Coast and Karst

Coast and Karst

In the shelter of the Mediterranean greenness, in the utmost northern part of the Mediterranean Sea, the region Primorska welcomes you. The attraction of the Istrian hills, the sea side, the saltworks, the Karst and stony villages has been celebrated in verse by many posts. The sea shore with its lush evergreen vegetation invites you for an active holiday.

The tourist resort Portorož is the central Slovenian seaside resort with a rich hotel and tourist offer. The thermal baths of the hotels Palace have been practicing the spa tradition for 700 years already, and the aerodromPortorož offers interesting panoramic flights.

Piran, Izola and Koper are three ancient coastal towns, each revealing the lives and the spirit of past centuries in its own way. The sights worth visiting are especially the cathedral churches, palaces, narrow streets, squares with numerous stone-cutting details and green cypresses.

Koper is today an important port , as well as the cultural, administrative and university centre of Primorska.The central architectonic monuments include the Pretorska palace, the Gallery Loža Koper and the cathedral.

Izola, the place in the Simon Bay, has a rich fishing tradition, where the remains of the sunken Roman harbour can be seen at low tide.

Piran with the mighty cathedral of Sv. Jurij is today under monumental protection due to its outstanding architecture. The town also hosts the Marine Museums and a Marine biological station. In the bays near Sečovlje there are ancient, at least 800 years old saltworks, protected under the Regional Park Sečovlje, and a renovated house of a salt worker hosts the Etnographical Museum.

The lagoon area in the Strunjan Bay with the abandoned saltworks and the Strunjan Cliffs is part of the Regional Park Strunjan. But Primorska is not just the coast, it is also the hinterland. The Istrian wine road connects places and their sights: Hrastovlje with a church behind the camp walls and frescoes with the motives of the dance of death, Črni Kal on the karst edge with a leaning bell tower, Osp with a picturesque overhanging rock, a castle in a cave, and much more. The area of the forested Brkini marks but the last borders of the Mediterranean Slovenia. The fragile karst landscape with reddish land reveals in its underworld the magnificent Škocjan Caves, protected by UNESCO.

Then there is the literary place Vilenica and the Cave Dimnice. Lipica, a green oasis in the midst of Karst, is the home of the highbred Lipizzan horses, the white horses of the Vienna court. The Stables Lipica offer various recreational activities. The bordering Sežana is the birthplace of the poet Srečka Kosovel and the Botanical Park gives shelter to many vegetal plants from all over the world. Above Sežana the Komenski Karts opens up, the land of Teran. The Refosko vine gives us a dark red wine sort, which can be served together with the Karst prosciutto, dried in the karst gale wind.

On the autumn Karst sumach flares up amongst the white stones. The image of this countryside is supplemented by typical karst villages, where stone is more than just building material, for example Tomaj, Dutovlje, Kobjeglava or Štanjel – this stony middle-aged town with a castle that used to be a summer holiday resort of the inhabitants of Trieste.

Castle Rihemberk is the biggest and oldest castle in the Primorska Region. From the top of the Gothic tower you can enjoy a nice view of the Karst and the Vipava Valley.