Rovinj vacation
Rovinj (Rovigno in Italian) is coastal Istria’s star attractive feature. Although it can get overrun with tourists in summer, and inhabitants are growing a bright eye for raising earnings by improving hotels and restaurants to four star status, it keeps to be one of the last true Mediterranean fishing ports. Fishers draw their catch into the harbour in the early morning, followed by a bunch of screeching gulls, and patch their nets before lunch. Prayers for a great catch are sent forth at the massive Church of St Euphemia, with its sixty meter-high tower punctuating the peninsula. Wooded hills and low-rise hotels surround the old town interconnected by steep, cobbled streets and piazzas. The 13 green, offshore islands of the Rovinj archipelago make for a pleasant afternoon away, and you can swim from the rocks in the sparkling water below Hotel Rovinj.
The old town of Rovinj is contained within an egg-shaped peninsula, with the bus station just to the south-east. There are two harbours: the northwestern open harbour and the little, secure harbour to the south. Some 1.5 km south of the old town is the Punta Corrente Forest Park and the wooded cape of Zlatni Rt (Golden Cape), with its age-old oak and pine trees, and many big hotels. A little archipelago lies just offshore; the most well known islands are Crveni Otok (Red Island), Sveta Katarina and Sveti Andrija.
Sights in Rovinj: Church of St Euphemia
The town’s show window is the imposing church dominating the old town from its hilltop position in the middle of the peninsula. Built in 1736, it’s the largest baroque construction in Istria, reflecting the period during the eighteenth century when Rovinj was its most populous town.
Inside the church, look for the marble tomb of St Euphemia behind the right-hand altar. Rovinj’s patron saint was tortured for her Christian faith by Emperor Diocletian before being thrown to the lions in 304. Based on legend, the body left one dark and stormy night only to appear off the coast of Rovinj in a spectral boat. The townspeople were unable to budge the heavy sarcophagus until a small boy appeared with two calves and moved it to the top of the hill, where it still stands in the present-day church. On the anniversary of her martyrdom (16 September), devotees converge here. Molded on the campanile of St Mark’s in Venice, the sixty meter bell tower is crowned by a copper statue of St Euphemia, which shows the direction of the wind by turning on a spindle.
