Free entrance to impressive Barone Fortress in Sibenik on February weekends
- by croatiaweek
- in News
SIBENIK, 4 February 2020 – The impressive Barone Fortress, built in 1646 on Vidakusa, the 80 meter-high hill above the city of Sibenik on the Dalmatian coast, will open its doors to visitors for free on weekends in February, the City of Sibenik has announced.
Entry to Barone Fortress will be free for visitors on Saturdays and Sundays for all of February (including 1 March) from 9 am – 4 pm.
Free entrance in February celebrates four years since the opening of the revitalised Barone Fortress. New life has been breathed into the fortress which was once a neglected place with a new gastro-cultural centre and the construction of a playground and amphitheater at the fortress.
Recognisable for its attractive content, augmented reality (AR), Barone Fortress earned the title of “Cultural Attraction of the Year” in 2016 in its first year of operation. Local SMEs were encouraged through the presentation of their products at the bistro and souvenir shops.
So far, over 180,000 visitors have visited the fort through daily visits with over seventy evening events being held there such as concerts, dance performances and film screenings.
Barone Fortress was a unique defence system that protected the city from invaders for centuries. The city of Šibenik was protected from enemy attack by its city walls and the St. Michael’s Fortress until another fortress – Barone was constructed on the hill to give a better defence to the city in the mid-1600s.
The fortress took just 58 days to construct and was ready in time for an attack from the Ottomans that same year. Barone was shaped as an irregular star and resisted the enemy cannons with bastions reinforced with soil sediments.
Today, Barone Fortress is no longer the first line of defence but a place where the spirit of the Dalmatian area and way of life is preserved.
