About Lošinj

The Cres and Lošinj archipelago in Kvarner Bay is the largest group of islands in the Adriatic, made up of 36 islands, islets and reefs. The Town of Mali Lošinj includes the southern part of the island of Cres, the island of Lošinj and a group of smaller islands and islets (Susak, Ilovik, Unije, Male Srakane and Vele Srakane etc.). The island climate is very pleasant all the year round. Century-old pine forests and a variety of plant and animal species are the distinctive features of these islands. When we add 120 years of tourist tradition, the result is an ideal holiday area. Lošinj’s sights include numerous churches and works of art. The antique, approximately 2000-year-old bronze statue of the Greek athlete Apoxyiomenos, found in the Lošinj sea, stands out among them. One of the facts that we point out to with particular pleasure is that the area around the island of Lošinj is the habitat of the last large group of bottlenose dolphins (tursiops truncatus) in the Northern Adriatic, which is indicative of an exceptional level of cleanness of the sea.

Geographic location

The Island of Lošinj is part of the Cres-Lošinj island group, which constitutes the western segment of the Kvarner’s islands inside the Kvarner Bay. The Kvarner Bay together with that of Trieste forms the most inland point of the Mediterranean Sea. The archipelago of Lošinj comprises the Island of Lošinj (74,68 km²) and smaller islands: Unije (16,77 km²), Ilovik (5,88 km²), Susak (3,76 km²), Vele Srakane (1,17 km²), and a series of smaller uninhabited islands.

The islands of this archipelago form the natural bridge between Istria and Dalmatia. It is very particular that the island is positioned right in the middle between the Equator and the North Pole, where the 45th parallel passes through the north side of the island of Cres and the biggest part of the island is in the subtropical zone of the southern half of the northern part of the Earth.

The biggest island of the archipelago is Lošinj, the 11th biggest on the Adriatic Sea, 33 km long, with the width varying from 4,75 km in the north and middle of the island, to 0,25 km near the town of Mali Lošinj. The total coastline of the island is 112,7 km.

Many, many years ago the island of Cres and Lošinj where one, only after the channel of Osor was excavated, probably during the Roman period, two islands emerged. Today a bridge connects the islands and in the geographically trafficable sense they form one unit. In ancient times the islands where know under a common name of Apsyrtides.

Mali Lošinj is the biggest settlement on the island, found on the southern side of the Bay of Lošinj, which thanks to this position has become a very important maritime and commercial centre, and today, also an important tourist destination.