mytravelbugbite

This was our dedicated day of rest as our holiday so far had been pretty non-stop. This meant one thing- beach day!!!

There are numerous beaches around Dubrovnik and after a quick search online there was one name that kept cropping up as the best to go to Sveti Jakov. Banje was another beach mentioned but as this was described as a busy tourist beach good for parties so we avoided that and went to Sveti Jakov which is apparently popular with the locals.

The beach is a 20 minute walk from the Old Town. There were a lot of people online complaining that the steps to get there were really difficult; there are a few steps down but it wasn’t as bad as people made it seem.

When we arrived there was only one other group of people there. We had our choice of sun loungers (30 kuna). The beach was a mixture of pebbles, stones and sand which meant it was uncomfortable under foot getting into the sea. This is made up for by the views across the bay of the Old Town.

We spent quite a few hours on the beach which did gradually start to fill up but it was by no means busy.

After we had finished on the beach we went to the cable car station to head up Mount Srd. When we walked past the cable car station early or late in the day there were next to no crowds but at the rime we were there (about 4pm) all the cruise ship tours were going up; less than ideal.

The views of the city from the top were good however there were the cable car wires and pylons in the way which it did spoil it a little. Not only that the shed loads of tourists up there also ruined the views.

Also at the top of Mount Srd was Fort Imperial which had an exhibition on the Serbian and Montenegrin aggression against the Croats and in particular Dubrovnik in the early 1990s. The exhibits were in Croatian and English and were very informative telling the story from the Croatian perspective. There were a lot of very moving images and it was shocking to see how much damage was done to the city so recently nearly all of which has now been renovated.

Fraser was fascinated by the history, the highlight of the tour for me though was going up to the roof of the Fort. From here there were uninterrupted views down to the city and also over towards the Elaphite Islands without having to look over the tourists and wires.

Back down the mountain we got some crispy cheese from Yummmi before going to the apartment to get ready for dinner. The football World Cup final was on so we stopped at a pizza place where Fraser could see an outdoor screen whilst eating our food. There was such a good atmosphere with people really getting into the spirit of things. After dinner we headed back to our room for bed.