We arrived into Hvar island's main ferry port at 4:30pm, absolutely drenched in sweat from having baked ourselves on the ship's deck for the entire 6 and a half hours of the journey from Dubrovnik. My travel buddy even had the tan lines to show for it, but me being a total whitey had hardly turned a shade of "olive".

We had stopped off only once on the way at Korcula, a pretty-looking island with a town that claims to be the birth place of Marco Polo. This is a contested fact, as most recall Marco Polo as the famous VENETIAN explorer, but Croatian locals seem to hold fast to their belief that the great traveller hailed from their homeland - hence the name of our ferry:

We stayed in Juravec campsite which is (unlike man campsites) pretty much in the town centre. About 300m from 'Lanterna' (lighthouse) beach and not much further from the town's main square, its the perfect pitch for cheap travellers with decent facilities and social atmosphere.

Stari Grad, literally "Old Town", is a delightful place with a phenomenal history of settlement behind its beautiful stone architecture. It's name is a collective title for a number of towns which have been established and abandonned on the same spot. It dates back to a Greek Pharos settlement and archeological reserch has uncovered remains of Roman, early Croatian, Christian and Romanesque settlements since.

The locals are friendly and welcoming, and the atmosphere is relaxed and simultaneously buzzing with activity. Though it is a small town, much smaller than Hvar town 27 km away, Stari Grad is festival central. The town is decked out with strings of multi-coloured festival flags and almost every day/night there was something happening.

On our first night there the town's brass band played a set of traditional songs, with a few brass band favourites thrown in...the encore being TEQUILLA! if that's not familiar to you, just think mexican music puncutated by a few shouts of "Tequilla!" throughout. Despite being distinctly un-croatian, the song fits quite well with the Croatian's love for drinking! Whilst there I fell in love with the local rakija, a type of brandy/spirit, and prosek - a deliciously sweet desert wine.

After the band, a group of locals about our age put on a display of fire poi and fire-staff twirling. It was mesmerising watching a beautiful girl engulfing herself in swirls of fire as she swung two poi from her hands, miraculously (to me) managing to keep from catching fire!

The second day, I woke to the sound of a distant horn. It turned out to be the Faros Marathon, an international long-distance swimming race of about 16km from the harbour to the end of the bay and back again. A large crowd had gathered, tv cameras and all, to watch the men's first place winner glide into the harbour with powerful arm strokes. Fireworks burst into the morning sky and a song that sounded like a national anthem or something similar blasted out from speakers.

Personally, I had come to participate in the Faropis festival of literature which took place between 24-25th August. On the 25th we did a poetry reading in the house of Petar Hektorovic, the town's equivalent of Shakespeare, a 16th century poet who lived on the island. His house is now a heritage site and a museum which stands in the town's main square.

The gardens are abundent with lush green plants and vines hanging from a treslis which puts most of the garden in relative shade during the hours of hot sun. There is also an impressive pond, containing a large shoal of black fish, framed by stone archways. This was where we read our poetry, in homage to the great poet Hektorovic.

The town has a whole host of lovely restaurants, mostly around the main square, coffee shops, and bars full of character which tend to be tucked away in the maze of cobbled streets off the harbour side. We ended up in a cute little bar called Antika most nights with a mixed group of other travellers and a few locals that we made friends with throughout the trip.

And not far from Antika there are several small galleries exhibiting the owner's own work. One of the things that struck me about the town was the mentality of artists that I met. If one was an artist, it made sense to open their own gallery: one of the galleries we popped into was literally a room in the man's house! One room was dedicated to his amazing sculptures of imaginary creatures, created from the skins and bodily parts of real animals, and another room was a cross between a jewelery workshop and a living room, with the third room being the guy's room where he'd sit and talk to visitors, make his art, and chat to his wife who'd be there chilling, feeding the baby etc. Art is life in a town like Stari Grad. Artists are given an immense amount of respect, and there is always music playing, or poetry, or visual displays of some kind going on.

I am not sure if half of these features of the town exsist out of high season, but I sure the artists must continue their work and gallery exhibitions throughout the year. Hvar Town, about 27 km from Stari Grad had Europe's first ever covered-top theatre, which says a lot for the Island's artistic heritage and value awarded to art.

The festival atmosphere is not one that engulfs the daily life of the island, but coexists with it. Unlike Hvar town, Stari Grad is not crowded with expensive yatches and hoards of tourists, particularly the young clubbing crowd, mostly from Croatia but also from Europe, who live it up in the town's designer clubs and party yatches. Stari Grad is much quieter, but no less interesting.

Aside from the town-life, the natural environment should not be neglected. The island, like many of the islands, has few sandy beaches. Instead, there are large white rocks which people lie on and dive off into the azure sea. Though this may sound unappealing to the beach-lover, I assure you that it is almost just as delicious, if not more so as you dont have to deal with getting sand everywhere!

It also has stunning sun set that casts amazing colours over the harbour.

It was hard to leave this mini-paradise, but I am sure I will go back there soon...