Living Inside a Roman Emperor's Palace, Adriatic Island Hopping & Dalmatian Lavender
📍 Split, Croatia📅 3-day itinerary
The city that was born inside Diocletian's 3rd-century retirement palace — where 3,000 people now live in apartments built into Roman walls 25 metres high, where the emperor's mausoleum became a cathedral dedicated to the Christians his persecution created, and where the 1,700-year-old basement halls that perfectly preserve the floor plan of the emperor's vanished apartments above were used as Meereen's slave pits in Game of Thrones — with Hvar Island 90 minutes by ferry and the clearest Adriatic water in the Pakleni coves.
The Octagonal Roman Mausoleum Where the Last Emperor to Persecute Christians Was Buried — Now a Cathedral Named for a Christian Martyr Killed by His Persecution — and the Basement Halls That Preserve the 305 AD Floor Plan While 1,700 Years of History Erased the Apartments Above
The Venetian Island Where 2,726 Annual Hours of Sunshine and June Lavender Fields Make It the Sunniest and Most Fragrant Place in Croatia & The Pebble Beach That Changes Shape Daily as the Sea Current Shifts Its Tip East or West — Built from the Same Limestone Quarried for the White House in Washington DC
The Medieval Island City Where Every Building Within the Walls Is Romanesque or Gothic Venetian Architecture Without a Single Modern Intrusion — Including the Finest Carved Portal in Croatia Dated 1240 & The Gorge Where 12th-Century Pirates Defeated Multiple Venetian Punitive Expeditions and Now Hosts River Rafting Below 300-Metre Limestone Cliffs