New York Times about Hvar

St. Tropez, Majorca, Aspen, and other glamour destinations don't have anything on Hvar, the glitzy Croatian playground patronized by celebrities, the idle rich, and the average Joe tourist who wants to find out what the Hvar hoopla is about.

Hvar is indeed a lush, sunny Shangri-la with more hours of sunshine (2,724) than any other place in Croatia, according to the literature. But when you're talking just 24 more hours of rays than Brac (2,700) and only 124 hours (4 days) more than most of Croatia's other islands, you're splitting hairs. Nonetheless, some Hvar hotels will discount the price of your room if it rains for 4 hours on any given day and give you a free night if it snows (fat chance).

Ultraviolet rays aside, Hvar is a lovely piece of real estate with vineyards, fields of lavender and other aromatic herbs, a few interesting sites, a lot of good restaurants, and some rather expensive -- but historic -- places to stay.

Hvar's principal towns are Hvar Town, Stari Grad, Vrboska, Jelsa, and Sucuraj, though Hvar Town seems to be the center of current interest in the island.

Lavender Blues

Hvar is sometimes known as "Lavender Island" because the graceful plant with silver-green foliage and a hypnotic fragrance grows in profusion all over the place. Lavendula, as the plant is known in botanical circles, is a native of the dry Mediterranean climate and is the subject of many legends and superstitions. It is also thought to have medicinal properties.

One legend claims that lavender acquired its soothing fragrance when Mary hung baby Jesus's swaddling clothes on a bush and transformed it. A popular superstition says that lavender flowers scattered between the mattress and sheet of the conjugal bed will prevent spousal arguments. Today dried lavender flowers are used as sachets to add a pleasant scent to closets and drawers, and lavender oil is used to promote relaxation.

On Hvar, lavender is an industry and you'll pick up the lavender scent as soon as you disembark from the boat that brought you there, because it is sold in kiosks up and down the dock at Hvar Town. It is said that the whole island is enveloped in a cloud of lavender scent in the spring, and that may be so. But in the summer of 2005 in Hvar Town, the only lavender we saw or smelled originated at the kiosks on the dock.

By FROMMER'S