Senj

Senj is a small town on the coast under the steep slopes of the Velebit, the windiest stretch of the Adriatic, and it is dominated by the square, block-like Nehaj fortress that sits on the hill above the old town. The fortress was built in 1558 to defend against the Ottomans and the Venetians, and from it the Uskoks, the irregular soldiers and corsairs of the Habsburg Military Frontier, harried shipping along the coast for decades.

The bura, the fierce dry wind that funnels down off the Velebit, is the defining fact of Senj. It blows here harder and more often than anywhere else on the coast, and it shapes the landscape, the bare grey slopes above the town and the wind-bent trees. When the bura blows, the sea off Senj is streaked with spray and the ferries can stop.

The old town below the fortress is a compact grid of stone houses, with a cathedral, a small maritime museum and a seafront. The Nehaj fortress, now a museum, gives the view over the town, the Velebit and the islands of the Kvarner Gulf.

For photographers, the Nehaj fortress against the bare Velebit is the shot, and the bura itself, when it blows, turns the sea into a subject. Check the forecast, the wind genuinely shapes the day here.

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