Dubrovnik: Agony for a Handful of Dollars

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Some 800 to 900 cruisers are to arrive in Dubrovnik this year carrying some 700,000 passengers.  This means that this year, if God forbid, there is rain in the peak tourism season we will experience ever more crowds than before.
It’s not hard to remember the images of chaos and an onslaught of genuine panic attacks brought on by the unbelievable crowds in Stradun, the main Dubrovnik square. They resembled a stampede at a South American football pitch rather than a picture of a high-end resort meant for those who can afford it.

The unbearable crowds would not be such a problem if the day-trippers that sometimes number 15,000 were of some use in the financial sense. However, this is not the case. The Dubrovnik port authorities has been charging a total of 2.2 Euro per each passenger stepping on its soil and this coming season the fee will be increased to a ‘staggering’ 3.3 Euro.

This means that Croatia’s most visited tourist destination will rake in about 2.2 million Euro from passenger fees, which is really low compared to the chaos and problems created by the mass invasion from the sea.

It is anyone’s guess how the real tourists must be feeling, those paying several hundred dollars for an overnight stay in a medium quality Dubrovnik hotels, as due to the visitors from the cruisers they cannot enjoy their coffee in peace. It should be pointed out that a day on an average cruiser costs about 200 Euro per person, so this makes the 3.3 Euro fee seem even more of a joke.

It is time for Dubrovnik to stop offering those travelling on cruisers everything for nothing i.e. to in return experience overcrowding and absolute chaos and not earn practically nothing.