Baredine Cave

Overview

Not far away from the town Poreč in Istria, by the village of Nova Vas, you can find an interesting Baredine cave that offers a treasure chest of stalagmites and stalactites, underworld sculptures created through time by the patient work of water.





























The water inside the cave slowly created numerous interesting rock-arts, some of them are exceptional, such as the 10 meter long and high curtains, a very realistic sculpture of Our Lady, the leaning tower of Pizza and snowman the torchbearer-who has become the trade mark of this cave.

In one of the halls you will pass a crater that is 4 mtrs wide and 66 mtrs deep which goes down to the underground lakes and it is reserved only for experienced cavers.

Another interesting experience is also meeting the endemic animals of the underworld, that live only in this kind of environment. In Baredine cave several troglobite species live. Most famous are, of course, the human fish, Proteus anguinus. Other endemic troglobionts of the cave are crabs and insects. Cave guests are bats and doves. Also toads can be found in the entrance area.

Cave facts

The Baredine cave is 132 meters deep and on its bottom are underground lakes which can sometimes be up to 30 meters deep.

It has 5 five large rooms at the depth of 60 meters, with one 66 meters deep crater that leads
to a series of underground lakes.

The cave is a protected geomorphologic nature reserve.

The temperature in the cave is 14 degrees.

Guiding tour of the cave takes about 40 minutes of walk along some 300 meters of pathway through five lamp-lit "rooms" all at around 60 meters below the surface.

History

1926 first exploration by a team of speleologists from Trieste to a depth of 80m.

1973 start of exploration by the Proteus Speleological Society.

1974 complete exploration of the cave by Silvio Legovic and a team of speleologists from Porec.

1976 caving club Proteus founded.

1986 cave was declared a nature reserve.

1990 start of development.

1995 opened to the public.


(above information was taken from http://www.showcaves.com)

Red tape

No smoking inside the cave.

Photographing is permitted only without using of flash.

No animals allowed.

The Legend

The Baredine cave has its own legend and it comes from the 13th century.

The story goes like this...

A nobleman from Poreč city named Gabriel, fell in love with a beautiful milkmaid from Nova Vas village called Milka. But Gabriel's mother was against this love and tried to stop it. Nothing helped, so she bribe robbers with three gold pieces to kill Milka secretly. The robbers did not kill the milkmaid, but instead they hijacked her and threw her into a Baredine cave.
When Gabriel heard this, he took his horse and tried to save her. Later his horse was found, but near another cave nearby. At the end it seems that they both got lost, but in different caves.

Official Website

More info on:

http://www.baredine.com/

Weather conditions in the area

Informations on weather conditions in the area can be found on
Croatian State Hydrometeorological Institute site:

http://meteo.hr/index_en.php

Images

View Baredine Cave Image Gallery - 13 Images