Natural heritage
GEOGRAPHY
The Kornati archipelago is a special and separate island group situated in the meeting point of Šibenik and Zadar islands, and it stretches throughout an area of about 320 km2 and includes about 150 land units which are permanently or temporarily above the sealevel. This most developed island ecosystem in the Adriatic Sea , which includes as many as 12% of all Croatian islands (1264 islands, of which 67 are populated), and only 1% of the total Croatian sea surface, has been attracting attention of many boaters, divers, hikers and other people who love nature and things  nature has to offer for a long time.

From Balabra to Samograd on the total length of 35 km or 19 nm (between Dugi Otok and Zirajski islets) and from Mana to Gangarola in the width of 13 km or 7 nm (between the open Adriatic Sea and Pasman, Vrgada and Murter) four island series are situated and divided into two groups: the Upper Kornati – Sit and Zut island series with a total of 51 land units; and Lower Kornati - Kornati and Pucinski or Piskerski island series with a total of 98 land units. Northernmost island of Kornati archipelago is an islet called Mala  Balabra (43 ° 56 '50''N, 15 ° 17' 00''E), the southernmost island is the island of Juznji Opuh (43 ° 40 '29''N, 15 ° 30' 08''E), the westernmost is Vela Aba (43 ° 52 '14''N, 15 ° 12' 42''E) and the easternmost is Samograd (43 ° 41 '15''N, 15 ° 33' 42''E) .

The average size of a Kornati island is just 0.47 km2, but it should be noted that the island of Kornat (32.5 km2) and the island of Zut (14.8 km2) account for 70% of the total land size. If we also take Piskera, Levrnaka, Lavsa and Sita in consideration, then these islands account for even 88% of the total land area of the Kornati archipelago (the total area is 69,452.963 m2). Only 9 islands are larger than 1 km2, while there are 76 less than 1 ha. According to some data, the coastline of the island of Kornat is about 66 km long, while the coastline of the Lower Kornati (i.e. the Kornati National Park) is about 238 km long. Following these characteristics, we can state that the most valuable resource of this maze of land in sea and sea in land is “insularity”.