Today I wanted to start the exploration of Dubrovnik's walls in the morning for two reasons: First of all, there aren't that many tourists in the morning. Secondly, there is no shade at all on these walls so it would have been crazy hot in the afternoon.
I must say that the walls are really quite impressive. You can walk in a circle for 2 kms above the old town. Here are some pictures of the walls:
And of course the view of the city from the walls is very nice:
So nice that I took a lot of pictures which makes it quite hard to decide which ones to show you! I'm honestly still unsure why Dubrovnik is more popular than the other cities in Croatia but I did enjoy the walk around the walls a lot today and I hope you like the pictures.
My next mission after the walls was to send out some souvenirs back to Canada! I am so happy, I got rid of plenty of stuff and my luggage will be super light now, yahoo! The post office was outside the old city area (I had to go outside of the walls) and when I came back, there was a freaking human traffic jam to go back inside the old city:
I was so happy I had been on the walls in the morning!
The rest of my day was very very quiet. I took a drink somewhere and when I finished it I wanted to stay a bit longer but 10 minutes later the lady came and told me "Can I bring you something else?" I figured it meant "you drink or you go". So I left! But even though the rest of the day was very quiet, I still have a few pictures to show you!
First of all, I discovered a timer functionality on my phone, so I tried to take pictures of myself, at first with some difficulties:
Then I finally managed, so it's nice now I don't have to bother people all the time!
I also found a hole in the road just like in Belgrade, remember? Here is the Croatian version of the hole in the road:
Although here at least there's no car stuck in there :)
And finally here's a picture that I want to show you just because I like it, I think the "end of day" light is very nice, I don't have that many pictures at that time of day:
A friend on the French version of the blog sent me an interesting comment yesterday about the fact that it is great that there are so many visitors in Dubrovnik, especially because the city was quite affected during the war of 1991. I was going to summarize what Wikipedia has to say about that for you but seems to me like all the information there is important so here it is:
"In 1991 Croatia and Slovenia, which at that time were republics within Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, declared their independence. At that event, Socialist Republic of Croatia was renamed Republic of Croatia.
Despite demilitarization of the old town in early 1970s in an attempt to prevent it from ever becoming a casualty of war, following Croatia's independence in 1991, Serbian-Montenegrin remains of the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) attacked the city. The regime in Montenegro led by Momir Bulatović, which was installed by and loyal to the Serbian government led by Slobodan Milošević, declared that Dubrovnik would not be permitted to remain in Croatia because they claimed it was historically part of Montenegro. This was in spite of the large Croat majority in the city and that very few Montenegrins resided there, though Serbs accounted for six percent of the population. Many consider the claims by the Bulatović government, as being part of Serbian President Milošević's plan to deliver his nationalist supporters the Greater Serbia they desired as Yugoslavia collapsed.
On October 1, 1991 Dubrovnik was attacked by JNA with a siege of Dubrovnik that lasted for seven months. The heaviest artillery attack was on December 6 with 19 people killed and 60 wounded. Total casualties in the conflict according to Croatian Red Cross were 114 killed civilians, among them celebrated poet Milan Milisić. Foreign newspapers have been criticised for exaggerating the damage sustained by the old town, instead of responding to human casualties. Nonetheless, the artillery attacks on Dubrovnik damaged 56% of its buildings to some degree, as the historic walled city, a UNESCO world heritage site, sustained 650 hits by artillery rounds. In May 1992 the Croatian Army lifted the siege and liberated Dubrovnik's surroundings, but the danger of sudden attacks by the JNA lasted for another three years.
Following the end of the war, damage caused by the shelling of the Old Town was repaired. Adhering to UNESCO guidelines, repairs were performed in the original style. As of 2005, most damage had been repaired. The inflicted damage can be seen on a chart near the city gate, showing all artillery hits during the siege, and is clearly visible from high points around the city in the form of the more brightly coloured new roofs. ICTY indictments were issued for JNA generals and officers involved in the bombing.
General Pavle Strugar, who coordinated the attack on the city, was sentenced to an eight year prison term by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for his role in the attack."
To finish on a brighter note, I found a setting for the blog that enables anybody to leave comments, which means you don't have to be a registered user anymore, you can send a comment as an "anonymous" person, so please please leave me lots of comments I will be so happy reading them tomorrow morning!! Just make sure to sign your name at the end of your message so I know who you are! And please feel free to comment even if you don't know me. I know from the stats of the blog that there are people from Russia who reads my posts, and I don't think I know anybody in Russia... Hello Russian friends! Feel free to say hi in the comments, I'd love to know who you are :)
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