Hungary & Croatia -- Day 9

Checked out of the Hotel Ivan and were on the bus and moving at 9:15 a.m. We had a long drive to get to Ston, including passing into and out of Bosnia-Herzogevina. That country splits Croatia for about a 10-mile stretch providing access to the sea, but requiring a lot of border crossing. (Check it out on a map.) At least both crossings were comparatively quick, none of the collecting passports and checking them individually as happened when we left Hungary for Croatia.

We arrived at Ston at 12:30 p.m. Most of us immediately went to do the Wall walk. The sun was shining brightly, and there was little shade, but there was a pleasant breeze blowing so it wasn’t unbearably hot.

Ston and Mali Ston were both strategic locations for the Republic of Dubrovnik in the 14^th century. Fortified walls and fortresses were built to run from Veliki Ston, in the main part of the town, up Sveti Mihaljo (St. Michael Hill) behind the town and descending the opposite side to Mali Ston. These fortifications served to limit enemy access to the Peljesac Peninsula in medieval times. The 3½ miles of walls running up, down, and across the hill resemble the Great Wall of China on a lesser scale. There were originally 41 towers, seven bastions, and two forts.

The Wall and the City are still in good condition despite being bombed in 1991 and struck by an earthquake in 1996. Much restoration work has been done or is in progress. The path leading to Fort Podzvizd just over the top of the mountain is not completely rebuilt although that did not prevent some of the younger members of the group from climbing that part of the wall. I used discretion and stayed on the rebuilt portions since this path looked a bit treacherous. Orange fencing is not a good sign as far as I'm concerned.

There were good views of the town, the sea, and the salt drying areas as we walked up from and down to the town. (Production of sea salt is a major economic activity of the area.)

As soon as the tickets were purchased, we immediately started up some steep steps.

Then the group began a rather steep incline.


I was there -- partway up!

And I even reached the top.
The view of the town below with the salt drying rectangles clearly visible at the top by the sea.

Toward the end of the downward path there was work ongoing, and the pathway deteriorated a bit. More work is needed.

The town was quite small with the narrow pedestrian streets to which we’ve become accustomed. However, unlike Trogir where every street catered to tourists with souvenir shops and restaurants, most of Ston was actually residential.

There was one street of restaurants. Thank goodness since we were hungry.

There did seem to be some remaining earthquake damage as this partially-boarded house with hanging stairway shows.

We left Ston at 5 p.m. arriving at our Dubrovnik hotel at 6. After a group dinner at the hotel, I was happy to return to the room and relax, work on the blog a bit (free in-room WiFi), and do some reading.