Return to the land of the fathers. This is the name of the journey that retraces the route of 13 fishing boats carrying 53 families of exiles from Istria, Fiume and Dalmatia.
They reached Fertilia after 20 days and 20 nights of navigation along the coasts of the peninsula. Tomorrow the departure with the Klizia boat which will land in Alghero to say goodbye to the Catalan city. And then it will head towards Trieste touching the French, Tuscan and Lazio coasts. To then arrive in Friuli, also passing through Croatia and Slovenia.
Over 800 miles of navigation are expected. Also on board was Giulio Marongiu, an exile who said goodbye to the city of Pola for the last time when he was only 8 years old. He never wanted to go back to the city where he was born. But today, at the age of 85, he has changed his mind: he will be part of the crew made up of his son Federico, Mauro Manca, son and grandson of Fiuman exiles, and Giuseppe Bellu.
After having cast off the moorings from the small port of Fertilia and having said goodbye to Alghero, the boat will pass under the cliff of Capo Caccia, heading towards Stintino, the first stage of the journey. The journey will continue touching the ports of Castelsardo, Santa Teresa di Gallura, the last Sardinian stop of the journey. Then Solenzara and Bastia in Corsica, Capraia, Livorno. And, after two stops in Punta Ala and Porto Ercole it will be the turn of Civitavecchia. Precisely in the Lazio port on August 13 the crew will celebrate the eighty-fifth birthday of its commander, Giulio Marongiu, before continuing to Fiumicino, Anzio and Gaeta, the last Tyrrhenian stop which hosted 3 refugee camps through which thousands of exiles from Istria passed. Rijeka and Dalmatia.
“Here in Gaeta, in the Cavour Barracks, today the Guardia di Finanza Naval School, my mother was born in 1951 – says Mauro Manca, a member of the Klizia crew – my grandparents exiled from Fiume stayed for about 2 and a half years before arriving in Fertilia”. Then the Adriatic. From Ferrara to Chioggia up to Venice. We will then arrive in Trieste and Gorizia. Then Muggia, the last Italian bastion in Istria, and then Pirano, in Slovenia and Rovinj in Croatia. “It will be a great emotion for me to set foot on that land for the first time, which I abandoned as a child – says Giulio Marongiu – I cannot imagine today what emotions I will be able to feel, I only know that the time has come to reunite this thread which in My heart has never broken.”
The long journey of Klizia, which will be told in a documentary that will be filmed during the journey, will end in Trieste on the occasion of the Barcolana.
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