Istria

Bastianich was born in 1947 in Istria, an Italian territory ceded to Yugoslavia after World War II. She spent the first years of her life under communist rule, then fled with her family across the border to Italy.

The plane crashed around 12:30 p.m. during takeoff at the airport in the town of Pula, in the Istria peninsula, according to the Ministry of Sea, Traffic and Infrastructure.

Istria and the rest of Croatia’s Adriatic Sea coastline are a very popular tourism destination for travelers from all over Europe and beyond.

The Dalmatian coast where grapes and olives are grown produces wine and oil, while Istria and Salvonia are heavily forested with fir and oak trees.

The smell of truffles lingered in the air as I wandered up the steep cobbled streets toward the ramparts that lined the edges of Motovun, a fortified medieval hill town on the Istria peninsula in northwestern Croatia.