Brestovac Sanatorium could be your typical Scooby-Doo-style haunted house. A large, abandoned former medical complex, located deep in the forest high up on a nearby mountain? All you need is the occasional lightning strike and the picture would be complete.
However, despite its potentially off-putting appearance, Brestovac Sanatorium (sanatorij brestovac in its native Croatian) has become a popular tourist attraction.
And with good reason! Not only are the buildings and grounds fascinating to explore, but the story behind Brestovac Sanatorium reads almost like a Hollywood screenplay.
FYI: Although you may not find Brestovac Sanatorium on your typical list of Zagreb day trips (most people opt for the Plitvice Lakes, or Lake Bled in Slovenia), and while it is technically in Zagreb… without a car, you should probably plan to spend all day getting there and back. Except on the weekends when buses are more frequent.
A History of Brestovac Sanatorium
The origin of Brestovac Sanatorium is rather sweet. The facility was founded in 1909 by a local doctor named Milivoj Dežman. Its purpose was to help care for patients suffering from tuberculosis, as at the turn of the twentieth century, the tuberculosis mortality rate was very high.
Brestovac Sanatorium became the first establishment in the region with a specialisation in tuberculosis treatment. This was due in large part to the fact that Dežman’s wife, Croatian actress Ljerka Šram, had contracted the disease.
Dežman had known Šram since childhood, but sadly they lost touch during their adolescent years. While studying medicine, Dežman saw Šram during a stage performance and fell in love, but despite Šram promising to wait for him until he finished his studies, she married another man named Aleksandar Isakovic, the then president of the First Croatian Savings Bank. However, Isakovic disappeared following accusations of embezzlement and, despite her first marriage and her having had a son with Isakovic, Dežman finally married his beloved.
Tragedy then struck again as Šram became seriously ill with tuberculosis, so Dežman used his influence to get the facility built following her diagnosis. Sadly though, there was no cure for TB at that time and, in 1913, despite being one of the first patients admitted, Šram succumbed to her illness.
Brestovac Sanatorium was regarded as one of the best of its kind at its height. However, as medical advancements in the treatment of TB were made, it eventually became functionally redundant, with the facility finally closing in 1968. From then, no plan for its reuse was successfully put forward – it fell into disrepair, and it remains abandoned to this day.
Brestovac Sanatorium Today
Abandoned, but not unused, I should say. The site has, in recent years, been adopted by local paintball businesses as a combat/shooting arena during parts of the year.
Thankfully, we appear to have visited in the off-season, as while the floor was spotted with the occasional yellow pellet and the walls had semi-rainbows of previous shootouts spread across them, there was not another soul in sight.
The facility itself is HUGE. There are multiple buildings, with the main structure holding several large floors, and a covered walkway connecting it to a secondary area, which is much more collapsed than the first, though there are still multiple levels to explore.
In the main building, there’s enough remaining to give you a sense of the former medical nature of the place. Shower cubicles, bay windows and reception areas still stand, and you can imagine patients being moved in wheelchairs along the long main corridors. The only recent additions appear to be wooden boards with slats placed over crumbling staircases to help those carrying paintball guns get between levels (slightly) less hazardously.
Despite its former medical nature, which can make an abandoned place feel ominous and oppressive, I found Brestovac to be more of a curiosity than a trepidation. It’s very easy to spend a lot of time here, investigating all the different ways that nature is reclaiming the land and the ruins that humans have left behind.
Make sure you don’t linger too long, though, as getting to and from the place on public transport can be tricky! There is a bus that goes up towards the Sanatorium, but it doesn’t stop too near it and it only goes up and down a few times a day. If you’re not careful, and you don’t give yourself enough time to get to the bus stop, you may have a long walk back to the city…
Getting to Brestovac Sanatorium
By Car
Brestovac Sanatorium is situated just off of Sljemenska Road (Sljemenska cesta), which is the main road that winds up Medvednica Mountain in Brestovac Ridge (brestovac sljeme). To get there, head towards Bliznec.
It is one way, so to get back, you will need to drive the rest of the way up Sljemenska cesta and then down the hill towards Zagreb city via Prilaz Kraljičinom zdencu and Mlinovi ulica, onto Ulica Matije Jandrića.
By Bus
If you’re without a car, the best way to get to Brestovac Sanatorium by yourself is to take a bus/tram from the city centre up to Mihaljevac terminal and change onto a second bus which will take you most of the way up Medvednica Mountain, where the building resides.
From Mihaljevac you want the #140 going towards Tomislavov dom (Mihaljevac is the last stop, so this will be the only option). Get off at the second stop from Mihaljavac at Šumarske jaslice. It is then a 20 minute walk downhill to Brestovac Sanatorium.
The number of buses from Mihaljevac available to you will depend on what day of the week you visit. The bus service is there primarily for the skiing crowd, so there are more buses (and people) making the trip up and down on the weekend. We went during the week, and there were only two or three buses back down that gave us enough time to properly explore the place, so bear that in mind.
Whichever bus you do take unfortunately will not stop near the site. Most likely, you’ll be taken past the path that leads to Brestovac Sanatorium and your first option for stopping will be part of the ski resort. There is a small chance that you may be able to get the driver to stop by the path you need, but they are under no obligation to do so and there may be a language barrier so attempt at your own risk!
When we went, we thought we had had a stroke of luck when some older passengers who were not carrying skis got the driver to stop early, so we hopped off the bus with them. But it turned out they were there to do what looked like bird-watching and we had to hike further up the mountain to get where we needed to be. The perils of not knowing the terrain, I guess!
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Have you visited Brestovac Sanatorium? Were there paintballers there when you arrived? How did you feel about the place? Let us know in the comments below!
