Korčula’s old town is small enough to walk in an hour and clever enough to be worth much longer. The streets run off the main spine in a herringbone pattern, angled so that the summer maestral is funnelled in on one side while the winter bura is blocked on the other. Once you notice it you cannot unsee it.
At the centre is St Mark’s Cathedral, Gothic and Baroque in carved local limestone, much of it the work of the stonemason Marko Andrijić. The Greeks knew the island as Corcyra Melaina, dark Corcyra, for the pine forest that covered it.
Marco Polo is the town’s calling card and the claim is genuinely disputed, what is documented is that he was captured off Korčula by the Genoese during the battle against Venice. There is a house that is shown as his birthplace; treat it as a good story rather than a settled fact.
If you are there on the right evening, Moreška is the real thing: a two-sword dance recorded here since the seventeenth century, the black king against the red, fought over a girl and settled with steel.
The island’s two wines are worth the detour. Grk is grown almost entirely around Lumbarda on the sandy soil east of town; Pošip comes from the inland villages of Čara and Smokvica.
Old townherringbone streets · wind by design
CathedralSt Mark’s · Gothic and Baroque limestone
Greek nameCorcyra Melaina, dark Corcyra
Marco Polobirthplace disputed · capture documented
Moreškasword dance, recorded since the 1600s
WinesGrk from Lumbarda · Pošip from Čara and Smokvica