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Croatia - Dubrovnik

In celebration of our milestone birthday this year, my friend Dawn and I planned a group trip to Split, Croatia.  More on Split in a separate blog. Prior to meeting the group in Split, Ryan and I went to Dubrovnik for a few days.  Sam was left with Grandpa Rick and Jean (Ryan's dad/step-mom).  

More Dubrovnik photos here:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/1TMQ3gMscfjs7DGEA

May 9:  We headed out on a super early flight (another 5:30am bus ride to the airport).  This allowed us most of the day to explore.  First we walked the City Walls.  This involved a good amount of stairs.  With this and the general hilliness of Dubrovnik I was left sore for days (prior posts and this one proves my lack of conditioning for inclines!).  Later we did a Old Town History Walking Tour to satisfy Ryan's need for history and then to appetizers and a wine tasting at D'Vino Wine Bar.  


This glass is the size of my head.

 At dinner I had a ULIT (Uncontrollable Laughter at Inappropriate Times - hopefully this acronym is catching on!).  It had to do with Babic wine which is delicious but awkwardly pronounced. 😜


May 10:  We booked a boat cruise to the Elaphite Islands.  We visited 3 Islands and did a hike, wine at a random local restaurant and lounged on a beach/swam in the ocean.

Ryan likes to look daring by defying "do not walk here" signs.


  Random local restaurant that gave us homemade wine - I think they expected us to drink all this wine.

Here is Ryan swimming at the beach.

The excursion included unlimited wine and lunch.  We shared a table with two Canadian retired ladies who knew how to party.  This resulted in possibly having too much wine.  The ladies wanted to dance.

After the boat I was exhausted due to the aforementioned over indulgence of wine.  Since we had a Game of Thrones tour scheduled in the morning we watched the episode with Cersei's "Walk of Shame" since the Walk of Shame stairs were part of the tour.  Very pivotal episode! 

At some point it became clear that Ryan was not feeling well and I think he would prefer that I did not share details of that.  

May 11:  Ryan was still not feeling well today so I ventured out on my own and essentially completed the itinerary we had planned by myself. Good thing I brought my selfie-stick!  The Game of Thrones tour did not disappoint. It was interesting to get the perspective from a local who was there when the series was being filmed.  

After the tour I headed to the Cable Car to go to the Panorama Restaurant for beautiful views.  I had a nice lunch and then I walked down instead of taking the cable car.  It was a long and unstable walk but very quiet and scenic.  I stopped and did a photo shoot with my selfie-stick tripod.  I made a collage of my special day all by myself. 


May 12:  We picked up a rental car to make our way to Split to meet up with friends for the birthday celebration week.  On the way we stopped at Trsteno Arboretum, hiked the Walls of Ston/Great Wall of Europe (just me again for that one - more inclines!) and visited Rizman roadside winery.  See "Croatia - Split" blog for the next portion of the trip.



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