The Balkans - Dubrovnik, Croatia & Mostar, Bosnia - April 2024

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Dubrovnik!! Got here at last!! One of the places I had always wanted to visit, but never quite got round to it!! Flight from Bristol was only 2 ½ hours and we were treated to views of snow, the Alps (I think!) before all the islands along the Croatian coast. We had arranged for a taxi to collect us and drop us at the Amoret Apartments in the Old Town! What we didn’t realize is that Dubrovnic is pedestrianised, and no cars can enter therefore we were dropped, by the taxi, at gate no 2, which according to google, meant we had a 7 minute walk! That would have been ok under normal circumstances, but wifi signal was periodically bad and the map was upside down! Then Chris fell over, ( he tripped over my suitcase and the gutter while trying to use his mobile!!) We eventually found apartment Amoret, up a tiny street behind the Jesuit steps! It’s just a studio apartment, pretty basic but on the flat part of Dubrovnik! Thanks Richard!!

Anyway, we dumped our stuff, and had something to eat in The Old Town (not cheap!!) before having a wander around the streets to help get our bearings! Ended up at the Old Port, where we bought tickets for a boat trip on Monday as it’s due to get stormy on Tues & Wed & the boats wouldn’t be going out!!

Monday 15th April 2024 -I was awake before Chris (for once!) at about 6.00am and we were both ready to leave before 9.00am! Decided to walk UP the Jesuit Steps and found a good church that was actually open so we could see the inside of it! Wandered around, getting lost, and finding new churches (there does seem to rather a lot of them!) squares and alleyways until it was time to board the boat at 10.30am.

After 45mins we were dropped at Kolocep, the first all the Elaphite islands,for a 45minute stop. Decided to go to the 10thC Church of St Nicklei and its cemetery. Unfortunately, the church was shut and there are no windows to peer in, so we stopped another Church on the way back as its window was open!! (Door was still locked though!!) Walked back to the boat to find it was about laid up for our lunch and we had a huge cool box with wines and soft drinks in it! The fish was really good and along with salad and bread proved to be more than adequate!!

Onto our 2nd stop - the island of Sipan! A lovely little harbour with trees right down to the small beach. Decided it was too far to walk to the Monastery, so we walked as far as the crossroads, turned right up the hill for a while, before deciding that there was nothing to see, and walked back – making the boat, just in time!!

Our 3rd stop was the island of Lopud and we were stopping there for about 2hrs! Plenty of time to visit the obligatory church on the hill and to walk along the front. As we were flaking a bit by now, we also had an ice-cream and sat and people-watched in the sun! Back on the boat for a rough ride back to Dubrovnik!! The wind had whipped up,the sun had gone in and the waves were coming right over the stern!I think it took us a lot longer than the Skipper had anticipated to get back to Dubrovnik!! And the boat still had passengers to drop off in Cavtat!! We did think about staying on the boat and seeing Cavtat but the rough seas put us off!! Another day!!

Had a look inside the church in the square, before supermarket shopping and dinner. Found a nice place, just outside of the Old Town and had a 3 course meal for 22euros!! Watched the Old Town as it got dark and listened to the swifts screeching about!!

Tuesday 16th April 2024 – It was always going to be a difficult day because Dubrovnik was getting ready for heavy rain tonight and tomorrow morning! We thought we would go on the cable car this morning and then walk the City Walls this afternoon as it was just due to be cloudy!!First we went to Dubrovniks The Homelands (1991 -1995) war memorial. Very moving!

Walked up towards the cable car station ( past an earthquake evacuees park – yikes!!) To find that it was shut due to high winds and rain forecast! To be fair, it was really windy walking up the steps to get there....and with the odd spots of rain......I’m not surprised it was shut!! Plan B it was then......only we didn’t have a plan B!! Time for a coffee and to take stock!!

After wandering around in the Old Town ( and finding even more places we hadn’t been to!!) decided , after an earlyish lunch, to buy a three day City Pass and visit the Fort Lovrijenac, which was separate from the walls. Boy, was it windy!! The sea was really rough by now, so dodging the spray, we climbed up the stairs, and more stairs to a viewpoint the other side, then climbed up even more stairs, getting blown about, to the entrance!! Climbed up through the fort getting blown about everywhere to the point that it felt like the Fort was moving! It wasn’t!! Went back down again, carefully and walked back into the Old Town by Pile Gate.

As it was there, went into the Friars Franciscan Monastery Museum that was basically cloisters with a balcony that you couldn’t go up to!! Onwards, to our next port of call – Rectors Palace and Museum! Wandered around, up and down the stairs viewing all the artefacts and more war photographs showing how Dubrovnik looked when it was bombed, (December 6th 1991 more than 600 shells were fired into the city and 461 structures were damaged)and drifting through the Palace upstairs. Apart from the circular windows I was underwhelmed!!

We then went to the Maritime museum, that explained that Dubrovnik ranked 3rd in the Maritime stakes ( after Spain and the Dutch!!) in the 16th century!!Anyway we had had enough of the wind by now (it was due to rain by 17.00hrs!) so picked up a pot noodle and watched Pretty Women on tv and holed up for the evening, listening to the rain and wind outside!

Wednesday 17th April 2024– Woke up, after a stormy night, to sun and cloud so a good day to walk the Old City Walls. Started at Pile Gate and the view got better and better as we walked around the very impressive walls. The sea was still very rough, but the cable car was running again! I couldn’t stop taking pics!!After a quick lunch, looked at the Lazarus quarantine huts that have now been transformed into little shops and cafes. This was where they put the people with the plague so that it wasn’t spread.

Had a quick peer in the Cathedral and looked at a replica of the ‘green men' striking the bell, before looking at the only Serbian Church in Dubrovnik. Then walked through the park by Pile Gate before meeting out mini car who was going to take us where the cable car was going to take us – only cheaper and with a few more stops!!

First stop was at a bridge by the cruise terminal and then we drive to the world’s shortest river!! We could see the water coming out below the mountain, over a small weir, before meeting the sea under another bridge!! All the time, our guide was telling us how the Serbs and Montenegro kept attacking Dubrovnik in the Homeland wars (1991 -1995) and that was why Yugoslavia was split up? I must confess I didn’t really understand it!! I know Croatia painted their flag on a mountain when they got it back from Serbia!!

Had an unfortunate accident, where our mini -bus reversed into a car!! To be fair, the road was very narrow and the car was travelling quite close to us!! Stopped a little way before the cable car station to get the view over Dubrovnik, without the fence!

Drove back then and got dropped off at North Gate and walked round to the Tourist office to check out how to get to Kotor on Saturday.

Thursday 18th April 2024– We got up at the unearthly hour of 5.15am to get the coach at 6.45 to Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Lovely drive, past the Elephati islands and all the inlets and coastline, the walled city of Ston, until we got to the border. Delayed by 10mins or so and then we are off across a new road in the mountains. Miles and miles of scrubland/forest, interspersed with the occasional house! Small villages dotted about in the valleys – everyone seems to grow their own vegetables in the front gardens and have a grapevine covering a pergola!!Reached Mostar about 11.00 ish and had a guide for the first 45minutes, who told us a little bit of history about Bosnia. The only thing I remember is that they have got three presidents instead of the usual one!!

Declined the guides lunch, and had a good wander about the Old Town crossing the Old Mostar Bridge, that turned out to be very slippery!! Watched the Jumpers prepare to jump off the bridge.....but apparently they don’t jump until they have 50 euros!!

Had a Borek between us for lunch ( flaky pastry with spinach inside!) and an ice cream for pudding that we took down below the bridge. Wandered back to the coach for 14.05 ( she was very specific about the time!!) and then went to Kravica Waterfalls on the Trebizat River, near Ljubuski. Amazing!! Walked down via steps and a slope, 400 or so metres to the waterfalls!!.But it was definitely worth it!!Wandered about for a bit before tackling the steps back upto the coach and starting the journey back. We all had to get out at the border and have our passports looked at ( in the case of UK – stamped!!) and got back to the apartment about 21.00 hrs , after having our evening meal!!

Friday 19th April 2024– We thought we would have a nice easy relaxing day, before out travelling day tomorrow so we headed out about 9.30am to get the number 10 bus at 10.00am to Cavtat!( The bus goes by the cable car station!!) Lovely journey long the coast, just enjoying the scenery! Got off at Cavtat, a lovely quiet little seaside resort, very different to manic Dubrovnik!! Walked long the sea front, to Luca Bukovac's house ( only because it was included in the three day Dubrovnik pass!!) He was a very famous Croatian painter, born in 1835I think. He had an accident at sea, and his parents, knowing he was gifted, let him paint their house and furniture at the age of 16 years!! To be fair, it was a really nice normal, big house with two rooms turned over to portraits of his wife and family.

Next we visited the Franciscan Monastery and Church of Our Lady of the snow! Just looked like a church but it also had a lunette of Bukovac inside! ( We didn’t know what a lunette was and had to look it up – and still couldn’t find it!!

Walked up (!) loads of steps to get to the mausoleum! You just though you had finished with the steps and then it went up again, and again!! Eventually got to the top, had a wander around and took the sloped path, through the line woods back down to the restaurants along the front! Had some delicious home made vegetable soup for lunch, before walking around the headland, with pine trees and turquoise sea with little islands, mountains in the background – it was perfect!!

Walked along the other way, past St Nicholas Church and followed the walkway into the woods, along the shoreline! Beautiful walk, with plenty of benches, eventually reaching the Hotel Croatia, where we stopped and had an Aperol spritzer! It was Happy Hour so it would have been rude not to!! Sat in the sun before taking the path back down through the woods and along to a restaurant for our evening meal!! Really nice meal, a bit cheaper than Dubrovnik, and loads more food!!! Complementary starters ( before OUR starters! + a liqueur red wine at the end!!) As it was a really nice light, walked back along the seafront and was treated to a wonderful sunset over the sea getting the No 10 bus back! ( Nb- The no.10 bus drops you for the Old Town, miles away!! From the bus stop, you cross 4 lanes of traffic, go down the steps opposite, turn left and keep walking down! It’s about 15-20mins I would guess!)

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