In the aftermath of World War II and the creation of socialist Yugoslavia, Brijuni became a kind of second Yugoslav capital. Tito used to spend a good part of the year on the islands, welcoming numerous international guests. And this is where the Non-Aligned Movement was born
The Brijuni Islands, a small national park in the northern Adriatic, have a very unique history. Once a malaria-ridden area with inhospitable terrain, they became an important tourist destination in the 19th century thanks to Austrian entrepreneur Paul Kupelwieser. In this two-part report, we explore their history and present-day reality.
The chessboard on which the future of cruises in the Adriatic Sea is being played out has more and more squares. These are the ports that aspire to new destinations, for their own gain but also at their own risk. With its interregional projects, the European Union has been trying to help them since before the crisis
A city that does not advertise itself, but is worth discovering: Craiova, the historic capital of Oltenia. Little-known even in Romania, it offers a rich cultural life, a unique atmosphere, and the jewel of Romanescu City Park
Băile Herculane is among the oldest and most popular spas in Romania. It reached the peak of its splendour in the second half of the 19th century, when the region was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
After decades of severe decline, the historical spa town of Băile Herculane is gradually flourishing again. The credit goes to the efforts by a group of young people who mobilised to save the heritage and reclaim the spaces, and to EU funds
Many low- and mid-altitude ski resorts, due to global warming, remain without snow, but not necessarily without tourists. There are ways to reinvent the mountain: an ongoing cross-border project, BeyondSnow, helps some Alpine resorts understand how to do it
From its source, on the border between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro, the Drina flows for almost 350 kilometers, marking much of the border between Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina before reaching the plains of Vojvodina where it flows into the Drina. A photographic journey that accompanies the reportage of the same name. Photos and text by Giovanni Vale
The last episode of our reportage along the Drina: from Višegrad towards Žepa and Mokra Gora, all the way to the Šargan Eight, a railway built in 1916 by the Habsburg administration. We talk about the past, language variations and environmental protests
Our reportage along the Drina continues, following one of the most important and celebrated rivers in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this episode we discover canyons and rafting, the Sutjeska National Park with the famous monument by Miodrag Živković and the city of Goražde
Known for its presence in famous novels, such as that of Nobel Prize winner Ivo Andrić, and remembered for the war crimes perpetrated on its banks: the Drina is certainly one of the most important and praised rivers in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The story of the Drina in this reportage
Pesaro is a city balancing between the Adriatic and the Apennines, people-friendly and bycicle-friendly. Our Fabio Fiori invites us to discover it on pedals, moving beyond its squares to venture into the streets and paths that descend to the sea
Zadar, Croatia. For some it was once “the Venice on the other shore”. The history of Zadar sums up that of many other European cities, in the intertwining of different people and cultures, of thousand-years-old arts and architecture
The Mediterranean is where the olive tree, wheat and pomegranate grow. This is why, says Fabio Fiori in his Adriatic wanderings, the Montenegrin city of Bar, surrounded by wild pomegranates, merges with and embraces the soul of the great sea
From 2020 to 2022, nine countries participated in an Interreg project to improve the safety of those who use bicycles to get around in everyday life or for leisure. Two years of research to promote the use of bicycles while reducing the number of casualties
Peaceful, picturesque and full of history, the hilly regions between Slovenia and Croatia have become a destination for sustainable, cross-border tourism. The transformation was driven by Ride&Bike, a European Cohesion policy project
"I sailed to Hvar for the first time many years ago, going from island to island, on an insuleidoscopic journey of wonders, where every day it was the wind that decided our route": this is how Fabio Fiori describes his first meeting with the Croatian island
Erhard Busek (1941-2022), an Austrian politician active in Balkan regional cooperation and lover of a Europe of minorities in dialogue, opened the work of the Interreg Transdanube Travel Stories project by talking about history, languages, landscapes and international protests: a synergistic approach, in search of a shared narrative
Crossing North Macedonia in an endless circle, savoring the beauty of its pristine mountains: this is the goal of a group of mountain enthusiasts who are implementing the "Sammiana" project
A journalist and a photographer from Romania have been living in a van for ten years to be able to write their investigations on how life is in Romania and how expatriate Romanians live. They are Elena Stancu and Cosmin Bumbut: we met them
In his wanderings along the Adriatic, Fabio Fiori returns to Brindisi, the gateway to this sea full of charm and light. An out-of-season dive takes him back to an essay by Tonio Hölscher on the sea, body culture and eros in ancient Greece
Where was Marco Polo born? What is his native country? A question that made little sense in the 13th century – everything was under the control of the Republic of Venice – is nowadays a source of debates, especially between Croatia and Italy. A new project tries to overcome them
Through entrepreneurial initiative, Ana and Jasmina have managed to bring back to life a story – that of river navigation – which involves different territories. The last episode of our report dedicated to the Kupa
In San Martino in Valle, on the island of Cres, the distillation of medicinal herbs boasts a centuries-old tradition. Today, it is kept alive by Irena and her husband Guerino
The warm season will be an opportunity to test the new infrastructures and strategies of an EU-funded project in the municipalities of Gorizia, Nova Gorica, and Šempeter-Vrtojba, a border area that conceives itself as a single, homogeneous territory along the river Soča
As in other areas of the Croatian coast, also in Baška, a municipality on the southern tip of the island of Krk, the local administration is facing depopulation in the winter months and saturation in the summer ones. We talked about it with its mayor, Toni Juranić
For families who emigrated from Eastern Europe, affection and memory are also handed down through culinary inheritances. Distant and recent memories of a Transylvanian grandmother intertwine remembering Erzsebet's passion for coffee and her lost pickled gherkins recipe
A UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979, the Plitvice Lakes Park located in Croatia on the border with Bosnia Herzegovina, with its 300 sq km of surface area, is an exceptional European natural area. The biodiversity of its habitats and its overall ecosystem need constant protection interventions. A reportage
We dedicate the second chapter of our report on the rivers of the Balkans to the Kupa. The journey will lead us to talk about natural parks and migrations, borders and declining industry, barbed wire and sustainable tourism
