This summer, 11 Students and two faculty members are traveling to Croatia, Serbia, and Bosnia to learn about the 20th-century history of the countries formerly known as Yugoslavia and begin to unravel the complex reverberations of Conflict. Please enjoy this blog post below from Anais ’26 and Travis ’26 where they share about their peaceful day of swimming, shopping, and exploring Korčula, capped by a moving tour with a local guide whose stories of resilience, community, and post-war life brought depth and humanity to the island’s natural beauty.
By Anaïs ’26:
We started off our penultimate day with a nice, relaxing morning on the beautiful coast of Orebic. We were given the morning off, allowing us to choose between activities such as sleeping in, swimming, or going on a walk. After enjoying a lovely breakfast at our hotel, Travis, Eleanor, Ava and I decided to take a short walk down by the waterfront and explore some souvenir shops. We found a plethora of locally made goods such as carefully decorated lavender sachets, salt shakers and a deck of Croatian cards! Next, Ms. R-L accompanied us to the beach, where we spent an hour soaking up the sunlight and swimming in the crystal blue water of the Adriatic. As I dunked my head underwater, I spotted schools of fish navigating the ocean floor and many sea urchins sticking to rocks. After having the morning to decompress, we took the 1 o’clock ferry to a nearby island called Korčula. Our group was given two hours for a DIY lunch in the old town, along with some time for extra shopping. While Tim and Albert chose to enjoy Asian cuisine by the water, several others of us found a delicious local pizza restaurant with a delightful view.
By Travis ’26:
We rejoined our group after exploring the old town of Korčula. The town was made up of many old, narrow streets made of cobblestone, and each alley held stores with vastly different products and goods. Our group then said goodbye to the old town and boarded a bus that took us to a different part of the island for a tour. We met our guide, Tatiana, who moved to Korčula full time in 2002 (“for love”) and took us on a two hour walking tour around the agricultural part of the island. Tatiana was very knowledgeable about the land and shared many facts about the countryside and the farming that took place there. One thing we learned was that because the area was so rocky, it was often too difficult for farmers to use industrial machinery for harvesting. As a result, a lot of harvesting- for example, with olives- was done by hand and by families. Tatiana also told us that water was scarce on the island until 1986 when the island got an undersea pipeline connecting them to the mainland, and before this, people would often add wine or vinegar to the cistern water (especially during hot summer months, when rain is scarce) to kill some of the microorganisms in their water. Something that was shocking to us was the fact that one region of the island hadn’t received running water from the public pipeline until three years ago. Tatiana attributed this to the cost of building a pipeline across the bottom of the sea.
Tatiana also told us a little bit about how the war in the 1990s affected Korčula, connecting our current setting to some of what we had learned earlier on the trip. While some of the island’s inhabitants had gone to fight in the war and died, and although the island did struggle sometimes because of difficulties obtaining supplies, no fighting had taken place on it. Unfortunately, growing up as a teenager during the war was difficult at times. Children often felt abandoned, she suggested, as their parents dealt with other situations such as injuries or the loss of their income, so teenagers grew up with a lot of autonomy. Tatiana also told us about how the community on the island has always worked together to support each other. This sense of community manifested itself in the 1960s when one resident bought a generator that he allowed the whole town to use. Because of his generosity, each family could have one light bulb on in their kitchen so they could eat dinner together. As a way of repaying him, people would lend a hand when he needed help with his crops. We learned much more from Tatiana that cannot be condensed into one blog post, but having the experience to talk to a local of the island was invaluable. After our tour, we had our penultimate dinner together, and then took a ferry at sunset back to the main island of Orebic.
