Circumspencing the Globe

 

I couldn’t help but smile as I trekked through the ancient walls and onto the shiny marble streets of Dubrovnik.  I’d never seen anything quite like it.  Old Jerusalem is also surrounded by walls but it’s not on the sea and has no harbor.  Venice has a harbor and a maze of narrow streets, but it’s not built on steep hills or wall-enclosed.  They say Lord Byron dubbed Dubrovnik ˝the pearl of the Adriatic˝and I think he had it right.

On Friday, October 26, I left Slovenia on a train to Croatia and got off at a small town in the north called Rijeka.  A few hours later I boarded an overnight ferry heading southbound along the Croatian coast.  Though too far away to be seen, Italy was just across the Adriatic Sea to the west.  I booked a two-man cabin but I had it to myself.  The boat stopped at a few islands before reaching its terminus, Dubrovnik.  I was hoping for warmer weather and I got it.  It did rain a bit, but I definitely didn’t need the gloves I’d bought in the Czech Republic.

I had arranged for a flat in the heart of the Old Town.  My contact, Sergio, picked me up at the harbor and dropped me off at the ancient gate leading into the Old Town.  Cars are not permitted into the old town, he explained.  Sergio handed me the keys and a map, directed me to go straight through the gate (Pile Gate), continue along Placa (the main pedestrian street) and then turn right at the narrow lane the Irish pub is on (incidentally, every Eastern European city seems to have at least one Irish pub), proceed up the stairs to the music school, turn left and go around to the back of the school, zig zag up more stairs along a street whose name differed from its name on the map, and enter a residence bearing the number 15.  My flat would be at the top, through two locked doors.  He said it’s a good thing I had a backpack and not traditional luggage.  Sergio instructed me to leave my payment on the table, told me ˝a fat lady˝ would be there to clean every day and wished me luck.  I never saw or heard from Sergio again.  Likewise the fat lady.

I found the flat without incident.  After climbing 158 stairs (the last 48 of which were inside my building), I set foot onto the hardwood floor of my new living room.  (Note:  It did NOT come equipped with a Stairmaster.)  The smile returned.  Out of one window I could see the nearby city wall, the one on the Adriatic side.  I waved to the walltop passersby and was close enough for them to see me and wave back.  Out of another window I could see countless orange-tiled rooftops and all the way across to the far wall.  Private bathroom.  Kitchenette.  Not bad for about $25 a night.  This was gonna be good.

As you enter the Old Town, the marble pedestrian street cuts straightway to the clocktower at the far end, spanning no longer than the length of a modern indoor shopping mall.  Because of the marble and the walls, the acoustics make the open-air city sound like an indoor mall, too.  The street forms a sort of valley, with steep hills rising up to the right and left.  My place was up on the right.  Like the main street, the stairs are made of marble.  And like the street, the stairs shine brilliantly in the sun wherever the sun can reach.  Except where there’s cat poop.  There are cats everywhere and they treat the city as one big litterbox.  By the way, I think there’s a useful simile to be found here:  ˝like cat poop on marble.˝

You can’t leave the main street without ascending stairs.  The town definitely would not meet ADA standards.  And bandits could have a heyday.  There are nooks and crannies everywhere, and the many narrow walkways are poorly lit.  This made the trip to and from my flat a bit eerie.  Even once I completed the maze-like trek and entered the building, the stairway light only illuminated part of the hallway and left me in the dark much of the way.  Once I entered my flat–through a door that creaked like the entrance to a haunted house–I had another set of stairs to ascend in the dark since the light switch was at the top.  No one was around.  The entire building was empty apart from me.  Anything could have happened and nobody would have known.  Except the cats.

But nothing happened.  Anyway, there are plenty of outdoor cafes, and I’ve supped on my share (and then some) of seafood and pizza.  The significant sites can be visited easily within two days.  (I had three.)  Among the ancient ones–monasteries and churches and the world’s third longest running pharmacy–is a modern one that is particularly stirring.  It’s a memorial to the victims of the 1991 bombing of the city by the Yugoslav army.  The monuments were rebuilt and roofs retiled.  The newer ones are a darker shade of orange.  In one monastery museum, among the medieval paintings on display an out-of-place piece of circular glass is affixed to the wall.  The glass covers and preserves for the sake of posterity a substantial missile hole, labeled as such.  I have yet to make sense of the relatively recent violence in this region.  If that’s possible.

Tags: Croatia, Dubrovnik, ferry, Rijeka, Travel

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 31st, 2007 at 6:19 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.