Mark Thomas - The editor and big chief of The Dubrovnik Times. Born in the UK he has been living and working in Dubrovnik since 1998, yes he is one of the rare “old hands.” A unique insight into both British and Croatian life and culture, Mark is often known as just “Englez” or Englishman. He is a traveller, a current affairs freak and a huge AFC Wimbledon fan.
Email: mark.thomas@dubrovnik-times.com
We have brought you the best restaurants in Dubrovnik according to TripAdvisor so it seems only fair to bring you the worst restaurants as well. With so many restaurants to choose from in Dubrovnik you will need a little help along the way to avoid the tourist traps and the fleapits.
So we have trawled the most popular travel website in the world and listed for you the sinners and not the winners. We used the criteria of a minimum of ten reviews to make this list of the top five worst restaurants in Dubrovnik. Some of these restaurants received many terrible reviews and many of them as recent as the past week.
The fifth worst restaurant in Dubrovnik according to TripAdvisor is Gostionica Stella located just off the Stradun in the heart of the historic core of the Old City of Dubrovnik. Not many reviews from you, the public, here only 17 but of those 7 were the lowest grade – terrible!
Originally enticed by the restaurant by the prices and the friendly older gentlemen who seemed to be the owner of the restaurant. Good measure of wine, and that's where the positives end. Food was poor, service wasn't great, really wish we sent the food back. Ross B, Cardiff, United Kingdom
The next eatery on the list of shame, the fourth worst, is Restaurant Uvala in Lapad. A busy promenade surrounded by many hotels means that this area of Dubrovnik is always a popular place to stop for a bite to eat. And although many restaurants in this suburb are getting it right, some are getting it completely wrong. From a total of 65 reviews a whopping 23 ranked this restaurant as terrible.
We stopped for a drink and made the mistake of staying for dinner. We waited an eternity for mushrooms stuffed with ham and cheese, truly awful. We could see into the kitchen and had seen the "chef" chopping something and putting it into his mouth while dressing the plates...only to have our foods come out of the microwave (after seeing him put it there) in about a minute. Main course was just as bad. Mixed vegs were cold as were the potatoes. JudyanneT - Edmonton, Canada
We continue with the top five worst restaurants in Dubrovnik with another Lapad eatery, Konoba Uvala. At third on our TripAdvisor list of the worst places to eat in Dubrovnik this Lapad based restaurants seems to have plenty of room for improvement. From 35 customers reviews a total of 10 were the lowest ranked, terrible.
We decided to try this restaurant because we were looking for seafood, and the menu listed a mixed seafood platter for 2 that sounded really good. The mussels were OK, but the fish was dry and tasteless. The vegetables appeared to be mixed frozen overcooked mushy vegetables, not fresh real veggies.
sunshyn468 - Fresno, California
At the second worst restaurant in Dubrovnik, the silver medal winner is Konoba Longo. Another restaurant based in the heart of the Old City of Dubrovnik, the main magnet for tourists. With a massive 143 reviews or which an impressive, or should we say unimpressive, 54 terrible rankings.
It is not very often that I give a bad review but we had a terrible experience at this place. The staff attempted to rip us off by overcharging for a piece of butter and then threatening to call the police! We didn't even get to taste the so called sandwich that we had ordered.
Takapuna - Auckland, New Zealand
Bon appetit - Photo TripAdvisor
And the winner, or loser, of the worst restaurant in the Dubrovnik region, at least according to your reviews on TripAdvisor is Restaurant Gusti. Again located in the vey centre of the Old City of Dubrovnik this restaurant “won” an amazing 216 terrible reviews from a total of 471. One of the latest reviews written in October this year read as follows.
What a disappointment...to say the least! A charming host came to greet us in old town while deciding where to eat. He offered us a complementary drink and discount if we were to decide on choosing his restaurant...what a mistake that was!
LickMyPlateMTL - Montreal, Canada
Not so pleasant - Photo TripAdvisor
Whether you are a child or an adult you must have heard for Frozen, one of the most famous animated movies these days. With Elsa and Anna, one of the main characters is Olaf, the funny snowman, that accompanies the sisters in their adventure.
Dubrovnik Winter Festival will bring a piece of that Disney magic to our City! That was published on the Facebook page named ''DULAF'' – combination of words Olaf and Dubrovnik.
- Dear friends, I'm DULAF! I'll be coming to Winter Festival this year and I'm really happy because of that. If I have a nice time, I'll invite Elsa and Anna to join me. I'm going on the trip now and we'll see soon. Yours sincerely, DULAF – says the Facebook page.
Dulaf will surely bring joy to the children, but also to adults, just like ''Teddy bear Franko'' who turned into real mascot of the Dubrovnik Winter Festival last year.
It is never-ending swimming season in Dubrovnik this year, well for the brave. This photo was taken on the 16th of November in Soline in Zupa near Dubrovnik.
The Adriatic Sea temperature in Dubrovnik is currently around 18.5 degrees.
When asked if the sea was cold the lady in the photo answered “When I get numb it’s great.” She added that she works as a tourist guide and doesn’t have much time to swim through the warmer summer months.
The Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) has reported that Peter Clement, the purchasing manager of the French retail chain Auchan visited Croatia on the 14th and the15th of November in order to establish direct contacts with potential Croatian suppliers.
Peter Clement as the purchasing manager of non-food products for the European market met with Croatian manufacturers of footwear, textile products, plastic household products, cleaning products, hygiene products, umbrellas etc.
The visit of Auchan representatives was organized as part of the HGK project "Croatia Supply Day", which has been initiating potential foreign importers to visit Croatia and meet with Croatian exporters.
Auchan is the third largest retail chain in France and the 11th biggest chain in Europe. It is one of the world’s leading distribution chains present in 16 countries with 330,700 employees working in 1,774 hypermarkets.
The French company has branches in France, and internationally in China, Hungary, India, Iraq, Italy, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Spain, Taiwan and Ukraine. Its revenue in 2014 was 63 billion Euros.
The next major tourism investment in the Dubrovnik region, the Kupari resort, is underway. The former military resort has remained destroyed since in the Homeland War in the early nineties.
The site contains five hotels, including a hotel which was constructed in the early 1900s; the new plans are that all these hotels will be destroyed to make way for a five-star resort with a Marriott as the centre piece.
The new look Kupari Resort will look impressive
And now work has begun to clean the whole site in preparation for the construction of the one of biggest hotel investments in Croatia in the past century. “I heard some loud explosions in the morning and the ground shook,” explained a resident of nearby Mlini to The Dubrovnik Times.
Kupari was purchased by the Avenue Group based in Austria on a 90-year lease in the spring of this year.
Check out these photos from Adriatic Images of the Kupari Resort this morning
This year the Croatian capital has announced the best Advent in Europe which is to start on the 26th of November and will last to the 8th of January, 2017.
At the opening ceremony of Advent in Zrinjevac with the illuminating of decorative lights, Advent at the European square will also be opened as well as the Ice Park at the Tomislav square, Fuliranje, Zagreb Christmas Fairy Tale, amongst many other events.
This year the tourist board of the city of Zagreb with its partners have prepared over ten new programs for numerous visitors and citizens. Apart from the traditional programs such as a live Nativity scene, ArtOmat, Zagreb Christmas balconies, Advent and the New Year's Eve at the Jelacic square, this year Advent events such as New Advent and Santa Claus's Frozen Fairytale will also be organized in Novi Zagreb. Some novelties such as Fashion Advent, At Rudolph's, Advent in the Design district, Advent in the Tunnel, amongst others, were also announced in the program.
The city of Zagreb has got one more Advent attraction – the Christmas Fairy Tale in the Tunnel which will be told in a totally different way. A 3D installation on the ceiling, selected music in this magnificent acoustic space and video projections will create a truly superb atmosphere.
''Advent in Zagreb is the most important event in the Croatian capital which recorded an increase in the number of visitors of almost 50 percent in the last two years. According to data from the Zagreb Tourist Board more than 45,000 arrivals and around 82,000 overnight stays were recorded in 2013, whilst 70,550 arrivals and 123,734 overnights were achieved only in last December'', said from the Zagreb Tourist Board. In addition, Advent in Zagreb won the Best tourism event award at the Croatian Days of Tourism 2016, whilst as the last year's winner in the European Best Christmas Destination category, this year Advent in Zagreb will have the opportunity to defend its title from the 2nd to the 12th of December, 2016.
Dubrovnik Winter Festival is just around the corner – it will start on Saturday. Opening ceremony will start at 8 pm in the Old City by turning on the Christmas lights and will continue with the concert of famous Croatian band – Colonia.
The third Dubrovnik Winter Festival was presented on the rather interesting press conference held right in front of Orlando Column.
- Dubrovnik is not only sun and sea, even though we're not trying to escape from that. Dubrovnik is not only inheritance and we want it to have content trough all 365 days. During this winter there will be around 10 hotels opened, Dubrovnik is growing during the whole year, winter is interesting in our City. We'll have famous car brand and film crew this year too – said Romana Vlasic, director of Dubrovnik Tourist Board.
There are four parts of this years festival: Advent in the City, Festivity of Saint Blaise, Valentine's and the Carnival. Dubrovnik has really worked to enrich its winter offer and the third Dubrovnik Winter Festival will for sure be the best one yet.