The luxury of blue skies, 24+ degree weather, eating seafood, people-watching and lounging around on rocks next to the ocean in nothing less than a 2-piece is something to look forward to on a weekend trip. Europe offers so many options for escaping reality and on this occasion we were headed for Dubrovnik, Croatia. London by contrast has been fogged up to its eyeballs - so much that it has been impossible to distinguish Tower Bridge from the Tower of London as both were almost invisible when looking out from London Bridge. Winter is here and it is only October.
Arriving in Dubrovnik
London's aforementioned fog did cause over an hour delay to our departure from Gatwick Airport. Luckily it turned out to not be the thick pea-soup variety and once the pilot cleared a few hundred feet, the surrounding landscape looked like the fluffy inside of a duvet. The flight time was just over two hours and also adding on the additional hour for the central European timezone, we arrived in Croatia just after lunchtime. The flight scenery was very pretty as we hovered over the Adriatic Sea and its islands, as well as the UNESCO listed walled city of Dubrovnik (formerly known as Ragusa).
On top of one of the fortresses
Bijele Apartments
On this particular weekend trip, we were accompanied by our friend Wai, who shared our passion for travelling and eating seafood - of which was in cheap abundance in Dubrovnik. On arrival at Dubrovnik Airport we took a shuttle bus to the Old Town and quickly located our night's accommodation that was booked with Bijele Apartments - a family run Bed and Breakfast off the main street.
Missing that warm summer sunshine already
Star jumping for Jetstar
Attempting to climb the city walls
On check-in we met the friendly landlady - Desiree, who also lived in the apartment upstairs. She showed us a number of maps of the town and recommended a few restaurants and the city wall walk where you could get an amazing view, captured in the short video below.
Eating Seafood
One of our objectives for visiting Dubrovnik was to eat seafood. Using recommendations from our friend Yun and also our landlady, we located a small but popular restaurant - Kamenice near a small street market. The restaurant was surrounded by potential patrons, waiting like seagulls for an opportunity to swoop at the next available table. Lunch was a platter of mussels, small fried anchovies and fried calamari and an ice-cold pint of local beer.
Olie trying to choose which beer to drink
Mussels!
Fried squid and baby fish
Wall Walk
After lunch, we headed towards the Harbour area to find the lesser known second entrance to the city wall that isn't as steep as the one at Pile Gate. Walking along the walls we were treated with a great view of the harbour where we spotted some massive cruise ships. We took many photos of the town's famous buildings and climbed up the fortresses that were used in medieval times and also in the recent Balkan conflict of 1991 whereby the city was shelled by Serbian troops on the nearby hills.
At the part of the wall overlooking the harbour
On top of one of the many watch towers
At Pile Gate, overlooking the main street
Cannon boy
Enjoying the view
Wai stretching her legs out
Cafe Buza (the bar in the Wall)
After walking for about an hour, we headed for the well known (we had seen it on a travel documentary) Cafe Buza that was accessible through a hole cut into the city walls. The steps leading to the bar were terraced quite steeply down a cliff face. The bar offered great views of the sunset and a departing cruise ship. The highlight of this drinks stop was discovering a lemon flavoured local beer that tasted like an alcopop Stolli that we used to drink as teenagers.
Cruise ship chasing the sunset
The moon came out to shine
Buza bar on the cliff face
Best place to watch the sunset
Lemon beer
Kopun Restaurant
After the sunset had faded, we headed across the Old Town for dinner at Kopun, a restaurant next to an old church that had been recommended by our landlady. The restaurant had only opened recently and served traditional Croatian food. The restaurant's name means capon (castrated rooster), and we ate that, as well as squid ink pasta and the local ham.
Croatian ham
Capon and pasta
Flash-mob Gangnam Style
Whilst we were walking back to our hotel, we noticed a group of young American tourists asking us to join their flash mob Gangnam style dance-off, to the amusement of other tourists. We declined but offered our support by capturing their actions on video. To their credit they did a good job dancing without any background music.
Dubrovnik By Night
We then walked around the Old Town, taking photos of the buildings at night. When we arrived back at the hotel, our landlady had made us a fresh batch of marmalade crepes that were delicious.
The polished main street
The church next to the restaurant - Kopun
The view from the steps from the church square
The dark medieval streets
The Rector's Palace
Walking Tour
The next morning, we said goodbye to our landlady and joined a walking tour of Dubrovnik. Our guide, from the Tourist Board was very knowledgeable about the history and sites. However she did lead us through a number of stores where it became clear that they offered a strong commission payment as she recommended their products to us.
Taking a drink
Macaw cleaning a tourist's hair
Shrapnel damage from the war
Graffiti in Latin warning young children not to kick
balls into the church wall - dated: 1597
The statue in the centre of town, where the girth of the forearm
was used as the city's measuring unit for trade
Lokanda Peskarija Restaurant
Lunch was at the Lokanda Peskarija restaurant on the harbour, where we ate amazing grilled prawns and octopus. The latter was 'so fresh' that Wai found pebbles and fishing netting in the serving pot. When we told the waiter, he shrugged and said the food was so fresh that they don't bother cleaning it prior to cooking.
The octopus that came with pebbles
Garlic prawns
Wai Offering Recommendations
While we ate our platters of seafood, we noticed a small crowd of onlookers admiring our food. Firstly, it was a table of Chinese tourists that came over to inspect what we were eating and asked Wai her opinion on the dishes. Then we found our meal being assessed by a long queue of cruise ship passengers that had to line up neatly along the pier, waiting to be ferried back to their ship.
Glass Bottom Boat Cruise
As the weather was perfect for a trip on the harbour, we took a ride on a glass bottom boat. We were joined by a few other tourists, including a bunch of Australians who were on a cruise around the Mediterranean. When the boat neared the islands, we saw a range of different sea-life - fish, coral and sea urchins. However for most of the boat ride, the captain didn't provide much commentary. However this all changed when we passed the Rodeo Drive of the coastline, including a hotel priced at 9500 euro per night. The captain started to reel off prices and facilities on offer at the different locations - perhaps he was getting a cut of commission if we chose to change our accommodation to one of these luxury venues.
One very expensive hotel
Wai with the harbour as a background
At the front of the glass bottom boat
St Lawrence Fortress
After the walk, we took a stroll outside of the city gates to the St Lawrence Fortress, famous for its inscription of the city motto "Non Bene Pro Toto Libertas Venditur Auro" - Freedom is not to be sold for all the treasures in the world. This is a tribute to the independence of the Dubrovnik Republic during medieval times. From the cliff top, we enjoyed the view, drank some local beers and pondered on what seafood we were going to eat for dinner.
The St Lawrence Fortress
Watching people swim laps in the inlet below
Relaxing before dinner
Bota - Oyster and Sushi Bar
Dinner was spent at the Bota Oyster and Sushi Bar where our meal of oysters, salmon and tuna tartare was hurried along due to the need to catch a shuttle bus to the airport. However on paying the bill we realised that they were a cash-only establishment. This led us to do some quick exchange rate calculations, paying in a mixture of GBP and Croatian Kuna.
Local oysters from the Dalmatian coast
Goodbye Dubrovnik
Then as the sun began to set, we boarded a mini-bus that took us from the chairlift stop (allow plenty of time to walk there from the centre of the Old Town) to the top of a cliff where we had a magnificent parting view of the city before arriving at the airport for our return flight back to dreary London town.
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