Dalmatia Bocche Cattaro St Giorgio

Islands of Sv.Juraj/St. Giorgio and Gospa od Skrpjela/Madona a Scalpello situated in the vicinity of Perast/Perasto in the Boka kotorska fjord. On the left-hand side one can see entrance to the Bay of Kotor (see slide 5 - Untitled), in the middle-background are the ridges of Vrmac peninsula. At the sea level, just left of the Sv. Juraj island on the photo, there is Donji/Lower Stoliv village, and at about 200 m up the hill (apparently above the Sv. Juraj) there is Gornji/Upper Stoliv, with the Sv.Bazilije/St.Basil parish church. On the righ-hand side (just outside the picture) there is a Verige/ la Catene strait towards the open sea.
Photo was taken from the ship sailing towards Perast or Risan (according to the waves produced), with view towards SE.
The two miniature islands are very attractive spots and frequently photographed: In the foreground is the Gospa od Skrpjela (since I am sure you will be tempted to pronounce it I will give you a hint: try shirk-rap-yell-a, and omitt all the vowels in the first two words) - Our Lady of the Rock in the local dialect, built upon the artifical island. The story goes as follows: in 1452 brothers Mortesic (fishermen) found the painting of Our lady on the little rock close to the Sv.Juraj island. When they brought it home, their sick brother suddenly returned to health, thus proving its miraculous powers. The citizens of Perast then vowed to built a church in the honour of Our Lady on the spot where it was found. To this end, they unloaded a huge quantity of stones into the sea (30-40 m deep) around the barely visible rock (it was considered a sacred duty to bring a stone or two, and the famous seafarers from Perast regularly unloaded the balast stones from their ships at the site) , and made an artifical island. As it stands today, the church was built in 1630, and the dome added in 1720-1725. It harbours the original painting of Our Lady, actually painted by Lovro Dobricevic in the XV century. In the background there is Sveti Juraj (natural) island, frequently compared to that famous painting 'The Island of Dead' by Arnold Bocklin. It is the site of Benedictine abbey from the XI century, and todays church is from 17 / 18 century.