After a long, frosty winter, which has finally slowly given way to spring, which is showing up here with the first early bloomers, we are tarvelling into the perfect spring: to Opatija!
At the end of March and temperatures above 20°C, perfect spring full of flowers. All the trees are blooming – and even some roses.
And here, in a sheltered location on the mountainside, is the American Garden.
Around 1920, the Hungarian pepper merchant Michael Paulus Kuczor came here and fell in love with the wide view over the Kvarner Bay from the mountainside terraces. He wanted to build a magnificent garden here and was able to buy the property on condition that he would keep the plant that had already been started.
In 1922 he married Hilda von Hortenau, who lived nearby and was an illegitimate daughter of Archduke Otto von Habsburg, who ran a flower shop in Opatija.
Together they wanted to create the most beautiful garden in Europe. Terraces were blasted into the rock over an area of 30,000 m2, carts of earth were carted in and beds and structures were erected. Gardenias, camellias, magnolias, cacti and exotic trees, but also vines and thousands of roses were planted. The finished garden was opened to the public between 1926 and 1941. Then the couple had to leave Opatija.
After the war, the facility was used as the city garden center of Opatija, some time ago the revitalization started (currently about 8000 m2 are finished), which is not quite finished yet. The upper part is still overgrown, plans for completion already exist.
The garden can be visited at free of charge.
