Tito’s Cadillac

“You could have driven Tito’s Convertible Cadillac” the subject line of the email read.

It was from a friend in Zagreb, Croatia.

… A few years ago, I was in the Bruyini Islands in the Adriatic Sea. A short ferry ride from Zagreb reaches this archipelago of 14 islands that constituted the “playground” of the Josip Broz Tito, the communist leader of former Yugoslavia. During his playboy days, these islands were his secret resort where leaders of the world and most famous women of the time would visit. There were elephants there given by Gandhi, Shetland ponies from The Queen of England, deer from many parts of Europe, and wild animals taxidermied after Tito shot them. When I was there, a white parrot was kept in a large cage at the island center presumed to be one that Tito gave to his granddaughter.

Maybe.

I was there for a conference, as the islands are now the property of Croatia and transformed into conference centers and hotels. While the ferry ride from Zagreb is only about 30 minutes when the waves are calm, most of Yugoslavia did not know about the opulence of Tito’s playgrounds where he spent half of every year. It was four years after his death in 1980 that the islands were opened to the public.

I did not take many photos during this trip as the islands, its sunsets, its buildings and good food are not things I capture on film. However here are a couple of testimonials:

The ferry arriving into the main island and visitors (in this case colleagues attending the conference) headings to one of the residences now transformed into hotels with splendid balconies almost atop the Adriatic.

One of the many statues along the beach:

So, the first night I was there I was told that Tito’s convertible 1960 Cadillac, a present from the American President Dwight Eisenhower was on display. I had never heard about the Cadillac which he is told to use in picking up his famous guests from the ferry docks and taking them for tours of the island. So, late that night we went to see the Cadillac which unfortunately was kept in a garage at night and unavailable to the public. The next few days got busy and I never saw the Cadillac.

… So I wrote these lines because my friend sent me a note a few days ago informing me that the Cadillac is now fully restored and visitors can rent it for USD $500 a day to tour the larger island – buildings, photo museum, taxidermy museum, wineries and of course the zoo.

It seems that it is one of the most famous cars of the past century as it has hosted the leaders of our world on a small island where a communist leader played away from his people 6 months a year….

June 10, 2019

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2019