old 45’s.

Good night from Poreč and our last night in Croatia. It’s been fun.

Today's ride: 40 km (25 miles)
Total: 1,112 km (691 miles)

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Glenna JefferiesKim and I had a slightly different food experience in Porec (it was dine and dash...we never paid 🤦‍♂️🤣), but enjoyed riding the sea wall route.
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1 month ago

Kirsten KaarsooTo Glenna JefferiesI will have to hear that story!!!
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1 month ago