Within three hours of landing in Dubrovnik I felt as though I’d come face to face with the apocalypse, abandoned on an open stretch of the city wall, with no way down.
Lightning splitting the sky, sky getting darker, darkness signalling a torrent of water – the kind of torrent in which it’s difficult to separate raindrops from sea-spray off the back of raging white horses. I dared to take a quick picture to prove the ridiculousness of the situation, and the result looks as though my point-and-shoot has slipped into black and white mode – not your average photograph of the Pearl of the Adriatic, all emerald seas, creamy walls and terracotta tiles.
So we took the total drenching and the static electricity in our hair and laughed – a lot – as is only reasonable in these circumstances, where the only option is to make like Gene Kelly.
By the time we’d managed to slip down the steps back into the film set-esque Old Town, the laughing had changed. I was the idiot in shorts, my companion the one in flip flops, who’d decided to walk the wall without umbrellas or waterproofs on a Saturday afternoon in July when a storm was obviously going to hit. Ha! How stupid!
Now we were being laughed at.
But we caught Dubrovnik to ourselves for five minutes, strolling along streets now void of tourists and cruise-goers and prams and ice-creams and tables and chairs. Everyone had scarpered as soon as the first plip-plop warning signs had bounced from the polished paving, and no-one was going to let us inside, drips and all.
Starting to shiver, we made a dash for it and retreated back into our suite at the Excelsior Hotel, ensconcing ourselves in towels and bathrobes and the fruit bowl and pastries that had appeared during our ordeal – as though when the concierge had smiled at us on my way out, he knew the exact state in which we’d return, and had planted a recovery kit on the coffee table.
The next time I was aware of anything, it was half past five, I had a creasy cheek from a feathery pillow and had been awoken by the sun streaming through the shutters – the only sign of any sort of a storm the sopping clothes dumped in the bath tub.
Squinting onto my balcony, Dubrovnik was singing again – below, sun loungers had filled, with a glassy sea lapping quietly along. It seemed that the horses had gone to bed, just as I’d woken up, such were the Excelsior’s powers for ridding storms away into a foggy nightmare. It wouldn’t have mattered if the rain had persisted – we’d have spent longer running between our three bathrooms, bouncing between bed-sofa-bed-sofa-bed, and stretching out in our very own mini-gym. But once sun won the war against cloud, she wasn’t budging.
So we swam off the rocks, and in the pool, flitting between snorkel and goggles, sauna and steam room, inside and outside as we pleased, not needing to leave the hotel. We sipped Champagne and orange juice and fresh coffee for breakfast on the terrace, with poached eggs on toast and croissants and finely sliced gruyere.
Begrudgingly, almost, we strolled into town, dodging the crowds to slip into ancient churches and tiny art galleries, up and down endless stone stairs, glossy with a thousand years of footsteps. The Old Town turned out to be full of secret coffee shops, mountainous ice-cream parlours and shady corners serving gigantic pizzas, and a bizarre Bosnian restaurant named Taj Mahal – such is the quirk of Croatia. We talked with little ladies selling hand-sewn lace and home-grown lavender pouches and coo-ed at litters of kittens playing in the dust, between groups of teenagers smoking secretly around street corners.
Stopping for mid-afternoon beers at Buza, we ended up jumping from cliffs with children cooling off after school and settling in for sunsets sound-tracked by Coldplay and Carole King.
On the third day, a car arrived and whisked us to the other side of town, delivering our suitcases to a new room at a new hotel that was going to have to try very hard to beat its older sister. The Bellevue was all big views and its own secluded cove, with winding footpaths over the headland and water-polo matches in the sea. We cracked buttery langoustine and demolished lamb steaks and peach Panna Cotta in Vapor, with a chilled bottle of Trebbiano and a cool breeze through open glass doors.
A trip to the Žičara let the Dalmatian lurking along the coast reveal herself as the cable car zipped up its wire. Island after island rolling out across the expanse of water, turning hazy towards the Adriatic horizon, from the highest point over Dubrovnik – you can imagine the view, speaking for itself with a laid-back Croatian charm.
We relinquished to the draw of Nauticka and its truffles, scallops and John Dory, eating al fresco on the terrace with a moonlit view of the Lovrijenac Fortress. It was turning out that Dubrovnik was all about the seafood.
That is, until we sneaked a peek around Villa Agave. It had gone unnoticed before, sitting quietly next to the Excelsior, half falling over the cliff-edge but, behind ancient white walls, hiding a home for popstars and actors and rockstars– Kevin Spacey threw his 50th bash here, munching canapés beneath a canopy of stars and drinking Champagne on isolated paparazzi-defeating balconies. The Villa is all rustic timber and Mediterranean stone floors, softened by well-worn rugs, thick fabrics and four-poster beds.
I stood thinking that the only thing missing was a kitchen, to be swiftly reminded that with a private Butler on call 24/7, it’s simply a case of picking whatever you fancy, whenever you fancy it.
So that’s what it’s all about, in the end. Cruising in to Dubrovnik for a long summer at the Agave, and taking the odd storm in your stride with another bottle of Champagne and a giggle at the misfortune of anyone caught out on the city wall.
That’s what I’m aiming for anyway.
The Hotel Excelsior, Hotel Bellevue and Villa Agave are part of the Adriatic Luxury Hotel Group
