My 8 PM flight from Zagreb to Dubrovnik was canceled and I was bumped to the last flight of the day at 10 PM, which left an hour late, which annoyed me because there aren’t so many flight’s here you know and yet the aircraft is effing late? I was the only passenger on the shuttle bus between the airport and the Old Town an hour later and I found myself entering Ploče Gate at midnight with an empty yet well-illuminated walled town greeting me. Well, damn. I guess this was a blessing in disguise. My sleepiness faded into obscurity as an impromptu pictorial began. Impressive, King’s Landing. Impressive.
Dubrovnik has been known by many names. For the longest time, it was referred to by the Romans as Ragusa, a Thalassocracy which, during its heydays, gave its rival Venice a run for its money. An extinct Romance language called Dalmatian used to be the dominant mother tongue until Croatian eventually drove it to its extinction. The town has changed hands so many times over the centuries, from the Roman Empire to Byzantium to Yugoslavia. Nowadays, it is part of Croatia’s Dubrovnik-Neretva county, serving as its capital.
Of course, another name you’d know Dubrovnik by is King’s Landing, if you are a fan of Game of Thrones. I myself was surprised as to how little that show changed in this town to transform it to the fictional capital of Westeros. Heck, they probably just had to leave it as is and rename it before throwing in actors in costumes and keeping the tourists at bay. As a modern town, though, Dubrovnik’s existence extends beyond its mighty walls and is more than what the show has portrayed it to be, despite it being the town’s biggest tourist draw to date.
I arrived in Dubrovnik with a three-day diarrhea that wouldn’t leave me in peace. I was hungry, dehydrated, and lacking sleep. Imagine the dilemma that entails, when you are in such a charming town beckoning you to explore it but you just don’t know how to eat, shit, sleep, and go sightseeing at the same time. I might as well should have directed my own take on Tita mo Cersei’s Walk of Shame, parading the alleys of King’s Landing in my birthday suit with a toilet bowl strapped to my ass while Septa Unella rings her bell to the tune of “Shit, Shit” instead of “Shame, Shame”.
Luckily, Dubrovnik’s old town within its walls is very compact and easy to navigate, if you don’t take the hills into the equation. Oh, yes, those effing hills. To be fair, they weren’t that challenging to climb and the views from above are a reward in itself. Climbing the walls themselves and entering the fortresses, of which there are several, would entail a fee of EUR30 (~PHP1,800) which I wasn’t in the mood for paying because I was busy trying to just not die from being ill. I’d probably just reserve that when I come back to the Adriatic and maybe when I have company in tow. That ought to be fun.
Despite the lack of access to the walls, I still managed to get a good bird’s eye view of the town from the streets up above. You know? Those zigzag roads the shuttle bus had to go through to get me to Ploče Gate? Those serve as good vantage points for panoramic photos. For those who are interested, Dubrovnik also has a cable car which brings you farther uphill, but I didn’t check it out. The old town, as expected, is always packed with tourists when the sun is up. I suggest roaming those alleys close to midnight when everybody else is already done for the day. It’s surreal AF, promise!
There are several churches inside the walls as well as an old palace or two and museums. Of course, you can also hunt for GoT filming locations. If you are too lazy to do so yourself, there are walking tours aplenty on Viator where the guide shows you a printed portrait of the view on the show vis-à-vis the actual location in Dubrovnik. Remember that Dubrovnik lies at the southernmost region of Croatia bordering both Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro. If you have the right visas, you can always tour this region as a whole. With bus connections aplenty, it’s not that difficult to pull off.
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