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
The Dubrovnik Tourist Board of “A City for all seasons,” could well be changed to “A swimming City for all seasons.” With only 27 days left until Christmas Day these brave swimmers dived in the Adriatic Sea today.
The sea temperature today reached highs of only 19 degrees but that didn’t seem to bother these local swimmers who had the iconic Banje Beach, overlooking the Old City of Dubrovnik, rather unsurprisingly to themselves.
Whilst summer sea temperatures in Dubrovnik often reach 25 degrees, and warmer, the winter temperatures drop down to 14 degrees.
The renowned Dubrovnik vocal group “Klapa Kaše” performed this morning at 11.00am in front of the St. Blaise Church and in the centre of the Old City of Dubrovnik as part of the 2016 Dubrovnik Winter Festival.
The group sung traditional Christmas Carols, known as Kolende, to the gathered locals and tourists. The Sunday sunshine had brought many people out onto the streets of the Old City and the performance attracted plenty of attention.
The tradition of singing “Kolende” in Dubrovnik is believed to stretch back to the 13th century and is still alive today. Singers go from home to home and celebrate Christmas Eve, as well as Christmas day and New Year. Usually the singers take instruments, such as guitars, harmonica and mandolin, with them.
Miss Croatia, Angelica Zacchigna, is preparing for the upcoming Miss World competition in Washington and has released a video highlighting her homeland Istria. “I have the greatest honour to represent my beautiful homeland Croatia at the Miss World pageant 2016,” narrates the 22-year-old student from Novigrad in Istria.
The two-minute video was made to present Miss Croatia and the region that she comes from and was posted on the Facebook page of the official Miss World site. The final of Miss World will be held in Washington on the 18th of December.
Zacchigna was recently in Dubrovnik where she posed in the dress that she will wear in the finals, a dress that was created by Dubrovnik designer Džemila Dilberović.
Check out this impressive video
Advent has started. The first candle on the Advent wreath in front of the Small Onofrio Fountain in the heart of the Old City of Dubrovnik was lit last night.
The Christmas period has begun and every Saturday evening until Christmas Day a candle will be lit. The first candle was lit by the Mayor of Dubrovnik, Andro Vlahusic, in a special program to mark the first step of Advent.
The Zagreb Arena erupted as Croatia took a 2 – 1 lead against Argentina in the Davis Cup 2016 final. The Croatian double pair of Ivan Dodig and Marin Čilić defeated the Argentinean pair of Leonardo Mayer and Juan Martin Del Potro in straight sets.
After the second day of the Davis Cup final Croatia now have a 2 – 1 advantage. Both the first two sets went to a tie break but the Croatian pair kept their cool in front of a packed Arena and finished the match in style with a final set 6 – 3.
The final result was 7 – 6, 7 – 6, 6 – 3.
Croatia only need one more win to take the 2016 Davis Cup and that could come tomorrow when Čilić takes on Del Potro in a singles game.
Has the ban on riding bikes through the Old City of Dubrovnik been lifted? Well, officially no but these two tourists didn’t either didn’t notice the warning signs about riding bikes or they didn’t care. We would guess they didn’t see the less than prominent signs on the entrance gates.
However they only rode half way along the Stradun before dismounting and pushing their bikes the rest of the way. Whether someone told them or they found it difficult to cycle on the slippery surface we can only guess.
Rain, rain, go away come again another day. As predicted the weather in Dubrovnik took a turn for the worse today, in fact it will be a wet weekend in the city.
However the rain didn’t stop a large number of tourists, mainly cruise ship passengers, from having fun and sightseeing in the historic Old City of Dubrovnik this morning.
Check out our rainy photo gallery
Don’t leave home without your umbrella this weekend. After weeks of warm and stable weather the autumn rains are here. The whole weekend will be wet and grey as a southerly wind has brought with it clouds and storms. Temperatures today will reach 16 degrees and on Sunday around 18 degrees, but it will be weekend to enjoy indoors.
Next week, with less than a month left until Christmas, the sunshine and clearer weather will return to Dubrovnik. The start of the week will be cloudy but by Tuesday the sunshine should return and temperatures will hit 15 degrees.