There are 1,185 islands off the Croatian coastline. Most, especially those in the central Kornati grouping, are small, rocky hills rising straight out of the water, having been stripped bare of their trees (and subsequently, their soil) in the 15th century for the construction of Venice. Besides a few oases and hearty fishing outposts, they are uninhabited -- barren, scorched moonscapes.

But a few islands, like Ilovik in the north and Hvar in the south, have kept their lush foliage. By virtue of their natural beauty and proximity to major cities, they have been tourist destinations for years, and are modern, fully Western and very commercial. European tourists have "discovered" one island after the other, putting up modern marinas, expensive townhouses and chic restaurants. Then just as one is becoming the hot new summer home location, another is just appearing in the corner of the collective tourist eye.

The island of Susak is such a place, just now opening up to the European travel imagination. Long lost in relative isolation from the rest of the Croatian population, it has developed its own rich culture, dialect and traditions. About 40 miles southeast of the tip of the Istrian peninsula, Susak is a little larger than the average Croat island, and is one of the relatively few to have supported a native population for hundreds of years. It has the only sand beach in all of the Croatian islands, and its vineyards produce some of the best wine in the region. It is sunny, lush and untouched.

Susak is a long, thin island, with only one main town (also called Susak). Most of the population lives here, which itself is divided between the sea-level port area and the old town, located on a cliff and accessible only by a steep staircase. There is a dirt square, a convent and a small market, and all the buildings are painted in sun-reflecting pastels.

Like most of the Croatian coastline, Susak went untouched during even the worst battles of the Yugoslavian conflict. The war was mostly over ethnically disputed lands, and the islands are almost purely ethnically Croatian, on top of being more or less strategically worthless. Only in the major city of Dubrovnik, near the southern tip of the Croatian coast, was there any significant fighting.

Susak is like a precious swatch of wetlands about to be paved over for a strip mall. From an overlook in the old town, you can see the lower harbor neighborhood dotted with the summer homes of wealthy mainlanders, houses that sport rich mahogany doors and conspicously new tile roofs of wealthy mainlanders' summer homes. Next door to the aged gardens and dirt porches of the local population are the shiny facades and satellite dishes of the nouveau-riche. The local markets carry English-language postcards. An Italian outfit recently opened a vineyard and winery behind the old town.

The island, and everyone in it, carries the tension of transformation; they know they cannot hold on to the old life, but they are not quite sure what is to come. The old sit, languidly, outside their homes. The young scramble to learn English and Italian -- whatever they can absorb to prepare them for the onslaught of the outside world.

Like Rab to the south, where Sophia Loren and other celebs have bought property, Susak is in danger of becoming the happy reserve of powerful outside forces, who treat the rest of the island as no more than their playground, and look at the natives like animals in a zoo.

While many such places in Europe have been able to incorporate local culture with the encroaching commercialism of the wealthy, Susak may be simply too unique, too traditional to withstand the onslaught. Already the young people have begun sloughing off the once-dogmatic religious traditions of old, leaving only elderly women and a few men in the church sanctuaries.

One tradition that is destined not to last is the "skirt rule." Quite simply, the younger the woman, the longer the skirt. So at puberty a girl begins to wear ankle-length dresses, which shorten through courtship, marriage, and child-rearing. By the time they are old, the women are wearing shockingly (for outsiders) short skirts.

But perhaps the biggest factor in Susak's incipient transformation is the generation gap. In the 1930s, like many places in the world, Susak went through a series of droughts, and, as a result, most of the movable population transferred en masse to the United States, settling mainly in the Cliffside Park neighborhood in New York City. What remained was a rump population, barely able to support itself and doomed to fade away. Emigres would visit, but few returned.

And so Susak remained the same until a few years ago, when, for one reason or another, the sons and daughters and grandchildren of the New York Susakians began to return to the island to raise their own families (the last thing you expect, but an all-too- common sight in Susak, is golden-haired kids running with their Barbie dolls through the main square). They brought with them not only money and resources that helped reinvigorate the island, but also foreign ideas, traditions and language. The old don't speak English, nor do they want to.

And though the young do their best to honor their native culture, they are also outsiders, and can never hope to fully re-assimilate into the culture.

In an ominous coda, I heard a newly arrived, very blonde wife of a re-emigree complain about the centuries-old steps going up to the old town. "Is this the only way to get up there?" she asked. The steps won't last. Neither will Susak, at least in any recognizable form.