The beauty of my job is that I got to meet some awesome folks over the years. Not only clients but also guides, owners of small businesses… and, most recently owners of most charming B&B in Croatia located in the sleepy village of Trpanj. It all started few weeks back when the owner, Morana, sent an email to see if I would be interested in offering their B&B to my clients. Once I saw the photos, I called her up and we scheduled the meeting. No time to waste and it was never hard for me to go anywhere to see something exceptional!

This past Saturday, I was on a 9:30 ferry from Ploče to Trpanj enjoying the cool breeze and stunning views of magnificent Peljesac peninsula. The ferry ride is about 40 minutes and it is not the most popular ferry connection out of the main season so there were no crowds. This is also a great connection if you are going to Korcula as you skip quite a bit of driving. Once I reached Trpanj, Morana was waiting for me in the harbor to show me the way to her place. Set on a hill, the house offers some of the nicest views of Trpanj!

The house itself is magnificently restored and it is one of the best examples how to use our heritage! Forget about  apartment owners who know only how to build cheap and ugly monsters that are destroying our coastline (and I will NEVER work with them!), this is a true gem where every detail was carefully planned and designed making it truly one of the finest properties I have ever seen in Croatia!

The house was built in 1830s and, after WW2 served as some sort of a summer house for kids from Belgrade. Unfortunately, in all those years, no one invested anything in the property and once Morana and her family bought it, it was just a wreck… But with LOTS of love and passion, this is where you enter this whole another dimension:

The house features 5 bedrooms and it is a B&B type of a property with Morana and her family living there. The returned from the US after 40 years working on Florida and invested their life savings into this project. To cut the long story short, it was not until Morana personally overtook the works and made the house into what it is now. Her artistic skills (she is a very talented artist) came really handy!

They also designed the most charming wine cellar!

And then the kitchen! At every step there is something new and exciting!

What is great about this place is that there is no kitsch. It would be so easy to cross that fine line but everything is done with so much care and taste: all the details, all the colors…
Of course, the house is nothing without the people so I got to meet Morana’s mom Lenka and father Josip who worked hard all their lives to work even harder now in their Trpanj providing the superb service.

And I was also invited for a lunch! Enjoyed a rather international mix of local zeje (or rastika as it is known elsewhere in Dalmatia) and spicy pork ribs! Loved it! All accompanied by the great local plavac red wine from nearby Kuna village.

Since the whole family lived in US running a deli, they are not only cooking local specialties but know how to make great mixes between different cuisines(can’t wait till I go there next time!). Morana’s boyfriend Vale also joined us and we planned our afternoon visiting several other locations (that will be subject of other posts) but we went to the hill above the house to visit small chapel built be the owner of the house back in 19th century which is also a popular panorama point for all visitors of Trpanj.

The views of Peljesac channel and the hills and mountains across are just amazing! Same views were a popular theme of local artist Celestin Medović – one of Croatia’s greatest landscape painters – and his spirit still seems to linger in the air. Felt like dusting off my old oil paint set and sit on the hill for hours… soaking the beauty of a spring afternoon and getting those gentle blues, of the mountains in the distance, just right.

We moved on to see Viganj and abandoned Nakovane but also returned to Trpanj to see another house that is Morana currently restoring and creating another masterpiece. Morana and Vale really know their stuff when it comes to great restoration of old properties and they do a great job so, anyone interested in restoring an old house should definitely hire them!

This is a property we will definitely recommend to our clients being so exceptional and we are also developing several programs with Morana to make their stay even more interesting and special. Anybody looking for a great retreat, this is the place to go!