Smorgasbord Posts from Your Archives – Travel – ‘The Streets of Old City Dubrovnik’ by Sherri Matthews

Time for the fourth last post from the travel archives of Sherri Matthews who has taken us to Lake Garda, a traquil village in Normandy and to Jersey during wartime occupation. Today she takes us to Croatia and the beautiful streets of the old City Dubrovnik.

Over at the Daily Post, the Weekly Photo Challenge for this week is ‘Street Life’. Cheri puts the challenge to us in this way:

‘For this challenge, document the movement (or stillness) of a street: tell a story with your snapshot, capture a scene that reveals a bit about a place, or simply show us where you live — or a path you often take.’

With this in mind, here is my story entitled, ‘The Streets of Old City Dubrovnik’.

The beautiful country of Croatia (once part of Yugoslavia together with Bosnia and Slovenia until declaring independence in the 1990s) is home to the Old City of Dubrovnik. Otherwise famously known as ‘The Pearl of the Adriatic’, this medieval walled city is nestled on the Dalmatian coast; from the 13th century onwards it became an important Mediterranean sea power.

Dubrovnik is home to beautiful Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque churches, monasteries and palaces, all of which were severely damaged by an earthquake in 1667 and then again in more modern times by the Serbian attack against the city in 1991.

After a ceasefire was called, and due to its great concern for the damage done, UNESCO (United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization) named Dubrovnik a ‘World Heritage Site in Danger’ and immediately coordinated a major restoration programme. Click here to read more about this programme and for a more comprehensive history of the Old City.

We were privileged to have been able to visit Dubrovnik in 2012.

Approaching by a narrow, twisting road which drops down to the Old City and its hidden streets, I was able to take this shot. This was the moment when I first caught sight of it, having been blocked by the tree-lined road until then. Stunned into silence, I immediately understood why Dubrovnik is known as ‘The Pearl of the Adriatic’.

My photo doesn’t do it justice, it is simply breathtaking.

The Pearl of the Adriatic – Old City Dubrovnik taken from the road above. Look at that sea! (c) Sherri Matthews 2014

Once inside the city, climbing the city walls gives a magnificent view of the rooftops. The buildings seem to be hiding the streets as if protecting them, closing in on themselves. What secrets lie there I wonder, what stories are to be told?

View of the Old City of Dubrovnik taken from the city walls. Notice the Clock Tower (c) Sherri Matthews 2014

Climbing back down from the city walls, you can get a closer view of the streets below, beckoning to be explored.

View of the streets below from the Old City Walls, Dubrovnik
(c) Sherri Matthews 2014

Head over and discover more about this old city and enjoy Sherri’s wonderful photographic guided tour: https://sherrimatthewsblog.com/2014/04/01/wpc-the-streets-of-old-city-dubrovnik-croatia/

My thanks to Sherri for sharing her travels with us and I do recommend that you check out her archives for her other posts..

About Sherri Matthews

While bringing her memoir, Stranger in a White Dress, to publication, Sherri is published online and in print magazines and anthologies with memoir, essays, poetry and flash fiction. Her short story, ‘A Walk in the Woods’, is published in Prima Magazine, and two of her short memoir entries are longlisted with FISH Publications. Sherri raised her children in California for twenty years before returning to her home in England, where she lives today in the West Country with her husband, Aspie youngest and their pet menagerie fondly called ‘Animal Farm’. Sherri keeps out of mischief gardening, walking and snapping endless photographs, the better ones of which, along with her (mis)adventures, she shares on her blog, A View From My Summerhouse

Here are the anthologies that Sherri has contributed to. Click the covers to buy.

Connect to Sherri.

Blog: sherrimatthewsblog.com
Facebook Author Page:  https://www.facebook.com/aviewfrommysummerhouse
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WriterSherri
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sherri-matthews/60/798/aa3
Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/103859680232786469097/posts

Our next guest with some travel stories is Carol Taylor, who when not creating dishes for her food column here, travels around Thailand and the far East and will be sharing three of her posts.

After that a new Posts from Your Archives Series….look out for it…thanks Sally