Great Wall of Dubrovnik
Walking the Walls of Dubrovnik
The Oldies had had a traumatic enough time of it, driving the caravan through the city in search of their campsite out on the Lapad Peninsula. So, there was no way on earth they were even going to consider driving into the old part of town. They stuck with public transport all the way. Many of the locals, however, have street smarts. I have never seen so many Smart cars in one place.
At one point, I spotted seven in a row, all parked facing the kerb. The perfect car for this city, it seems.
As promised, we went up the walls. Stretching almost two kilometres all around the historic town centre and offering fabulous views every step of the way, this is one great wall! With all the Chinese tourists around, it reminds me of another great wall…
The views of Lokrum Island from the walls were just wonderful, and, in spite of the weather still being a little iffy, I was hoping against hope that His Lordship might be able to persuade Herself to take a boat trip out there later. Unfortunately, Her Ladyship spent an inordinate amount of time carefully watching the tourist boats from above. Now, in my opinion, looking down from this angle greatly exaggerated the impression that the boats were rocking about wildly on the waves. Fair dues to His Lordship, he tried his best to convince Herself this was all just an optical illusion. Unfortunately, the screams of the passengers carried upwards. No. There’d definitely be no boat trip this time round.
When you admire this beautiful old city – which had already been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site back in the 1970s – it is shocking to think that it was under siege for 7 months in the early 1990s. Crazy! No wonder there are so many restored buildings, with many more restoration projects still in progress. I’ve rarely seen so many new roofs in one place. It was nice to see that they had been able to recycle old roof tiles in some cases. With its narrow streets and high buildings, being a roofer or builder in this town can’t be the easiest job!
I overheard a tourist guide explaining that the old city walls were just one of many filming locations in Dubrovnik for the TV series Game of Thrones. So that explains all those Game of Thrones shops around town. I know the Oldies have never seen a single episode of this popular series, but here they started to get their teeth into the whole thing…
Although it is not indicated on their tickets, the Oldies just happened to overhear someone mention that a visit of Lovrijenac Fort, just outside the old town centre, was also included with the visit of the city walls. Now, missing out on that would have been a terrible shame. The views out to sea are wonderful and it is a marvellous vantage point for viewing the old town in its entirety. It was only from here that I could fully appreciate what an impressive feat of construction it is.
After spending a day on the tourist trail, it was always a pleasure to retreat to our campsite out on the Lapad Peninsula. What a great location: close to town, yet perched on a wonderful natural setting with great sea views and lovely walks all around the headland. No wonder our campsite was called ‘Solitudo’. We even noticed that, as the days passed, there were fewer and fewer campers until we had most of our section of the campsite to ourselves. Wonderful! But then the penny dropped. The Oldies finally realised that the strange looking construction just 20 metres from our pitch was actually a stage. Then they noticed the posters stuck up all around the place…
No more solitudo for us!
Sure enough, the bikers started to arrive en masse. They were huge, muscular and hairy. And that was just the women! Well, this was definitely a case of ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’, so off we went to the first night of the festival. To my surprise, the music was not bad at all. After all the heavy metal music the Oldies have been subjecting me to recently, I’d even go as far as to say it was quite mellow. I mean, the spectators were actually singing along. There’s no singing along to Death Metal music, that I know for sure.
One spectator, obviously wondering why the Dynamic Duo weren’t joining in with the singalong, roared over the music: ‘You’re strangers, right?’ ‘Right!’ ‘So you don’t understand nothing?’ ‘Not a word!’ shouted back Her Ladyship. Don’t tell her, but I was greatly relieved that she didn’t ‘understand nothing’ and couldn’t sing along!
In the end, the gig turned out to be quite a civilised affair and it even ended at a civilised hour. We were all sleeping peacefully when the real racket started. At 7am, some bright spark decided to clean up. All fair and good, but since when do you need a petrol-powered leaf blower to clear up cigarette butts and plastic cups? I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure they have already invented a cheap, clean, environmentally friendly, noise-free and sustainable alternative to the leaf blower. I believe it’s called a sweeping brush.
I felt sorry for the bikers. The only thing separating them and their hangovers from that horrendous racket was their tent walls. And they had two more nights (and early mornings) to go. Luckily, the Oldies saw no reason for us to stay on.
Right. We’d rocked. Now it was time to roll.
