Dubrovnik from Split

Someone said she has a big present for me, I wonder what. Anyway, I’m currently still in Belgrade, Serbia. Just met a new friend who’s CYCLING from France to central Asia. He’s 3 weeks into his 4 month long journey, 3 more months to go! His name is Niall from Ireland and you can follow his journey here.

At 9am French time tomorrow, I take off from the Promenade in Nice and intend to cycle to Kyrgyzstan. Quite a few people have told me I’m crazy and as the time approaches I’m starting to think they’re right!
- Niall

Anyway, back to my own travels! After spending a short day in Split, we moved onward to the enchanting city of Dubrovnik.

But that’s not before we pass through Bosnia! It’s not very safe, and we actually were illegal to be in the country as we required a transit visa. But what the hell, we went through anyway without any problems onto the other side. Anyway, this was how Bosnia looked like…

Bosnia countryside

Once we arrived in Dubrovnik, I called Sergio, who was supposed to pick us up. But he was in Germany and so this other pretty lady came, which I assumed was his girlfriend. Anyway, she drove us to the Old Town and brought us to our hostel room, which was about 149 steps from the bottom of the Old Town. Now, remember we all had backpacks with us. Ouch. After settling down, we set off to find lunch and started exploring the town in the drizzle. Then came the madness. We saw some hills which seemed fairly easy to tackle, so off we went, UP in the rain. After over 500 steps and 15 turns of roads up the bloody slopes, we got to the top. Damn siong ah! Guess my fitness is not keeping up.

If anyone remembers, Dubrovnik was shelled by Bosnian forces during the war in 1989. Dubrovnik was a worthless target militarily and Bosnia was condemned for such behaviour. Anyway, this hill was the point where many lives were lost keeping the integrity of Dubrovnik. On top there was a memorial for lives lost to this cause with many war ruins left about.

The next day, we took the opportunity of sunshine to explore the city walls which surrounded the Stari Gard (Old Town). It gave us a great view of the city as well as the surroundings. The view was splendid and we had an impressive view off the coast.

After circling the town, we started walking out and it started hailing on us. God, hailing in the middle of Spring. Anyway, we walked out into the new town area and explored the new area of Dubrovnik. We walked around and decided to explore the beaches. A nudist beach.