Dubrovnik, Croatia

Unless you take a ferry, to get to Dubrovnik from elsewhere in Croatia you need to cross into Bosnia and Hercegovina for six miles. Fortunately, those border crossings went fast. Driving along the coast is just stunning. It's winding and hilly, and islands everywhere. There are over 1,000 islands in Croatia. 

Dubrovnik is on a very narrow strip of land between the coast and Bosnia and Hercegovina (it's worth finding on a map). The city is particularly known for the wall that surrounds it (though now the city extends far beyond the wall, and inside is called "Old Town"). The Old Town is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the wall defended the city as far back as the Middle Ages and as recently as the early '90s. Ivana, my host, told me that the wall is two kilometers long, which makes it the third longest wall in the world, behind the Great Wall and another wall not far from Dubrovnik. I walked the wall when it opened, at 8 a.m., which was the right choice to avoid crowds and heat. 

The walled city was a very different experience from the palace in Split. Of course it's much larger, and many people live inside the city walls. But the tourism is much more dignified. There were no stalls in the streets; there were many shops, but they were inside buildings. Ivana told me that her house is the youngest inside the city. Her grandfather built it in 1902. I walked up the steps one night with an older man who said he was born in his house, which was a few homes up from Ivana's. And when I say "up," it really is up. My view from my window included much of the city and wall. 

the main street, Strodum

my street at night

the view from my room at night

Me with Ivana, and Ivana showing me her new ring (she works at an antique store)

lots of cats

I walked through a memorial to the Defenders of Dubrovnik, 194 men who fought and died in Croatia's War of Independence in 1991-1992. Of course many of them were born around the same time I was. The Yugoslavian army tried to detach Dubrovnik from Croatia with the intention of integrating it into a Serb-dominated state.

Ivana suggested I head over to Lokrum, an island just off the coast, and it was the right choice. It was a quick ferry ride, and I walked the entire island--full of its own history, including an old fort, a botanic garden which was a research area for the adaptation of exotic plants to Lokrum, monastic ruins (which date at least as far back as 1023), and an unfinished quarantine hospital begun in 1534. The island is made of thick layers of limestone and dolomite. Lokrum also had the largest bunnies I've ever seen. And lots of peacocks. I took a short swim before catching the last ferry back to the city at sunset. On the ferry I sat next to the woman I saw feeding carrots to the rabbits. She said she goes to the island every day to feed them.  

 

peacocks on the coast

the old monastery

see both peacocks?

baby bunny

no idea