The project “Let’s feel the routes of the Frankopans”, worth 60,000 kuna, which included 100 people (blind, visually impaired and their sighted companions), was successfully completed and lasted for a year, from 20 July 2020 to 19 July 2021.

The project was designed at the UP2DATE Center, which was implemented in partnership with the Association of the Blind of Primorsko-goranske County, with the financial support of the Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia.

For the implementation of the project, we made reliefs of 5 famous sites in Primorsko-goranska County visited by blind people (Frankopan family estates: Grobnik, Trsat, Old town Zrinski in Kraljevica, Nova Kraljevica castle and Bakar) and tactile postcards with the coat of arms of the Frankopan family.

There was also a training for a licensed tourist guide who learned how to deal with visually impaired people, received instructions how to describe views and landscapes to bring visible elements closer to visually impaired people.

We organized 3 excursions with customized sightseeing tours where blind people visited the listed locations with expert guidance and what is visual to others, they experienced with a sense of touch.

With this approach to cultural heritage, we educate visually impaired people, include them in the regular life of the community, bring heritage closer to those to whom it is inaccessible, which affects raising their general culture, sense of belonging, raising quality of life, equalizing opportunities, etc.

Visually impaired people can finally experience the sights of the cities they visit, experience ground plans, shapes, facades, domes, towers, etc., understand the relationships between the displayed elements that are not otherwise available to them due to the size of the site or object.

Excursion impressions:

Robert Holjevac (blind, 54 years old)

It was beautiful, very informative, and only now I fully experienced Trsat and its sanctuary. As a historian, I am very interested in the appearance of historic buildings which is now finally made possible for me. Thank you!

Gordana Cvrtnjak, (blind person, 60 years old):

Many thanks to everyone who helped make this trip turn out so well. I spent one wonderful day, relaxed to the maximum, and recharged my batteries to the top. It was so good it couldn’t have been better. It is especially interesting to be able to feel the appearance of these old castles and get to know a new dimension of the space in which we are located. Very innovative.

Dragica Kramar, (mother of a 7-year-old visually impaired boy):

Thank you once again from my heart for giving my child a trip like this with these aids. You are a great team and it was a pleasure to hang out with you! Daniel is delighted.

Kristina Milić Zhang, (deaf and blind, 42 years old):

Thank you so much to the whole wonderful team for a wonderful and memorable trip. I am especially glad that we received tactile postcards, I have never heard or seen that anywhere, so I was especially impressed. There should be more educational trips and they should be more frequent.

Jasenka Škorjanec, (blind and hard of hearing person, 46 years old)

There should be more activities like this because there is almost nothing adapted for the blind like this trip was. Great job.

Enver Jusić, (blind person, 62):

I am more than happy and satisfied because we hung out a bit and I wish something like this could be done more than once. I know it depends on money and projects, but keep going because the blind want to know what the world looks like. Special thanks for trying to provide companions to those who didn’t have them. This is not the case everywhere.

Sabina Bogunović, (visually impaired and hard of hearing, 65 years old):

The trip was a complete hit, nothing too much or too little, optimally everything. We all need to be as equal as possible, to have an idea of our heritage and it is really nice to know that someone remembered that and tried to adapt it to us. Keep it up.

Adriana Katic, (blind person, 20 years old):

I admit that I was expecting an ordinary trip, and now I am delighted because the trip was extremely rich in information that I did not know, even though I am from that part of Croatia. It was also all very good described by a tour guide so I used to feel like I could really see everything around me. In addition, the relief depictions gave me an accurate insight into the appearance of the buildings we visited which is very important to understand for the overall impression. And the postcards with the coat of arms are wonderful to me because I’ve never had a chance to touch some coat of arms, and now that’s changed as well.

Except mentioned sights from the heritage of the Frankopan family, we have been made reliefs of some sights of Zagreb, Zadar, Šibenik, and next is Dubrovnik.