Dubrovnik (16.845 steps, 11,89 km, 82 floors)
We’re meeting our guide at 10 am, so we have time to fix our breakfast at ease and have a relaxed morning. Breakfast is oat porridge with banana, chopped nuts and chocolate (from our stash at home) and some local honey to sweeten it up. I sort and upload the pictures from the last days and we’re ready with time to spare. Our guide Mladen is picking us up with his car, we’re scheduled to visit some sites outside of town first and then end in the early afternoon.
First stop is a viewpoint on the slope of the coastal hill, where we talk about the history of the area and about current affairs of the country. We continue to a river springing from the mountains on which there are several ancient mills and fulling houses, one of which is still functional (though not actually used for milling of fulling). It’s cool to see the mechanisms actually working, we continue to the source of the river, all the while getting background information from the guide.
We do a quick stop in Cavtat to walk around the peninsula and then head for the old town of Dubrovnik. We talk about the war, about relations between Croats and Serbians, ancient history, medieval history, etc. We end around 3 pm, so we have a pancake as a snack to tide us over and visit a few things in the old town: first the aquarium with local sea life, then the old city walls themselves. You can walk all the way around on a one-way circuit, in high season it must be one long traffic jam of tourists. We get started around 5 pm and enjoy great panoramic views of the old city.
Once we’re back down we have dinner at restaurant Storia: Arne has a seafood pizza, I have seafood pasta. On our way back to the hotel we encounter the office of a travel agency that organizes day trips to Montenegro. After getting more info and assurances that I can sit in front of the mini-bus to minimize the motion sickness, we make a reservation with the group leaving the next day at 8 am.
Febe writes 