The “Pag Triangle” – and a ride on the North Dalmatian Coast, Croatia

Saturday, June 1st, 2024

Distance ridden 174 kilometres

Distance walked 9.8 kilometres

It was evident, from the very first second that I opened my eyes, that we were in for a lovely day. The view that we had from our terrace, over the small bay, was peaceful and serene. The calm sea was already beginning to reflect the blue of the skies above.

We had a nice breakfast, not ad-hoc, but selected from a list of possibilities. I chose “Dalmatian” on the “when in Rome” basis, Lucie went “Fitness”, maybe she can see into the future.

My dear wife seldom does anything by accident, so I guessed that there was some underlying reason why we were on Pag Island – and I was not wrong.

At some time in the past, Lucie had seen Pag on one of those “Unexplained Mysteries” television programmes and her plan for the morning was to at least see the mystery. Better minds, if not better haircuts than ours, have not yet managed to explain it.

Pag Island is a long, irregularly shaped, outcrop from the coast of Northern Dalmatia. At the southern extremity, it is joined to the land by the bridge I mentioned yesterday. To the north, access to the mainland is via a ferry. It rises quite sharply, to quite a height in places and, as a general rule it is rocky and somewhat bleak. Only the areas close to the sea have any real vegetation, the rest seems to be a mass of either solid rock or huge areas that look like lava fields, only they are the wrong colour and there has never been any volcanic activity in the area. The only vegetation to be found at the higher levels are scrubby bushes and tough little plants that somehow find an existence between the hot rocks. Sheep farming does take place here and there are endless kilometres of dry-stone walls made from the nearby rocks to keep the sheep in place. A special local cheese, unsurprisingly called “Pag Cheese” is made by fermenting the milk of sheep together with sea salt (there were the pans where this is evaporated on the approach road to the island) and olive oil. We have tried it and it is good.

Our overall plan for the day was to ride north, take the ferry and then ride south down the Dalmatian coast and re-enter Pag again from the south. The visit to the mystery site would happen before we boarded the ferry.

We took a tank of petrol and set off north. The climb out of Pag town was quite steep, but gave some fabulous views over the inlet.

Along the ridge line, the road was well surfaced and swooped up and down long inclines. The bends had the expected predictability and, at a sensible speed (something the locals did not seem to understand) it was quite fun, particularly without all the luggage.

A few kilometres before the ferry port, we took a right turn from the main road onto a much lesser one, which still had a good surface. For some reason, the small valley we entered appeared a lot greener than most of the rest of the island.

Within a few kilometres, we came to a small sign on the right hand side of the road which indicated that our destination was nearby.

We had come to see what is known as the “Pag Triangle”. This is a triangle (obviously) that, depending upon whether you are an archeologist or a UFOlogist, is either a petroglyph of religious origin and significance – or a way marker for alien visitors. It is only really clearly visible from the air, which encourages the latter theory, but it is something to behold even from ground level.

We parked the Harley, put every possible item of clothing into the panniers and prepared to set off for, what Lucie’s map program claimed, was a walk of under two kilometres. There was a rocky track and, as we approached, a farmer in a pickup was just exiting the gate. In reply to Lucie’s query as to whether we could go there, he merely grunted “Why not?” but then asked if we were going to ride the Harley up the track. A look at the surface was enough to convince us that we would not have got ten metres.

Did I say “nearby” a bit earlier ? We set off to walk. It was already very hot and it was slow progress up the first rise, then up the second rise – and then up the third one. Two kilometres ? I began to doubt it.

Then the track ended and we were confronted with a seemingly endless sea of rough, shattered rocks. Here and there, small cairns marked the way, there was no path at all.

We set off carefully, through the jumbled rocks and stones. There was a stone wall, going in approximately the right direction which had a red pointed triangle and an arrow painted on it, so we followed the line of that. It was easier going, but only in the context of not being quite so murderously hard.

A low hill, adorned with several cairns appeared on our right and, as we approached, the Triangle suddenly became fairly obvious. Not as a “triangle”, because we were on the same level as it was, but principally as a defined area of small stones in the ocean of jumbled boulders. Up close, it was definitely triangular and definitely man made – as in not a natural occurrence, lest I offend the UFOlogist community ! It is a triangular area (obviously) with edges of about 20 metres and of an “Isosceles” type, like an arrowhead. Its surface is made up of countless small white stones and its bottom edge in particular, is very clearly defined. It seems the stones have been “tested” and emit an infra-red light which indicates that at some time in the past, they were subjected to high temperatures similar to those in a volcanic eruption. As I said before, there has NEVER been any volcanic activity nearby …

From the low hill, the Triangle is clear and very noticeable – it also stands at the end of a long straight- sided depression in the terrain. I might be forgiven for saying that this looked, to me, like the shaft of an arrow – but that might also put me into the wild-haired and staring-eyed brigade.

Should you wish, you can read more about the Triangle here:

https://visitnovalja.hr/the-ancient-mystery-of-the-island-of-pag/?lang=en

One tiny disappointment. In the above article a representation of an alien adorns the site. It is not there now. Perhaps, it fell victim to souvenir hunters – or, maybe, his people reclaimed him ……..

We may never know !

–

The trip back down to the bike was easier, but still just as hot and we were both glad when we got back to the Harley and were at least able to get some breeze by riding it.

On a small hill, a couple of kilometres north of the Triangle, are the ancient remains of a Roman villa. I wondered if the people who lived there, around twenty centuries ago, knew about the Triangle and what they thought about it if they did.

We regained the main road and headed eastwards towards the car ferry. The terrain was very up and down, with one or two descents that tested the Harley’s compression and brakes.

We came to a small ferry terminal at Žigljen and Lucie jumped off and paid 16 Euros for our passage. As a motorcycle, we were directed to the very front of the line, which was not that long anyway. It was not a long wait, by the time we had purchased an ice-coffee and an espresso from the kiosk, the ferry was already approaching the dock. We were waved on board, the cars were swiftly and efficiently loaded and we were off. It was a short, smooth crossing, we did not even secure the bike, just side-stand and first gear and we were soon putting on our helmets to leave.

The route away from opposite the ferry terminal at Prizna was quite a steep climb, but the Harley easily managed it. I would not have wanted to be towing – but many people were and there was a passing lane on the steepest incline. At the top, everybody seemed to be turning left, which was north, but having already triangled, we were now circling, so we turned right and headed south.

There are some types of road that bikers love – and this was one of those. It hugged the edge of the land with the bright blue sea at its side. Travelling south, the sea was to our right.

Almost like a dare, there was a large blue sign stating, in several languages “Challenging road for motorcyclists next 15 km”. There was a lot of riders like us, who were only there for the scenery and, at our speed, as I have previously remarked, with a good surface and largely predictable corners, it was nothing more than slightly demanding. The only thing I needed to be careful of was the occasional piece of worn surface on the inside of some corners. There were dozens, if not hundreds of other riders though, who had eagerly picked up the gauntlet thrown down by the blue sign. It is a long, long time since I have ridden any form of “sports” motorcycle and I am cognitive of modern advances in frame, tyre, brake and suspension technology – but, gosh !!! Some of those guys (and girls, as their figure hugging leathers made fairly obvious) were travelling at almost surreal speeds. This was a public road, remember. Exactly where a high level of skill ends and becomes outright lunacy is hard to determine, but none of those riders could afford a thousandth of a second’s lack of concentration.

We arrived at Karlobag, at the end of that fifteen kilometre stretch and decided to stop for lunch. The seafront was crowded with some very serious two-wheeled hardware, basking in the sun while their owners stocked up on pizza and Red Bull in nearby cafes. Up close those projectiles looked extremely uncompromising and the Harley slightly out of place in such svelte company.

We wandered a bit further along the sea front and found the restaurant Konoba Šterna (Trg. Frane Tudmana 2, Karlobag) – it is at the end of a small cul-de-sac. We enjoyed our first taste of Pag cheese, a nice salad and two, local, meat specialities, Čevabčiči for Lucie and Pljeskavica for me – all of which we forgot to snap because we were hungry – accompanied by a couple of cold beers.

We set of south again and, on leaving the town, there was another blue sign. This one indicated that the “challenge” would be 37 kilometres in length. This section did contain one or two corners that WERE worthy of a high level of concentration, even at our somewhat leisurely speed. Those flying past us were certainly testing their mettle in a very big way. I saw some getting sparks, even from their high-mounted foot pegs, on some sharp corners and some of the speeds were breathtaking.

By the time we came to the end of the “challenging” section, I was exhausted from constantly having to watch my mirrors for something coming from behind at warp speed. I have to admit that, quite a few times, one of those missiles passed me and disappeared almost before I was aware it was there at all.

We came to a more normal road and stopped for an ice-cream in the small town of Stari Grad. Various bikers unwound there after their exertions and others tightened their gloves, pulled down their visors and gave us all the sound of their sporty exhausts before blasting off north. The view was idyllic, but peaceful it was not.

The next stretch was far more relaxing, just normal road which the speed-merchants approaching us on their way to play, gobbled up without any tyre testing drama. Across the straight, Pag Island was visible. The connecting bridge was far more impressive from over the water than it had been to ride over.

Eventually, we made the turn north towards Pag Island again and entered it via the same route as on the previous evening.

At one point a Police car pulled out quite sharply and suddenly in front of us. I wondered what transgression I might have made, but it was only putting in place some form of traffic-calming for a funeral procession and we were past before things got really slow.

We came to Pag town and visited a supermarket to get ourselves some of the famous Pag Cheese to take home, Somehow some biscuits also fell into our little basket !

After a short rest at our hotel, we ventured out again to town on foot. This time we walked all the way across the bay to the marina, crossing, at the end, the rather cutesie little Katine Bridge that was obviously quite new.

We found a nice restaurant, right at the water’s edge called Dubrava (Branimirova Obala 3, Pag). We enjoyed a plate of far “cheesier” Pag Cheese than we had eaten at lunchtime, a salad, a nice Mackerel for Lucie and a nice white fish (that was nicely filleted – I hate fish bones) for me.