Day 23 - Dubrovnik Again (Sunday 6th May 2024)

For last night’s volunteering I got a red Intrepid cap presented to me this morning! Breakfast was again at the Porat restaurant . Porat, BTW, is Croatian for port. Everyone gathered outside the hostel after they’d returned from breakfast and our first full day got underway. Bashkim led us to a spot in a car-park opposite the hostel and gave a history of Dubrovnik from the days when the first Illyrian tribes of Pleraei in ancient times settled in area, to their Roman conquerors, the Venetians traders, the Napoleonic Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the formation of Yugoslavia and through to the modern day – all in about 30 minutes.

The day was to start with a tour of the old town city walls. Since we’d done that with our previous group Kerry and I passed on the opportunity to do it again. We left the rest of the tour group at the bus stop and walked off along the adjacent marina to the region of Lapad on the other side. The marina was full of boats of all shapes and sizes. Many long, covered concrete piers provided for extra berths with some also providing restaurant and bar services. Just outside the marina but dominating the view were two very large cruise ships – one the Viking Sea from Norway and the other the Aurora, a P & O ship, from the UK.

Lapad is a green and largely residential area that lies below the twin peaks of Velika and Mala Petka at the head of a small peninsula only a few kilometres from the old town of Dubrovnik. The peaks are within a large protected nature park so are free of any development of any sort. A short and easy walk up from the marina takes one past many leafy gardens surrounding substantial houses along the road. This are was first developed by the wealthy business owners of the old town so that they could escape its hustle and bustle. At the top of the climb we found a pleasant little shopping strip centred on an open-air, tree-lined pedestrian mall that led down to the beach. Here we found a cafe and picked a table to take in the view of the small, pebble beach, a few swimmers in the aqua blue water with the forested Velika and Mala Petka as a pretty backdrop. The resident cat was not gonna give up its seat for me so we chose the next table along.

 

 

I wrote a postcard to Mum as we finished our coffee and then strolled off along the sea-side path. From here the winding path provides access to many flash hotels (way out of our budget) on one side and the sea on the other. Ladders and steps give access to the rocks on the water’s edge for people to swim, boat and (mostly) sunbake. The path follows the edge of the peninsula all the way back to the marina – about a 45 minute walk, I reckon. At the top of the peninsula I stopped to take a photo of some boats that were sailing across the deep blue water. To my dismay the screen of our newly acquired Google Pixel 7 phone would not light up. Everything I quickly tried to remedy the situation made no difference. It was not dead as I could feel it vibrating. Fearing the worst, we trudged across the point behind a couple of resort hotels and a place to sit by the water and think about our new problem. The prospect of no decent photos for the remainder of our holiday was not one we cared to contemplate. On my phone I googled “How to reboot a Google Pixel 7”, tried that but nothing changed so into the backpack went the phone.

Saddened, we finished our walk back to the hostel about 30 minutes away. I got the phone out of the backpack, intending to put some more charge into it in case it actually was flat. To our great relief it lit up as soon as I picked it up!! Perhaps the reboot fixed it after all!

Not keen to eat at a local restaurant we went in search of a supermarket for some things to make a simple tea. After finding one or two closed premises it soon became apparent that all shops, expect restaurants and bars, are closed on Sunday’s in Dubrovnik. Google told us that a micro-brewery not far from the hostel was open so we ended up there for a drink and a snack…. and that was tea.