Within the Erasmus project Marina 2 from 25 to 29th of November 25 members of the Aventure Pluriel association from France were on a study visit to Betina. Members of the association come from all over France. The association deals with the protection and preservation of maritime cultural heritage.
Members of the association are engaged in various fields – from the organization of maritime festivals, underwater archeology, photography, linguistics, museology, several of them are professional shipbuilders (including two women), or they own wooden boats, some of them are skippers on wooden boats, and the link connecting them is love and enthusiasm for the wooden boats and maritime culture.
At the Mediterranean Maritime Heritage Forum, organized by our Museum in Betina in June, a partnership between the Aventure Pluriel Association and the Betina Musuem of Wooden Shipbuilding was agreed through the Erasmus project with the aim of training, learning and sharing experiences. Together we designed the schedule and the plan of the activities. Members of the association visited the Museum and the old town of Betina. They also visited the shipwrights and talked with masters Ante Fržop and Milan Jadrešić. They also followed a very nice presentation made by Dieter Schellenberg on the Orlić leut. We were very lucky with the language – both Dieter and Vladimir Skračić whom we asked to translate when visiting the masters speak excellent French.
With our Zdenko Bilić, we did a boat ride in the direction of Modrave and talked about the islanders’ coexistence with a wooden boat. They were very interested in whether the ship was still used by locals when going to the olive groves and whether this tradition would continue in the future.
Irena Radić Rossi, one of our most respected expert in submarine archeology and ship archeology research, gave a lecture and a workshop on the principles of the ship form design on the fourth day of the visit.
We answered many of their questions. The group was also very interested in the local strategy, with an emphasis on the preservation and promotion of the cultural heritage, the work and activities of local heritage associations on our island, and even visited the market in the town of Šibenik, buying traditional tools and local products. On the last day of the visit, the work of our associations was presented by Jadranko Pavić, the vice president of the Betina gajeta 1740 association, and Jakov Lovrić, president of the Association Latinsko idro from Murter. Municipality representative Andrea Vlaić spoke about the Municipality of Tisno projects.
This was for sure very dynamic and productive week, with a very good cooperation established between every organization included.
We hope to return the visit soon!