Day 17

It’s Adam. Today was the last day of our trip!  For the first half of the day, we had a side trip planned to the city of Kotor in the country of Montenegro. We woke up at 6:30 and hopped in our car by 7. It is a short 2 hour drive to the city of Kotor. Shortly into our drive, we arrived at the Croatia-Montenegro border. It was easy enough to get through and continue on our way. The city of Kotor is located in the Gulf of Kotor, but it is at the far side of the gulf, and the only way to get there by car is to drive all the way around to the other side. After winding all the way around, we made it to the city shortly after 9AM. We walked around the town briefly and stopped at an ATM to get some Euros. The town has a very eastern European feel to it, and it is very nice! It is one of the best preserved medieval towns in the Adriatic. The origins of the city go all the way back to Roman times, but has changed hands many different times over the course of its history – Venetians, Ottomans, Habsburg’s, etc. Before long, we had made our way to the main attraction of the city – the walls and fortresses. The walls and fortresses of the city date back to the 500’s, although they received their current structure in the 1400’s and have continuously been updated since. We paid our entry fee and began the climb. The walls go straight up the very steep mountainside that is behind the town. It was starting to get hot, so the climb quickly became difficult, but we pushed on. Eventually, we made it to the beginning of the fortress structures and then to the last one at the top. The views over the town below and the Gulf of Kotor were spectacular since it was another perfectly clear day. We walked around the fortress for a while and rested some before preparing to head back down. Once back on level ground inside the town, we rewarded ourselves with some ice cream. I got the strawberry this time and Jessica got the mint. Just what we needed to help cool us down from all the climbing. We walked around the town some more, keeping an eye out for a restaurant that looked good for lunch. The town was becoming quite crowded at this point as many of the day tour buses from Dubrovnik had started to arrive. We settled on an authentic-looking restaurant for lunch. I ordered the popular local dish of roasted lamb and potatoes while Jessica had gnocchi in a ragu sauce with chunks of slow-cooked pork in it. Both were excellent. After lunch, we strolled around the town some more before making our way back to the car. We used the last of the Euro’s we had taken out to pay for our parking and then began the drive back to Dubrovnik. The way back was fairly easy and uneventful, although the wait to cross the border took almost a half hour this time around. Before going back to our apartment, we stopped at a grocery store quickly to grab some snacks for our plane flight tomorrow. Back at our apartment, we relaxed for a few hours in order to regain some energy for our last night out in Dubrovnik. Once we were able to summon up the energy to head back out, we walked back down to the old town for the last time. Our first stop is what we ended up missing yesterday – Fort Lovrijenac. Our tickets we bought for the wall yesterday were still good to use to get into the fort as well. After climbing up the steps to the entrance we went inside and explored the fort. The fort was originally built to protect the city from the Venetians who were attempting to conquer the city at the time. It is still in very good condition, and is another filming location for the Game of Thrones tv show (most of the scenes from the Red Keep are filmed here). We climbed up to the top for some great views over the city as the sun was going down. Getting hungry again, we went back into the city to find a restaurant for our final meal. In Dubrovnik, every restaurant has a person who stands outside and tries to convince anyone walking by to come to their restaurant. We began walking down one of the higher streets with the most restaurants and it felt like we were at a job fair interviewing a bunch of restaurants. We could hardly sneak a peek inside before we would be approached by someone working there. Finally, we settled on one – ironically it was the only place where there was no one outside soliciting. It was a tappas style restaurant that served traditional Croatian food, but in smaller portions so that you can enjoy a wider selection – a cool concept we thought. We ordered the black risotto with cuttlefish, the stuffed squid, veal rumpsteak, and shrimp risotto. For the last meal of the trip, it was definitely the right choice. Everything was delicious once again – Croatian food is our new favorite! After dinner, we wandered around the town once more and then made the slow climb back up to the apartment. We did some packing, but ended up going to sleep fairly early in preparation for our long travel day tomorrow.  Stay tuned – Jessica is going to do one last blog tomorrow to conclude our trip!