I really wanted to like Dubrovnik…

I woke up this morning and looked out my window porthole, and for the first time in a while was wowed. Dubrovnik is such a pretty town. White houses with terracotta roofs are built into the mountains like layers of cake either side of the Port. The protective fort and walls surround the old town. Narrow steep streets branch off from the main square. Its mediaeval origins are evident everywhere.

And Dubrovnik – unlike the parts of Italy I have seen so far – is so clean. I saw hardly any graffiti or rubbish.

On the day I was here, episodes of Game of Thrones were being filmed, so access to the old town via the usual route of through the city gates was cut. This meant that there was a bottleneck of people trying to get in and out of the city via a narrow footpath. Buses and people jostled for space in a very crowded spot. Once inside the old town, there were so many people it was unpleasant. Our guide was not the best communicator and did not wait for people, let alone offer a decent commentary that could be heard by all. He didn’t even do a head count when people got on the bus, so who knows if we lost anyone along the way?

I was not the only one to say: “Worst tour, worst guide EVER!” (And Lord knows I was less than impressed with the boring, crowded Burumini tour on Sardinia, although the tour guide was good. I now have a new benchmark for truly awful.)

Actually, the only good thing about this tour was the free time I had wandering through the old town, where I chanced upon a cafe with internet. So I had a lovely cappuccino and checked my email, Twitter and Facebook, all for three euros.