4-6 June : 2 days in Dubrovnik

Our minibus driver dropped us as close as he could to where he thought our accommodation for the next few nights in Dubrovnik would be.  We went in search for it. The area looked more like a suburbia neighbourhood than a commercial area.  Small hotels though can easily be in such areas as we had discovered earlier in our adventure in Bulgaria.  We climbed up some stairs and then climbed down the same.  There were no official markings of hotels, only numbers on the building.  It appeared that we had not read carefully enough the fine print in www.booking.com.  

Our hotel turned out to be an Air B&B. There were three rooms on the floor where our room would be.  Our room was in the process of being cleaned so check-in was not yet possible. The owner-host, Alen appeared to be a super micro manager.  He read us the Riots Act on what and how to use everything and the rules of the place. He charged for using washing machine and that would be possible only after permission had been sought and granted at some appointed hours!!  The room was relatively big with a double bed in it as well as a single bed that we used as shelf for our luggage.  We had apparently book the only room there with a balcony, even though the balcony is also accessible from the kitchen.  A bathroom-toilet in which the washing machine sat and a kitchen was shared between the occupants of the three rooms were located on the same floor.  We met a lady from New Zealand who occupied one of the rooms on the same floor. She was having breakfast at the outside balcony, the one shared by all. The views were a little obstructed by the trees.  But right then, there was nothing to see as there was a cruise ship in port.  Apparently, the cruise ships called in to dock mid morning but would leave port by late afternoon.

Alen requested that we leave our luggage in the "sala" and advised that he would put it in our room for us when the cleaning of our room had been completed.  We were handed a bunch of keys, one for our room and the other for access into the sala before the room.  

We were a little apprehensive as we had hidden our passport in our luggage.  But we calmed myself down, did a mental risk assessment and went off to get the bus to the old city.  We bumped into Alen in the carpark of the Konzum (supermarket) near the bus station. He explained where we could catch the bus to go to the old city after berating us for not wanting to listen to his entire instructions earlier.

Dubrovnik has a history that dated all the way back to the 7th Century.  It was its own republic which had reached the zenith of its power in the 15th - 16th Century. Known as Ragussa, it benefited from sea trade routes.  It was badly affected by an earthquake in 1667 which led to its subsequent decline.  It was once a rival to the Venetian empire but it had also been a vassal state in turn of both the Hungarian and the Ottoman Empires.  The old city is completely surrounded by a city wall that is still intact, giving it its distinctive look.  All the buildings within the old city have terra cotta roofs.  Entry into the city are via entrances with draw bridges. All streets within the walls of the old city are restricted to pedestrians.

Fort Lovrijenac

View of Dubrovnik old city from Fort Lovrijenac

It was sheer mayhem at Pile gate (the gate into the old city) when we arrived.  All the cruise ship visitors were there to do all they could before their ships leave later in the afternoon. The the water sports vendors, restaurants folks, pub crawl and walking tours agents were all vying for a piece of the potential action!  We walked down a hill into a less crowded lane that led to the fort overlooking the old city (Fort Lovrijenac) as it looked the least busy.  It turned out to be an excellent choice.  On the way we met a friendly American couple, and together we spent some time exploring that fort.  Entrance fee was 30 Kunas (~6AUD) but entrance fee to the fort is included in the entrance fees for the Old City Wall.  We were advised that when we buy the wall ticket later, we would get a credit for the 30 kunas paid there.  The fort itself was interesting and offered a great view of the walled old city.

Me at the wall that surrounds Dubrovnik near Mincenta Tower

We spent some time checking out various view points on the fort.  Then we headed into the old city, getting there around 11am.  The ticket which cost 120 Kunas (~23 AUD) is valid for a year but could be used only once.  There are a few entrances to the wall and each of them is also a checkpoint for ticket validity as one walked along the almost 2km long wall that completely surrounds the old city of Dubrovnik.  It was a hot day.  The human traffic moves only in a single direction - clockwise.  We can understand why this would be necessary when the crowds get more dense during peak tourist seasons. There were some relatively challenging climbs, not unlike a walk along parts of the Great Wall of China.  There are some cafes selling cold drinks and snacks as well as a few pubs at a few strategic locations along the length of the wall.

A view of Dubrovnik from its wall
with Lokrum in the background

Peek at the street

We bumped into an English couple from somewhere north of Newcastle who saw me being photographed by my travelling companion. They asked to follow our blog.  A Dutch gentleman asked our travelling companion if she is Indonesian at one of the cafes where we stopped for some cold water. There were nice friendly folks visiting the wall.  We bumped next into one of our shipmates.  With rest and photo stops, it was almost 2.30pm before we finished circumnavigating the wall.  There were various towers to explore along the way too. The city wall offered a different perspective of looking at the old city from walking in the maze itself.  One can see the top of monastery, churches, bell towers and only once in a while peek at what is going on at street levels.  One can also get a comprehensive feel of what city life feels like - roof top cafes, laundry hanging out to dry, garden with herbs and vegetables, maintenance in progress of the wall itself as well as on the buildings in it.  Like most old cities, the are many levels and these tend to merge at some points.  

Dubrovnik's old city is a really well laid out.  In spite of the number of visitors, the place never felt too crowded or too noisy.  This could be due to the variety of activities available and how these spread the visitors through the city.  It is probably too optimistic to think that the purveyors of activities actually got together to schedule their activities.

Photos of the city from the wall and from the walk along the wall can be found here :
https://www.facebook.com/SylviaTanPhotography/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1109713759105845

The streets in old city Dubrovnik are akin to those of Korcula and Stari Grad.  They are a little wider than those of Split.  The presence of Srdj Hill made it is easier to orientate even when one in the maze … at any junction it is possible to look up and use the cable car station at the peak for reference.  It was time to look for lunch.  We wanted to try something local.

We chose a lunch of fried small fishes with bread and coffee in a restaurant in one of those narrow shady lanes.  Our shipmate had earlier said that she was headed to Montenegro the following day.  Considering the size of Dubrovnik, we thought that may not be a bad idea since we would have almost 3 whole days there.  So at lunch, we re-checked the visa requirements for entry into the other countries that made up the former Yugoslavia.  In our original travel plan, we had wanted to visit every Central / East European country during this trip.  Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo had proved to be challenging to include on our itinerary due to visa requirement or length of time or complicated routes required to get there.  We do not need a visa for the rest of old Yugoslavia even though they are not members of the European Union.  After lunch, we visited one of those tour agents offering day tours to other former Yugoslavian nations.  They recommended Mostar as the architecture there would be the most different from that of Dubrovnik and the rest of Croatia. Mostar was part of the Ottoman Empire and that association left its mark significantly.  The predominant religion in Bosnia-Herzagovania is Islam.  We decided then that was where we would go the next day and paid for the excursion.

We continued our exploration of Dubrovnik and tried to see where we could get on the ferry that would take us to Lokrum, the botanical garden island.  Lokrum is also the location for the King's Landing in the HBO Series "Game of Thrones".  The Iron Throne is located there. Walking to the waterfront, we bumped into Annemette’s parents again.  Her dad was the first one to get our attention.  They are such friendly folks.  We had a short catch up before we walked all the way round the pier to where we wanted to make some photos.  We did not find a boat that would take us to Lokrum and back in the space of time that we would like to allocate to that activity.

The waterfront of old city Dubrovnik

Since we have scheduled the next day to go to Bosnia, that evening would be our only opportunity to go to the top of Srdj hill to catch the sunset.  There is a museum and a park up there that we could explore till sunset.  We went in search of the cable car station which is located outside the wall of Dubrovnik furthest from the sea.  To get there, one has to climb up some flights of stairs and exit near the tower.  A round trip ticket on the cable car cost 120 kunas (~23 AUD).  We took the cable car to the top of Sdrj hill.  The view on the way up was impressive.  In some ways, it reminded us of the cable car trip up Tromso in Norway.

The park on top of the hill is quite large and one can walk for quite a while.  There were also quad buggies for rent up there.  The museum was showing exhibits on the Croatian war.  We have seen and heard quite a bit on this topic already so we decided to give the museum a miss.  Entrance fees was 30 kunas.  We decided that we would instead sit at the cafe and soaked in the atmosphere for a bit.  That was also when with the free wi-fi we discovered that we have been invited to a gathering that evening in the old city by our ex-shipmates. We replied that we would try to make it there, if only for after dinner for drinks, as we would be watching the sunset from the top of Sdrj hill and that was not until around 9pm.

Me with Frank & Antge

After drinks at that posh cafe at the peak of Sdrj Hill, we had heaps of time to scout out a good spot for sunset viewing.  We found a nice nook to perch in the rock outcrop near the edge.  Soon all the other sunset viewers drifted in, some had brought picnics.  There were quite a few Chinese visitors and you could hear them long before you could see them.  They came loaded with the largest tripods as well as the latest fanciest cameras.  We were joined, thankfully, by a friendly and serene couple from Germany – Frank from Berlin and Antge from Munich.  Here is a picture of me with them.   We stayed at the top until the lights in the old city came on at around 9pm (sunset was 8.20pm) chatting about island hoping and travelling in the region.  They were great company.

Sunset from Sdrj Hill

The queue for the cable car to go back down to the old city after the sunset was quite long. We hurried through the old city noting that we should come back the next evening as there were many picturesque spots to make good night photos.  We joined the rest of our shipmates who were finishing their dinner and getting ready to split the bills.  We stayed for a while as they sort themselves out.

View from our balcony

We got on the minibus to return to our accommodation.  We were not sure which was a better stop for us, so we finally got off at the stop after where we should have stopped and walked back towards our accommodation.  We wondered if Alen had taken care of our luggage as promised.  The street was lit more dimly than we would have liked although it did not feel unsafe.  We could see that Alen's mom who lived in the room at the bottom of the building had her TV on.  She is the live in manager.  We let ourselves in and found that no one else was on our floor that evening.  Our luggage have been placed safely in our room as promised.  The view from our balcony was not bad.  Time to download the photos taken during the day, write our blog and turn in.  We had quite a early start the next day for Bosnia-Herzagovania. That will be the subject of the next post in this blog.

5 June (evening)

Our adventure in Dubrovnik continued after we have returned from our visit to Bosnia.  It was 6pm but as it was summer, it felt more like 4pm.  We had promised Alen that we would pay for our room that evening before we depart in the morning.  We had set the time for 5pm. However, Alen was nowhere to be seen.  We did not want to wait for too long as we wanted to do some dusk and night shots in the old city.  We went to ask his mother and found that he had gone swimming and she had no idea when he would return.  She was in her room with with her friend who offered us a raw cheery and was a little offended when at first that we did not accept.  Not wanting to offend and recognising the fruit, we tried one. His mother spoke German, and she thought it was very interesting that my travelling companion did too.  She said we could pay her but Alen had earlier said categorically not to, so we did not want to mess up the situation as Alen is such a micro manager.  So we told her that we would be back at 10pm and that we had better pay Alen as he is rather fussy.  They both laughed.  They appeared to know Alen only too well.

We walked to the old city.  One sees so much more when one is walking rather than taking a crowded mini bus.  At a junction, we took a wrong turn and had to hike through a park to get back on the correct path.  It was difficult to get really lost in Dubrovnik even though we had to traverse the new city to get to the old one.  As we approached the old city, we bumped into Don and his wife from our sailboat going uphill.  We exchanged news of what we did for the day.  They had been up to Srdj Hill.  We were surprised that they had not stayed for the sunset.  We thought we would probably be too late for the sunset that evening.  A few moments later, colours burst out of the skies.  Although the sun had already dropped below the horizon, the afterglow that evening was spectacular.

Afterglow

We knew we had to hurry to catch the beautiful colours from the Fort, the reflection of the waters at the waterfront, etc.  So we hastened our pace to the old city, snapping every few steps.  The colours were really remarkable that evening.  

More photos from that evening from Dubrovnik can be found here : https://www.facebook.com/SylviaTanPhotography/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1109685839108637

Swifts in the sky

There were guards who were dressed like the Pope's Swiss guards guarding the city gates that evening.  When we were photographing the old city, we heard drum rolls and turned around to see them marching for a change of guards at the entrances.  

Change of guards - Dubrovnik old city

How interesting.  It appeared that there is an enactment here for the tourists during the summer months.  Alfresco diners were in the plaza.  And the swifts were flying through the city from end to end of the long street within the city walls. The bright lights from the businesses that lined that street must attract bugs that the swifts were feasting on.  Their songs echoed from the walls of the buildings of that street.

We grabbed some takeaways for our dinner and then proceeded to catch the minibus back to our accommodation from outside Pile gate.  Who should appear when we were waiting but the minibus taxi driver who dropped us off the morning before.  He had recognised us so he greeted us.  We did not use his service as the public minibus pulled up just then.  We arrived back at our room before 10pm.  This evening, no one else was on our floor.  We went to get a shower and got ready for bed.  Alen had not appeared so we decided that as a last resort, we would just pay his mother in the morning before departure.  We were packing everything in readiness for the morning when we heard a knock on the door.  It was Alen looking for his fees.  We paid him, shut the door and continued packing.  Imagine knocking on the doors of a lady travelling solo at such late hours of the evening just to collect fees when it was your fault that you did not make the appointed time earlier!  Sigh!  Around midnight, we heard the door of one of the other rooms opened. There were others on our floor after all.  They were just home late.

As we were packing, we realised that we had left our belt behind on the boat.  Then we also realised that we had left our favourite Kathmandu travel coffee thermos on the coach we had been travelling on for the Bosnia trip.  Hmmm ... we have to be more careful with our things.  We went to the balcony to rescue our laundry that we had hand washed the night before in the basin in the bathroom and hung out to dry before we left for Bosnia that morning. 

6 June

We left slightly after 9 am and handed the keys to Alen’s mom who kissed us on both cheeks and said bye bye.  We walked to the intercity bus station near the supermarket across from the cruise terminal.  The lady at the ticket counter was most helpful.  She informed us that the public bus would cost only 33 Kunas while the Atlas airport express would cost 45 Kunas.  Not knowing where the public bus stop would be and not attracted by the idea of having to lug all our luggage in search of it, we opted for the Atlas airport express.  A little luxury of not having to battle with bags at the airport for some distance.  The bonus that we did not know then was that the airport bus has Wi-fi.  Wow.  We could connect to the rest of the world as we travelled to the airport.  We weaved along the coast on the way, towards the south, allowing us to view new areas that we had to date not visited.  Nice.