Zadar: This ancient city has some capital sights

City Slicker: Zadar, Croatia - Laid-back Zadar was once the powerhouse of the Dalmatian coast. Oliver Bennett offers ideas for new and returning visitors

Why visit?

Since Ryanair started flying to this Croatian city last year, it has become a bit of a hub: a place from where to explore the Dalmatian coast and its islands.

But it's worth delaying for a few days to explore the place itself. While Split is the biggest Dalmatian city, Zadar, with 3,000 years of history, can claim to be the original capital of Dalmatia – plus it's also the site of the first Croatian university, and was home to the 16th-century writer, Petar Zoranic, who wrote the first Croatian novel, Planine.

Zadar's old town is packed on to a peninsula and you can stroll around it in about an hour. Ascend to the tower of the Cathedral of St Anastasia for views over the pantiles to the sea and islands in one direction and the Velebit mountains in the other.

But this isn't really a monument town – it's a place to hang out. Go shopping in the little alleys of the Varos area, eat squid and drink Malvasia wine in the various konobas (taverns), leap off the quayside to swim, and finally, relax on the huge Dalmatian stones. You'll be following the example of the film director Alfred Hitchcock, who said that Zadar quay offered the most beautiful sunset in the world.

Don't miss

The Venetian Land Gate

This is the main entrance to the old town, a triumphal arch that illustrates that this was a major city-fortress in the Venetian republic. Built in 1543, it is decorated with reliefs of Zadar's main patron saint, St Chrysogonus, as well as the shield of the Venetian patron St Mark, and a rather threatening frieze of sculpted ox skulls.

The Forum

A huge plaza in the middle of Zadar – the address is Zeleni Trg – hosts the tumbledown remains of the city's Roman forum. So important was Zadar that the Romans gave it municipium status: the second-highest accolade. You can see the extent of the complex, although the only standing column has had a chequered past as the "pole of shame", where criminals from the Middle Ages to the 19th century were chained up.

St Donat's Church

Some of the Forum's stones were used to build this church, a handsome and simple vaulted edifice that dates back to the ninth century, when it was supposedly built by St Donat, a visiting Irish bishop. It stopped being a church in 1797 and these days it is used as a summer venue for classical music concerts (donat-festival.com).

The Cathedral of St Anastasia

This late Romanesque monster is dedicated to a fourth-century saint. The interior is lovely and Italianate, but the prize is the campanile, which was finished by the British architect T G Jackson in the 1890s and offers great views from the top.

Zadar University (unizd.hr)

This has been a university town since 1396, one of the earliest in Europe. It still has a big seat of learning, in an early 20th-century Neoclassical building at pole position on the waterfront, which was relaunched in 2002, and one of the reasons why Zadar is so full of young people.

The Singing Sea Organ

This is no mere curiosity but (probably) one of the most perfect public sculptures in the world. Created in 2005 by the Croatian architect Nikola Basic, it sits on the city's quay, creating aleatoric music from the waves running through its pipes. This is also Zadar's favourite hangout, where visitors and locals alike sit rapt on long evenings.

Greeting to the Sun

Basic also made this sculpture a few yards away: 300 glass plates in a large circle, representing the planets of our solar system. When lit at night, it's like being on the dance floor from Saturday Night Fever.

Croata (croata.hr)

Pick up a tie at this fun shop – the tie was created in Croatia, and "cravat" is a corruption of the word "Hrvat" (Croat). So they say.

Zadar's beach

Found near the Land Gate, Zadar's little swimming beach is in a free-of-charge complex close to the city's park and has a bar, diving board, and different levels of seawater pool – don't be put off by the sign denoting "no guns".

National Parks

Zadar is close to several of Croatia's eight national parks, including Krka, (npkrka.hr), which has seven waterfalls.

Island hopping

Visit Osljak (osljak.com), a tiny island with old windmills, a chapel – and traces of its role as a Second World War concentration camp. These days, it is the epitome of peace.

What's new

Hotel & Spa Iadera

The Hotel & Spa Iadera, just outside Zadar on the Punta Skala peninsula, is the latest place to stay. The 250-room hotel is right by the sea at Petrcane, close to Zadar, and has a spa and wellness centre offering several types of sauna, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, plus an enormous Turkish bath.

Details: falkensteiner.com/en/hotel/iadera

Restaurant Bruschetta

Food is fun and informal in Zadar. One of the newer places is Restaurant Bruschetta, at Mihovila Pavlinovica 12, which does Italian food – including the eponymous bruschetta. It's a modern building, so it's airier that some of Zadar's cellar konobas. Try the bruschetta puttanesca – tomato, anchovies, rocket, olives, capers, olive oil – with some of the sheep's cheese from the nearby island of Pag.

Details: bruschetta.hr

New Media Art Gallery

Each year, Zadar hosts a summer film festival – one of several events on the growing Zadar "cool calendar" – and the New Media Gallery is now at the heart of the action. Set in an old cinema, the gallery opened last year. Go this month and you'll be able to see Hegem.on.i.ja, an "audio visual poetic landscape".

Details: mavena.hr

Bar Shine

Bar Shine, near the Forum, opened this summer for Zadar's glamour crowd: one of a growing roster of places raising Zadar's game as a nightlife city. It's well lit, minimal and modish with DJs playing until the early morning.

Details: barshine.hr

Insider Secret...

Sinisa Klarica, Journalist at news site Zardarski List (zadarskilist.hr)

"The Gold and Silver of Zadar – also called the Permanent Exhibition of Religious Art – is terrific. It was started in 1951 by Croatian writer Miroslav Krleza, and became a permanent display in 1976 at the Benedictine Convent of St Mary, one of the first capital buildings of Croatian culture. Amazingly, treasures were preserved by the nuns through the years of war. We're very proud of it."

Details: tzzadar.hr/en/city-guide/museums/23-05-2007/the-gold-and-silver-of-zadar

Compact Facts

How to get there

Ryanair (0871 246 0000; ryanair.com) flies from Stansted to Zadar between April and October from £10 return. Croatia Airlines (00 385 1 66 76 555; croatia airlines.com) has return flights, via Zagreb, year round from £178.

Further information

Croatian National Tourist Office (020-8563 7979, croatia.hr ). Zadar Tourist Board (visitzadar.net ).