Roman ruins, a sea-powered organ, and Dalmatia's most underrated old town
Zadar is the oldest continuously inhabited city in Croatia — a peninsula jutting into the Adriatic where Roman forum columns stand next to 9th-century churches and Hitchcock called the sunsets the most beautiful in the world. The Sea Organ under the marble promenade turns Adriatic waves into music; the Greeting to the Sun — a solar-powered light installation beside it — pulses with colour after dark. It is less famous than Dubrovnik, less expensive, and more lived-in.
Founded by an Illyrian tribe and later a Roman colony, Zadar spent most of its history under Venetian rule (1409–1797), which explains the lion-of-St.-Mark carvings on every gate and the Renaissance well in the town forum. The Austro-Hungarian period added a fine 19th-century city beyond the walls. Zadar was heavily bombed by Allied aircraft in World War II and again shelled during the Croatian War of Independence in 1991–1993 — the rebuilt old town was meticulously restored stone by stone.