A frosty afternoon in magical Zagreb

It’s the coldest it’s ever been, said Andrea as she was showing us to our apartment in the center of Zagreb. It was the last day of February and it was a shivering -8 degrees in Croatia. In CROATIA! A country that is known for its pristine beaches and hot summers. I never even knew they got cold winters.

At the end of February, a cold front coming from Siberia had hit most of Europe. Russia and Belarus, I believe, experienced the worst cold. We had it pretty bad in Denmark as well with icy winds blowing through our capital, making my skin as red and dry as can be as I biked to uni. And as crazy as it sounds, Croatia – and Slovenia – got it as well. -8 degrees is a temperature that Croatia hasn’t experienced in over 50 years, according to Andrea. I couldn’t believe that of all days, my mum and I were there on the coldest day of the year. And we were only in Croatia for one day.

My mum and I go on a mother/daughter trip to somewhere in Europe every year for 3-4 days. This year, we had chosen Slovenia as our destination, as we really wanted to explore the quaint capital of Ljubljana and see some of the country’s beautiful lakes and caves. But flying both to and from Ljubljana from Copenhagen would mean having to cut our trip short, as the flight only leaves on certain days. Instead, we figured why not fly into Zagreb, explore that city for an afternoon and then take a morning bus to Ljubljana? After all, we had spent a week in Croatia back in 2013, but we’d never seen the capital. So that was what we decided to do.

We arrived in Zagreb in the early afternoon of February 28th after a short 2,5-hour flight. Although the temperature was way below zero, it was a beautiful day and the sun was shining from a blue sky. We were excited to be travelling together again and to see a new city.

Unfortunately, I had made a mistake when booking our accommodation for the night and had booked an apartment. To my defense, it didn’t state anywhere on booking.com that it was an apartment and not a hotel. It’s not that I mind staying in apartments, but I HATE the hassle of having to be in contact with the owners in order to arrange the time to meet up and get the key to the apartment. I would much rather just go to a hostel/hotel and check in straight away when I get to the city. And although the situation turned out to be good after all, we were off to a terrible start with our chosen accommodation.

We arrived there 45 minutes after our plane had landed, but when we rang the door bell and no one came down to get us or let us in, I decided to call one of the managers, Tomas. He told me the code to the door, but it didn’t work. Then he said he would call Andrea, another manager, to come and get us. We waited in the freezing cold some more, it took it’s time. Finally, Andrea showed up and told us it had all been a misunderstanding, as they had sent us an email saying that we had to change apartments due to a plumbing issue.

Andrea was really nice and apologetic and walked us to our new apartment, which, according to her, was an upgrade. The location was definitely better than the other one, right beside a beautiful park, and the apartment was lovely.

But spending so much time just to get to the accommodation left us with only 1,5 hours of daylight to explore Zagreb. 1,5 hours for an entire city. Thankfully, Zagreb is tiny and everything you want to see on a short day trip is within a 1 kilometer distance from each other.

We dropped off our bags and then headed into the streets of Zagreb. We walked into the center to the main square, Ban Jelačić Square, through the quaint Ulica Pavla Radica street, trying to locate the funicular to take us to the upper city, Kaptol. When we couldn’t see it or any signs pointing to it, we instead decided to walk up there despite the slippery streets. We climbed stairs after stairs and eventually got so high up that we could see over the entire city.

Zagreb offered many surprises, but the biggest one was definitely St. Mark’s Church. I’d read online that it was a popular sight to see in the city, but I hadn’t seen any pictures, so I didn’t know what to expect. But wow, how it took my breath away!

The church was built in the 13th century in Romanesque style, but later reconstructed into a late Gothic church. The most impressive part of the structure is the roof, where tiles are laid out so they represent the coat of arms of Zagreb, and the Triune Kingdom of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia.

A few meters more along the road, we came to a small snow-covered park where tiny lanterns were hanging from the trees. From the edge of the park, there was a view over the rooftops of the city, and with the last rays of the sun painting the sky orange, it made for a perfect and atmospheric setting. Zagreb looks absolutely stunning during the golden hour.

As we were finding our way back down to the lower city, we came to another view point, which was – if possible – even more stunning than the above one. We could see almost the entire city, but the best part was the Gothic-styled cathedral in the middle of it all – and the moon shining brightly beside it.

Zagreb Cathedral is a Roman Catholic church that is known for being the most monumental sacral building in Gothic style southeast of the Alps, as well as being the tallest building in all of Croatia.

If there’s one thing that my mum and I share, it’s our love for cats. We LOVE cats so much and therefore, we adore going to cat cafés all around the world. Naturally, we couldn’t miss out on going to Zagreb’s own cat café, so we decided to go there when the sun had set and day had turned to night.

It’s located a few kilometers out of the city center, and since it was so cold, we decided to take a tram there. Andrea had told us to take tram 11 or 12 and get off at Masiceva station, from where the café is only a few blocks away.

I’m so glad that we found time to go there, as the cat café was gorgeous! The interior was brilliant with so many things for the cats to climb on, play on, sleep on and get away from all the humans!

We had a Hot Chocolate Strawberry Swirl each and spent ages cuddling, playing and taking pictures of all the adorable kitties!

We ended the day with a meal at McDonalds… We would leave it for Slovenia to be healthy and try local dishes, as we were too exhausted after a long day and just needed something easy.

We weren’t in Zagreb for long, but it stole our hearts. It’s such a quaint and cozy capital that really doesn’t feel like a city at all. The views from the upper city are breathtaking, the churches are beautiful and the cat café is one of the best we’ve been to! Definitely a place to come back to.