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| One of the very steep streets in Old Dubrovnik. It was a bit of a fright when I first saw it & realised I had to walk down there! |
When we walked through the portal into the Old City of Dubrovnik we felt we had been transported back 1000 years in time.
When I saw the staircase we had to walk down to get to our apartment, I thought I had died and gone to hell !!
Stairs and I do not get on, but this staircase was another matter entirely! It went straight down at an angle of about 45 degrees, Bill surmises and had no handrails! And I had my hands full with two computers- which survived, and so did I- but only just!
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| We eventually skipped up and down these as we we were born here! |
The old-world, fairytale theme continued on the stairs because every few metres there was a little door in the wall at the side of the stairs that led into a shop. The shops were filled with the most diverse delights- jewellery made in the region, clothes, souvenirs, ice cream, shoes, anything your heart desired. I had to concentrate so hard just to stay upright that I couldn’t enjoy the displays but I can assure you, that I certainly returned when I was less burdened.
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| Street in Old Dubrovnik |
The streets, except for the main one, are about 2m wide, some maybe 2.5m and others, Bill says, would be less. There are a number of streets with stairs and on these it’s possible to touch each side of the walls when we’re standing in the middle of the stairs. We imagine that they were constructed this way for safety. It would be impossible for two people to walk side by side down most of them and that way, if the town were to be attacked, the good citizens of Dubrovnik could just kill off the invaders one by one as the appeared down the stairs! We have counted the stairs from top to bottom and there are 152 !!!!!! Thank God we’ve found a way around them to get back to the car tomorrow morning.
Dubrovnik has the oldest working pharmacy in the world. It’s run by the Franciscans and we could go to the museum which is in their cloisters to see the history of the pharmacy through the centuries. The churches are many- I think Bill counted about 14 crosses on parts of the map, some of which could just relate to a monument, but we have still seen some very lovely churches, one of which is Greek Orthodox . Funny- we hadn’t come across any orthodox churches till Trieste and now we’ve seen three.
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| Old City of Dubrovnik from the Cable Station. The walls of the city are clearly defined here. |
This morning, quite by accident, we found a cable car that went up onto a steep hill behind the old town. Of course, we had to go. I have never been totally into riding cable cars just for the experience- in fact, the older kids would tell you of their complete and utter embarrassment when in Switzerland many years ago. We rode a cable car there & I sat on the floor in the corner with my head in my hands and they moved to the other end of the vehicle and disowned me!
Last Christmas holidays, we came to Europe with Mike and Mikaela to ski with our friends, Tiziana, Ugo and Andrea and had to catch the cable car on a regular basis. Not wanting to embarrass anyone again, I put on a happy face in the cable car and found out that I really enjoyed the experience as I did today.
We had five star views of the world as far as we could see and of course took many photos. Unfortunately, the smog was very thick and so we couldn’t see forever. The views were so different though, from one side of the hill to the other. We met some very nice people who live in the Adelaide Hills and who are on a cruise, along with about 4 thousand others. We were talking to the proprietor here when we got back to our unit and she said that some days there would be 14 000 (yes, 14 thousand) tourists in the Old Town!
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| View of the Cable Station from the Old City Walls |
This afternoon, we climbed the city walls and found treasure troves of the old and the new. One of the new things we found was a cafe set right on the precipice with the sea hundreds of metres below! I’m sure I wouldn’t be game to drink anything but mineral water in case I fell over the edge! I don’t like heights but can handle most areas, however, this was one that I backed away from hastily.
The Domenican Monastery has a set of very lovely stairs with fancy balustrades. Apparently the balustrades aren’t quite as fancy as they were originally because the priests caught the local lads looking through them for a glimpse up the ladies’ dresses! So they filled them in! What a hoot! Men never change!
We’re glad that our next stop after here is the most important and special one of our whole trip, otherwise we would be very sorry to leave, but tomorrow evening, we will hopefully be enjoying a prosecco at the American Bar in our very favourite piazza in all the world- in the Old City of Cividale!
Ci vediamo a dopo!
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| Bill in one of the wider streets of Old Dubrovnik |
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| Old City Walls and Harbour |
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