Dubrovnik

Blessed be the cheap fares from Croatia Airlines. A trip -- perhaps I should say expedition -- from Croatia's northern capital of Zagreb to Dubrovnik in the far south should take almost a full day. The Zagreb - Split "express" takes about 8 hours, and that's when the line's not under repair, which is it. Add to that a 4.5 hour bus ride from Split to Dubrovnik, passing through a thin slice of Bosnia-Herzagovina, and a few waits between connections, and you're talking about a real investment of time. The price isn't bad: about 300 kuna, or 50 bucks.

However, compare that to a 190 kuna, 2 hour flight direct from Zagreb to Dubrovnik, and you have what they call in Hrvatska "a bargain". The only downside to this big score was that we woke at 4:30AM to make the flight. Not an easy start to the day.

[Need to see a map of Croatia?]



At least we were in a nice town, with a great apartment that we'd booked ahead of time. The room had a patio overlooking the old town, which is all any tourist comes to Dubrovnik to see. The inspirational view almost conquered the cloud of sleep hanging over us, letting us glimpse of the sights before the crowds arrived.



Again: that's almost.



Dubrovnik is known best for its old city, a patchwork of red tiled roofs encircled by a formidable stone wall that boldly juts out into the rich blue waters of the Adriatic. Most of the big draws, including a smattering of monasteries and museums fed by tight cobblestone alleys, lie within the walls, as do almost all the camera-toting tourists. While sprawling cities have concentrated pockets of tourists only at scattered landmarks, Dubrovnik seems particularly crowded because all the tourists are going to the same place -- the hotspot is everything inside the wall, and everything else goes ignored.



So we made it into town a bit late, and by that time the streets were full of tourists. As to be expected, business caters to the crowds, so the main streets are full of designer stores and cafe tables, while souvenir vendors and romantic (but culinarily uninspired) restaurants nestle into the narrow alleys. Occasional street performers dress in traditional costume for photographs, and a few wooden tables hold computers spitting out custom postcards with an image of you walking the city wall. I would highly recommend a visit to Dubrovnik to anyone vacationing in Croatia, but the old town feels more like Disneyland than a living city.



Dodging the main attractions on the first day, we had plenty of time for Marita's favorite part of the trip: meeting foreign cats. It's possible that Dubrovnik has more cats than even "Cat-ease", but even more importantly, the cats we met were highly receptive to Marita's attempts to pet and feed them. She actually managed to use up most of the cat treats she'd bought previously and had carried around for weeks. Although I was occasionally embarrassed about hanging around with someone who carries food for cats "Just in case," at least we weren't opening up cans of tuna (like we would the following week).

Speaking of Tuna: An Aside

The Croatian unit of currency is the kuna, which means "marten" in Croatian. It comes from the ancient practice of using marten pelts as currency, and today, each coin has an image of a marten behind its numeric value. When we first saw the coins, I pointed out the marten to Marita, who then referred to the two-kuna coin as a "tuna". I figured that this was a clever play on words, a contraction of "two" and "kuna", similar to referring to a Canadian two-dollar coin as a "twoney", a contraction of "two" and "looney" (a nickname for the one-dollar coin).



As it turns out, the two kuna coin actually has an image of a tuna on the reverse side. What a devastating loss, that the Croatian number for two -- dva -- has no potential for this kind of wordplay.

We finally got around to doing our duty as tourists when, for a small fee, we walked the length of the wall. Not only does the walk afford tremendous views of the sea, the city, and the wall itself, it also is a prime spot for watching tourists, some of whom seem to believe that vacations exist solely for the purpose of wearing hideous clothing that you'd be ridiculed for wearing at home.



Walking the wall was great for us. Its length let us work up a hunger for the leftover risotto we'd cooked the night before, its views got us excited about seeing more of Croatia, and its crowds made us appreciate the isolation of our upcoming destinations, the quiet Croatian islands off the southern coast.