Fortress

Another Spiritual Sundays quotation - one of the prayer cards I made for our church Healing Prayer Team.

I took the photo when I was on holiday in Croatia, inside the fortress overlooking Dubrovnik, which was a stronghold of the local resistance during the Balkan wars in the early 1990s.

Music while you walk

One unexpected aspect of exploring both Dubrovnik and the more northerly city of Split in Croatia, was coming across groups of singers and musicians performing. The stone walls and floors and enclosed spaces of the old cities gave wonderful acoustics. I couldn't, of course, understand the words of the traditional Dalmatian songs they were singing but the harmonies they made were spine-tinglingly lovely, even to a deafened person like me. I bought a CD of the traditional klapa music I heard in Split. That music is a capella (without instruments) but this group of young musicians in Dubrovnik were terrific both as singers and instrumentalists.

Sea tales

Dubrovnik's Old Port, cradled by the city walls and guarded against pirates and other enemy invaders by the bulk of St John's Fort, is wonderfully atmospheric. It is protected by two old breakwaters and they say that chains used to be strung across the entrance for extra security. These days the ships going in and out are glass-bottomed tourist boats and small ferries sailing to the nearby islands (like Lokrum in the background, now a nature reserve and botanic garden). In the past it must have been an amazing, noisy, bustling place filled with trading ships and galleons. The port was also where ships were built, in the Arsenal, now a restaurant.

Thankfully there is now another much larger port at the other side of the city and that is where the massive, modern cruise ships dock, those floating palaces. There were two or three moored there most days. You quickly learn to time your visits to the narrow streets of the Old City for before or after the peak for the cruise ships' tours (and - if you're me - you soon feel thankful not to be in a huge group all made to wear the same orange or pink baseball cap!)  I'd far rather be a make-believe pirate on the galleon out there than a passenger on a cruise ship. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

Night and day

Despite the drizzle, I ventured down into the old city of Dubrovnik one evening to savour the atmosphere and try a few experimental photos. I had decided at the last minute not to pack a tripod (too bulky and heavy) so relied on bumping up the ISO and bracing myself wherever possible against a wall or something else solid. The end results are not too bad, though the high ISO does make the images rather grainy. This is the old Bell Tower, now enhanced by a digital display though I'm not quite sure what it says! The bell still chimes and you can see the original patinated bronze 'jacks' (men called Maro and Baro) in the Rector's Palace. The ones in the tower now are replicas. The tower, first constructed in 1444, has been restored and rebuilt many times over the years, notably in 1929 after damage by earthquakes.

Hover your mouse over the picture and you can see a daytime view of more or less the same scene - though it does give the impression that the tower shrinks during the day! Something to do with the angle of the camera and the lens I used I think.

Sun!

Ha, the sun came out - finally - at 2pm on my final day in Dubrovnik. And what a difference it made! The pale limestone and red clay-tiled roofs look lovely against a bright blue sky. This is Dubrovnik's main square, at the eastern end of Stradun, the wide central boulevard that bisects the old walled city. In the centre, Orlando's Column portrays an image of the knight Orlando. Dating back to 1419, it is a symbol of the city's sovereignty and freedom. The Renaissance-Gothic building with the arched colonnade is the Sponza Palace, formerly the customs house and treasury of the Republic, now a museum housing the Dubrovnik State archives.

Holidays!

Hmm... last week probably wasn't the best week to choose to visit the Balkans... London 24ºC and sunny, Dubrovnik 16ºC and rainy! Nevertheless I had an enjoyable holiday, visiting five UNESCO World Heritage Sites in as many days. The jewel in the crown, of course, is the old walled city of Dubrovnik, in Croatia, whose incredible story is made even more poignant by memories of the 'Homeland War'. Little over twenty years ago, in 1991, the city was under siege and heavily bombarded by artillery. The bright new roofs hint at the history, though otherwise the casual observer might never know of the tragedy, so carefully has the city been restored and so brave is its demeanour.

I rode the cable car up to the Imperial Fortress, from where the city can be viewed 'as if on the palm of a hand'.

Expect a few more holiday photos... though it may take me a few days to sort them out. Apologies too for my infrequent visits and comments on other blogs - I will return!